Then they should not stream if it's costing them so much. But they do, so we will listen with our hearts content. Stations stream to attract out-of-market audiences, not for people to hear if they live in the same city. (That's why they call it the WORLD WIDE Web).
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Proof that hearing Hotel California repeatedly will drive you crazy
- Thread starter SuperRadioFan
- Start date
Then they should not stream if it's costing them so much. But they do, so we will listen with our hearts content. Stations stream to attract out-of-market audiences, not for people to hear if they live in the same city. (That's why they call it the WORLD WIDE Web).
One person won't make a difference to what airs and does not air. It takes most of your entire listening audience to make a change. I have bought most of my music collection during the last 30 or so years (whether it be 45's or downloads), the vast majority not heard on radio. Guess what....I still don't hear them on the radio. So your point is moot. Unless most of that station's audience supported their favorite artists and songs like I have, classic hits playlists will have changed little, if at all.
Classic hits playlists have been stale for the last 20-25 years in L.A.
Wrong. Stations stream to be available in the local market to people who do not use radios but instead prefer entertainment to be channeled through a tablet or smartphone.
There is no economic benefit to having out of market listeners.
(And when the term World Wide Web was created, nobody had any idea what it would be two decades and change later)
As you have been told hundreds of times, they are missing because they are no longer hits and would do harm to a station that plays them.
I'll address the last error first:
It was called the World Wide Web before radio stations ever considered streaming on it, and in fact, before anyone knew that was technically possible.
Stations do use online streaming to reach people who live in the same city. It addresses the problem of work environments where the signal does not penetrate and neighborhoods where the signal is less than optimal. It potentially puts the station into rooms of the home where there is no radio (the days of a clock radio at the bedside, a kitchen radio atop the fridge and a console in the living room are long gone). With mobile devices, it brings back the on-the-go listening of the old pocket transistor radios and radio-capable Walkmans. And it allows local listeners to keep listening when they travel beyond the signal, whether for a short period of time or a long one (vacation, business travel).
Out-of-market audiences are not a consideration in a station's decision to stream. Just as with powerful over-the-air signals that can be heard for hundreds of miles, the advertisers aren't paying for anything beyond the metro area where the station is located.
B
BOZ Profit
Guest
I think what the enthusiasts are simply trying to convey is that you cannot know 100% for sure that songs they would like to hear would "hurt" the station. The science is NOT that perfect. Once upon a time science's research said the world was flat and the the Earth was the center of of Universe. We, of course, know differently now. You cannot argue it is perfect, even if Arbitron is giving you information that says you are right... because their sample size is also terribly small for the population as a whole too.
The radio industry may accept audience research sample sizes, and the efforts from the results may be outstanding based on that research. The music tested is not always a 100% yes or no. So while you may select a certain group on any given day to participate in the research, if you select another group on another day, you may get completely different results. You can even get different results asking the same people the same questions a day later, maybe even 5 minutes later. Something can alter their mood about a song in an instant, for whatever reason. People are not THAT reliable.
Let's consider something else for a moment: Is Pandora able to gather data on a specific city? I would imagine yes, so if so, can they tell you how many people down vote Hotel California in LA? Again, I would imagine yes... Now, what if that number was far greater than the sample size radio uses? Would you use Pandora's statistics in your audience research, or deem it no good because it is an Internet audience... Would any consideration be given that it is an Internet audience because they don't like what the terrestrial signals provide, and if the terrestrial stations were better in tune with what they liked they would never have left? Or is that just not conceivable for you to imagine? Pandora's research says:
My point is that unless you actually ask EVERYONE what they like and don't like, you cannot know 100% for sure what the majority likes. It's kind of like the electoral college. Yes, it works, but it is not necessarily reflective of a true democratic (majority wins) vote. There will always be a segment that will listen to everything the radio plays regardless if they like it or not, because they like the station and maybe they like to be introduced to something different, even though it is not something they would actually choose on their own. There will always be people who change the dial if a song comes on they do not want to listen to at that moment. Maybe they like the song but need a different tempo or mood right then, so if they hear it another time when their mood is different they will keep listening. And then there are the people who will regularly change the channel every time a song comes on they do not like. Then when it happens too often they stop listening to that station altogether. When that happens with enough of the audience...hmmm... can we say format change?
