PPM capabilities and usage

[RockJazz]

I am curious how detailed the PPM tracking data getting to radio stations and advertisers is right now and how vigorously it is mined. If you know the answers to these questions I'd appreciate the response.

I assume the meters know exactly when a listener turns on a radio or other listening device, exactly when they change a channel, what they change it to, how long they stay there, how much flips per hour, how much total time, etc. Do they store that information by meter?

If all these data is available to Arbitron, can they and do they offer buyers the detailed data breakdown to allow them to know how many flipped away from a specific talk segment on a particular day or the average flip rate as a show moves thru its timeslot? Or for a general topic or specific guest or guest type? Or flippage from a particular song or type of song one day and how many flipped away from that same song the last 50 times it was played and how many flipped at particular times of day and week? How many flipped away immediately at the ad break (and with and without the DJ mentioning the break or using a teaser to try to hold audience) and how many flipped away from a particular ad and whether the flip rate was increasing over time? And the flippage in these and other contexts by listener demographics?

If you invest in the technology I'd think you'd want to work it hard, harder than just measuring basic audience size and duration. Do they make this more detailed information available? Is there a demand for it? If not, why not?

 

[RockJazz]

If this level of detailed information is not being tracked and distributed is it because radio stations wouldn't cooperate with a PPM system that provide that level of exposure of the performance of their service or is it because of cost? Or is the latter the official answer used instead of the former? I wouldn't think the computer programming to spit the new reports out would be cost-prohibitive but I don't know the nuts & bolts of what they are actually capturing and what their processing costs are. If you had all this detail would it be harder for radio management to program they way they have and want to or would it be easier to get to where they want to go (a station that actually performs better)?

 

[Arby Tron]

There is granular data available to look at in different fashions for radio clients. You can see when a meter turned away and what station it goes to in Arbitron software on a minute by minute basis. You can break down what demographic the meter is by narrowing down a search but its a bit time consuming. In Media Monitors you see the meter counts as the audio plays in a background. You get an idea as to what content pushes meter carriers away or when they come back and you also know what station they tuned in from.