Your audience research science works in your favor for only so long... because when the songs you say the audience wants to hear start to become a tune out factor, the station will change formats to "find the largest audience" again.. wash and repeat. I know you will want to argue against this because of your experience in radio, but you have to be honest with yourself and about the industry as a whole.
And then you have a situation where a better form of research comes along and blows the old research out of the water. Didn't Arbitron's PPM sort of do that already? Your science only works until a better way of researching is discovered or invented. You can swear by what you have now, but will be made to look a fool when that better discovery happens. Kind of like how DNA testing has helped convict or set free people accused of crimes. Is it 100% accurate? No, but we accept it now because it is the best we have. That is the same with radio's audience research. It's the best we have now, but it is not 100% accurate.
There is also the Ford Edsel. Ford asked a focus group all the things they would like in a car. They got all kinds of responses and took that info to build the perfect car. One question they forgot to ask: Would they buy it? I'd like to know, in your focus groups are you also asking "if you heard this on the radio in it's entirety would you listen to it"?
The radio industry may accept audience research sample sizes, and the efforts from the results may be outstanding based on that research. The music tested is not always a 100% yes or no. So while you may select a certain group on any given day to participate in the research, if you select another group on another day, you may get completely different results. You can even get different results asking the same people the same questions a day later, maybe even 5 minutes later. Something can alter their mood about a song in an instant, for whatever reason. People are not THAT reliable.
Let's consider something else for a moment: Is Pandora able to gather data on a specific city? I would imagine yes, so if so, can they tell you how many people down vote Hotel California in LA? Again, I would imagine yes... Now, what if that number was far greater than the sample size radio uses? Would you use Pandora's statistics in your audience research, or deem it no good because it is an Internet audience... Would any consideration be given that it is an Internet audience because they don't like what the terrestrial signals provide, and if the terrestrial stations were better in tune with what they liked they would never have left? Or is that just not conceivable for you to imagine? Pandora's research says:
Of course that is Pandora's research and one could easily argue it benefits Pandora. And what of radio's research?
- Ah, a report from Nielsen. So, it really depends who you ask.
My point is that unless you actually ask EVERYONE what they like and don't like, you cannot know 100% for sure what the majority likes. It's kind of like the electoral college. Yes, it works, but it is not necessarily reflective of a true democratic (majority wins) vote. There will always be a segment that will listen to everything the radio plays regardless if they like it or not, because they like the station and maybe they like to be introduced to something different, even though it is not something they would actually choose on their own. There will always be people who change the dial if a song comes on they do not want to listen to at that moment. Maybe they like the song but need a different tempo or mood right then, so if they hear it another time when their mood is different they will keep listening. And then there are the people who will regularly change the channel every time a song comes on they do not like. Then when it happens too often they stop listening to that station altogether. When that happens with enough of the audience...hmmm... can we say format change?
Your audience research science works in your favor for only so long... because when the songs you say the audience wants to hear start to become a tune out factor, the station will change formats to "find the largest audience" again.. wash and repeat. I know you will want to argue against this because of your experience in radio, but you have to be honest with yourself and about the industry as a whole.
And then you have a situation where a better form of research comes along and blows the old research out of the water. Didn't Arbitron's PPM sort of do that already? Your science only works until a better way of researching is discovered or invented. You can swear by what you have now, but will be made to look a fool when that better discovery happens. Kind of like how DNA testing has helped convict or set free people accused of crimes. Is it 100% accurate? No, but we accept it now because it is the best we have. That is the same with radio's audience research. It's the best we have now, but it is not 100% accurate.
There is also the Ford Edsel. Ford asked a focus group all the things they would like in a car. They got all kinds of responses and took that info to build the perfect car. One question they forgot to ask: Would they buy it? I'd like to know, in your focus groups are you also asking "if you heard this on the radio in it's entirety would you listen to it"?
The goal of radio research is not to find out individual taste. That's how OTA radio differs from personalized services like Pandora.
Radio research accomplishes what it's supposed to do, under rules that the stakeholders agree. It's not perfect, and there are lots of competing companies providing different approaches to research saying their system is best. Every time you ask people questions, you're likely to come up with different results. People want what people want. They won't be satisfied with OTA radio until it plays what they want when they want it. On the Philly board, we have people complaining that when they tune in to all-news radio, it's not immediately giving them the specific information they want at the time. Of course not. Same with music. The only way to deliver what EVERYONE wants is to give EVERYONE their own radio station.
So let me understand again what "freeloaders" means to the experts here. If you listen to a recording you make from an online stream of a radio station not in your local radio market, you are a "freeloader" because you don't pay for the stream, and you don't buy the recordings of the artist/artists you hear. (You DO pay for the access to that stream; you pay your ISP and you pay your cell phone carrier.)
BUT if you listen to an online stream of a radio station that is IN your local radio market and you more than likely do not buy the recordings of the artist/artists you hear, you are a consumer and not a "freeloader". Got it.
As to the listeners over decades just listening on devices called a "radio", if they just listened to hear music on a station but for one reason or another did NOT support those artists by buying their recordings or attending any of their concerts, well were those listeners also considered to be "freeloaders"?
And don't forget those poor advertisers who pay dearly in a large market to get their 30-60 second spots aired during a long 8 minute spot break on a music radio station, well if you don't support them you too are a freeloader. Same goes for TV. With the advent of recording, all you people who skip through those commercials (on one TV channel I counted 13 commercials) well you too are freeloaders because all that entertainment comes to you at a cost, doesn't it?
This whole conversation is getting absurd; New platforms of delivery, as Sr. Gleason has pointed out many times, are going to change the game to an inevitable change in how products are marketed.
If there were an OTA LA market music radio station that actually had a playlist favorable to my ears I would be a listener. Then, if I did not desire to use my money to pay for recordings, would that make me a freeloader? If I did buy CDs of artists heard on the radio and then I played those CDs on my commute instead of listening to the radio station and thus not hear their advertisers' commercials, would that benefit that radio station? They still have expenses regardless of my use or non use of their product.
BUT if you listen to an online stream of a radio station that is IN your local radio market and you more than likely do not buy the recordings of the artist/artists you hear, you are a consumer and not a "freeloader". Got it.
As to the listeners over decades just listening on devices called a "radio", if they just listened to hear music on a station but for one reason or another did NOT support those artists by buying their recordings or attending any of their concerts, well were those listeners also considered to be "freeloaders"?
And don't forget those poor advertisers who pay dearly in a large market to get their 30-60 second spots aired during a long 8 minute spot break on a music radio station, well if you don't support them you too are a freeloader. Same goes for TV. With the advent of recording, all you people who skip through those commercials (on one TV channel I counted 13 commercials) well you too are freeloaders because all that entertainment comes to you at a cost, doesn't it?
This whole conversation is getting absurd; New platforms of delivery, as Sr. Gleason has pointed out many times, are going to change the game to an inevitable change in how products are marketed.
If there were an OTA LA market music radio station that actually had a playlist favorable to my ears I would be a listener. Then, if I did not desire to use my money to pay for recordings, would that make me a freeloader? If I did buy CDs of artists heard on the radio and then I played those CDs on my commute instead of listening to the radio station and thus not hear their advertisers' commercials, would that benefit that radio station? They still have expenses regardless of my use or non use of their product.
Of course not. Just as one vote won't make a difference. But if that one person is representative of what a group of people are doing (and in this case, he is), then you're missing out on a mass of people.
The only information I had about you was the information you gave me in your post that said you make CDs from out-of market streams. No where in that post did you talk about every BUYING music. Am I right? So how would I know? Then again, the fact that you bought music 50 years ago doesn't entitle you to anything except the ability to listen to those 50 year old records any time you want. Those purchases aren't credited for lifetime listening to all music.
We've explained to you that free music is paid for by others. That's the case on YouTube, Pandora, and OTA radio. If you use an ad-supported service, you pay by being subjected to advertising. That's the trade-off. But what happens if you hear advertising for products that you can't buy because they're not available in your town? How does that contribute to the music you hear? And why does it matter? Because it's obvious that you LIKE the stream you hear, and you want it to continue. The only way it can continue is if the people providing that stream make enough money to pay their bills. That's how it benefits you. If you participate in funding your free service, then you can expect it to continue.
This is a fantastic statement. I recently saw a TV news report about the so-called experts in the wine industry. The report was questioning the accuracy of wine ratings given the the aggregate of professional wine tasters. In an experiment, the tasters were blindfolded and sampled various wines. Many of the taste tests were composed of sampling 5 samples of a wine for example, a Merlot and a few of the samples were from the exact same winery but got different ratings by the exact same taster. This happened more times than not.
I see, Your Honor.
Stale? No. On target? Yes. KRTH is at the very top of the rating, #1 or #2, for the last two books. People like it. Two and a half million people like it. You don't. So listen to your music collection and stop making the same complaints, over and over and over and over and over and over and over and....
B
BOZ Profit
Guest
What I am saying is mostly for the sake of discussing, debating and arguing for and/or against radio research.. Points to ponder if you will.
But, it is supposed to cater to the largest audience possible at any given moment to get those listeners to the advertisers. Correct? How can any radio research know that at any given moment what song the majority of people really want to hear? Wouldn't it make sense to not even have a "format" on the station but simply seek out the song that the majority of the people in the market feel like listening to right now and play THAT SONG? That's impossible.
And if this is true:
As I just said above, Pandora may be a personalized music service, but radio in effect TRIES to be personal by selecting the songs it thinks the majority wants to listen to. I feel like some of you are talking out of both sides of your mouth. One minute I read that one has to listen to what the stations play, so it is not a personalized service but then also read from the same people that there is research to show what music people prefer to listen to when they do listen. Is that not trying to make radio more personal to as many people as possible? Is not radio's goal to provide personal weather, news, local events... That information should be regarded as "personal information" for the listener because radio wants to be personal with the listener. Why not music too? So is the music radio plays based on personal taste (albeit a small group of people chosen) or is it just a group think kind of thing? Is radio personal? Is that not the angle to advertisers? "Radio is personal, intimate and immediate. We give people what they need/want when they need/want." Or does that only apply to the information part of radio (news, weather, local information and commercials), but not the entertainment (voice trackers from afar, and music selected by research ( a local focus group? really? ) but mandated from a corporate office that has an agreement with the record labels to push certain songs/artists despite what that "local focus group's" findings reveal).
There are songs I didn't like the first 10 times I heard them, but after much repeating I have found myself tapping my toes to it. "Tell a lie often enough, it becomes truth comes" to mind.
Aha, so the rules can change but the stakeholders have to agree to the change. In other words, if currently 10 seconds of a song is played in focus groups and that is what the stakeholders agree to.. to change to 15 or 20 seconds, all stakeholders must agree. You can't have a rogue PD thinking, "hmm I wonder if 20 seconds of a song will change the outcome of the results" without having it approved by the Industry as a whole.
I think to admit the research is not perfect is a big step in this discussion. I think to even admit that it is possible that the research could be wrong would be better. Because, as is, OTA radio will eventually lose ground. My kids love Grooveshark and Jango but they also listen to the radio. My wife prefers her iPod to the radio. She is the target demo most stations seek. I do not enjoy what I hear on the radio as much either. But I believe good content is like the ocean: sometimes the tide is in, sometimes it is out. I do believe radio as we know it will adapt; I've seen that happen already.
To get back to what I said at the beginning to those of you saying radio's purpose is supposed to reach the largest audience possible, I ask: why are there formats? If every radio owner only wants the largest profit possible, and if THAT means catering to the largest audience possible in any given market, why doesn't every radio station go after the same demo? It's because the need to cater to the largest audience is not true for attaining maximum profits. I honestly believe the audience size does not matter in radio. What matters is: what can the station deliver to it's advertisers? A station with 1000 listeners COULD provide more value to an advertiser than a station with 10,000. It depends on what the product is and who is listening at any given moment. So, if you think you can help your advertisers sell more 401ks than zit cream, what kind of format will you run? Are you playing One Direction or are you playing Billy Joel? Also, the sales team matters. If you have the most listeners but your sales team cannot sell, what would it matter? You could have 100 listeners with a sales team that can sell ice to Eskimos and the format really would not matter because you have sales. And even better if your small audience is responsive to the ads they hear. (This topic of radio sales becomes a more complex discussion, but for a basic analogy you must agree).
There is much more to radio than any given station having the most listeners, because obviously there can be only one. There is much more to radio than playing songs that "test well", because there are still people who like songs that don't test well. They just may not have been picked for your focus groups. There is much more to radio than knowing the focus group likes one song over another because one group may say "good song" and another may say "bad song". There is much more to radio including agreements between owners and promotional companies, including record labels. There are relationships involved and history too.
I'm all for telling the enthusiasts "these are the rules radio currently plays by", just like any sport plays by rules. But like any sport, sometimes the rules must change in order to benefit either the players and/or the fans. That's business. Period.
But, it is supposed to cater to the largest audience possible at any given moment to get those listeners to the advertisers. Correct? How can any radio research know that at any given moment what song the majority of people really want to hear? Wouldn't it make sense to not even have a "format" on the station but simply seek out the song that the majority of the people in the market feel like listening to right now and play THAT SONG? That's impossible.
And if this is true:
then, Pandora's model works better. Because at any given moment I can up or down vote any song that comes on. Yes, that is based on personal taste, but the advertisers can reach a larger audience listening at any given moment because I am controlling the "dial" by choosing which "station" I want to listen to; each song in effect becomes a "station". If Pandora can tell you that at any given moment the majority of it's listeners down voted "Hotel California" when it popped into their listening stream, would you consider it reliable research to use on a station whereby the goal is to find songs the majority of people want to listen to?
As I just said above, Pandora may be a personalized music service, but radio in effect TRIES to be personal by selecting the songs it thinks the majority wants to listen to. I feel like some of you are talking out of both sides of your mouth. One minute I read that one has to listen to what the stations play, so it is not a personalized service but then also read from the same people that there is research to show what music people prefer to listen to when they do listen. Is that not trying to make radio more personal to as many people as possible? Is not radio's goal to provide personal weather, news, local events... That information should be regarded as "personal information" for the listener because radio wants to be personal with the listener. Why not music too? So is the music radio plays based on personal taste (albeit a small group of people chosen) or is it just a group think kind of thing? Is radio personal? Is that not the angle to advertisers? "Radio is personal, intimate and immediate. We give people what they need/want when they need/want." Or does that only apply to the information part of radio (news, weather, local information and commercials), but not the entertainment (voice trackers from afar, and music selected by research ( a local focus group? really? ) but mandated from a corporate office that has an agreement with the record labels to push certain songs/artists despite what that "local focus group's" findings reveal).
There are songs I didn't like the first 10 times I heard them, but after much repeating I have found myself tapping my toes to it. "Tell a lie often enough, it becomes truth comes" to mind.
Aha, so the rules can change but the stakeholders have to agree to the change. In other words, if currently 10 seconds of a song is played in focus groups and that is what the stakeholders agree to.. to change to 15 or 20 seconds, all stakeholders must agree. You can't have a rogue PD thinking, "hmm I wonder if 20 seconds of a song will change the outcome of the results" without having it approved by the Industry as a whole.
I think to admit the research is not perfect is a big step in this discussion. I think to even admit that it is possible that the research could be wrong would be better. Because, as is, OTA radio will eventually lose ground. My kids love Grooveshark and Jango but they also listen to the radio. My wife prefers her iPod to the radio. She is the target demo most stations seek. I do not enjoy what I hear on the radio as much either. But I believe good content is like the ocean: sometimes the tide is in, sometimes it is out. I do believe radio as we know it will adapt; I've seen that happen already.
To get back to what I said at the beginning to those of you saying radio's purpose is supposed to reach the largest audience possible, I ask: why are there formats? If every radio owner only wants the largest profit possible, and if THAT means catering to the largest audience possible in any given market, why doesn't every radio station go after the same demo? It's because the need to cater to the largest audience is not true for attaining maximum profits. I honestly believe the audience size does not matter in radio. What matters is: what can the station deliver to it's advertisers? A station with 1000 listeners COULD provide more value to an advertiser than a station with 10,000. It depends on what the product is and who is listening at any given moment. So, if you think you can help your advertisers sell more 401ks than zit cream, what kind of format will you run? Are you playing One Direction or are you playing Billy Joel? Also, the sales team matters. If you have the most listeners but your sales team cannot sell, what would it matter? You could have 100 listeners with a sales team that can sell ice to Eskimos and the format really would not matter because you have sales. And even better if your small audience is responsive to the ads they hear. (This topic of radio sales becomes a more complex discussion, but for a basic analogy you must agree).
There is much more to radio than any given station having the most listeners, because obviously there can be only one. There is much more to radio than playing songs that "test well", because there are still people who like songs that don't test well. They just may not have been picked for your focus groups. There is much more to radio than knowing the focus group likes one song over another because one group may say "good song" and another may say "bad song". There is much more to radio including agreements between owners and promotional companies, including record labels. There are relationships involved and history too.
I'm all for telling the enthusiasts "these are the rules radio currently plays by", just like any sport plays by rules. But like any sport, sometimes the rules must change in order to benefit either the players and/or the fans. That's business. Period.
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As BigA said already, we are not measuring the tastes of an individual but, rather, the consensus tastes of a much larger group. Radio is a one-to-many model and thus has to achieve a blend of songs that are not just acceptable but generally liked by nearly everyone in the target audience.
For that purpose, we take a sample of the target and test our music and all the songs that might work. It yields results that are good enough to be trusted for the purpose of building a playlist.
The proof of the accuracy is in doing a replication study. That's when, using one of several methods, you do the same research against an additional group of the same size and within the same time frame. In the case of music tests, the results are generally off by no more than a couple of percent, song by song, for the whole test. As this process is very expensive... an additional $25 to $30 thousand dollars... it's not done often but when it is it yields the same results. I have done myself a variant of replication, which is to severely oversize the sample and then, using random numbers, creating two half-size samples. The results are virtually the same to the extent that the playability of songs and even the rotation categories of each song would not change between one result and the other.
What we are involved with is behavioural science, not empirical science. You are measuring what people feel about songs at one moment in time. If you test again next month, some changes will be noticed, although minor. If you test again in 6 months, there will be greater change and so on.
But if you asked, back then, of the average citizen whether the earth was flat, they would have all agreed. We are not testing physics or celestial mechanics here. We are testing peoples likes and perceptions.
Nielsen data may show small variances due to the sample size. We know that, but radio can't possibly afford a larger sample. And the results are adequate for the purpose of selling advertising which is why stations pay for the ratings. The little variances make little difference: the fact that KRTH is #1 in June and #2 in July does not affect sales. The fact that they used to be #10 does.
No, the industry does not like the current PPM sample size. And the industry could have double the sample or triple the sample if it wanted. But that is not economically feasible , so we live with what we can afford.
This statement has been proven to be false. I could recruit various different samples and test the same music against those samples and get virtually the same results in each group. This is the replication process I just mentioned. The results, with the same recruit specifications, do not materially vary.
In the real world, that does not happen as long as you have the minimum sample size. I've done tests where we had a small facility and had to do 20-25 people per session over 4 to 5 days and even the smaller individual session subsets looked at individually are remarkably similar.
I've done over 1000 music tests, and seen no evidence of a statistically significant difference. They either want to hear a song on the radio, or they don't... or they don't care one way or another. And, with gold based stations, that is fairly stable over relatively lengthy periods of time.
The factors that will change overall average scores are things like seasonality, weather, heavy traffic, etc. But that simply affects the mood of the whole room, resulting in higher or lower average scores while the songs still rank the same. And rank is what determines rotations and playability.
Pandora is a one-to-one individualized service. They do not need to research as each person can build their own stations or channels. All they have to do is make as many songs available as they can and continue to work on the algorithms that deliver "similar songs" to people who build a seeded list based on an artist or a song.
A radio station with access to Pandora's data would have to know who the listeners to each song are. Radio stations research in their target demographic cells among people who use specific stations. If that were know, then the data might be valid. A lot more would have to be known first.
But the fact that the audience is on the web is not relevant. Radio is moving to streaming and away from OTA, so what matters is the brand, not how you listen to it.
Apples and oranges. You are talking about Pandora doing music research among their users, and then about Nielsen ratings. Ratings are not music research... ratings are a sales tool.
That's the argument for the Census. Ask everyone, even though it is so costly that it can only be done every 10 years. And it is written into article 1, section 2 of the Constitution. Yet the Census Bureau uses statistical sampling every year to update the decennial census data, and it has been shown that the statistical samples are much more accurate than a full census. But we continue to do a census because the Constitution mandates one must be done even though there are much better and cheaper ways of doing it.
Even a full census has a margin of error. So a music test that has a big enough sample that could be replicated will give results on a song by song bases that are within a few percent of "perfect" and that are, thus, more than adequate for building a playlist and establishing rotation categories.
Nope. Stations don't test and then use that data for years to come. They test as often as they can afford it. If competitive situations change where an adequate audience size is fragmented into a non-viable one, then format changes are in order. Or, sometimes a good music list is used by a station with bad execution... and that's an entirely different issue.
The real issue for radio is not playlist size or selection. It is the change in distribution methods towards the smartphone and other mobile devices and the preferences for one-to-one vs. one-to-many models of programming. There is much to be said for the future of curated playlists which give the listener the ability to set and forget and to hear a nice variety of music they like... and radio is skilled in doing this. The issue is conveying this knowledge and ability to new media platforms and still maintain the ad supported business model when many of the pure plays have little or no advertising.,
No, all the PPM added was greater accuracy in listening times and much faster delivery. And, of course, 60% higher costs.
As I said, ratings only have to be accurate enough to create a usable metric for advertisers.
Radio does not use focus groups to research music. When a music test is initiated, the respondents are told that they will hear little snippets of songs "or we'd be here until tomorrow" and asked to score, based on the sample, how much they'd like to hear the song on the radio today. It's intuitive, simple and well explained.
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Let's see if I can get this down to its simplest essence:
Each successive evolution of ratings methodology, from Hooper's knocking on people's doors to Pulse's phone polls, to Aribtron's diaries and now to Nielsen Audio's Portable People Meters, has had one thing in common: The more focused stations do well, the less-focused stations do not. PPM has the added benefit of recording the actual behaviors of the participants, as opposed to relying on their memories hours or even days later, when they filled out the diary before sending it back.
There never will be an opportunity to ask everyone what they like and don't like, what they do and don't listen to, what makes them turn the volume up or tune a station out.
What radio stations have to do to survive is to show strongly in a demographic the advertisers want to reach. That gets them advertising revenue with which they pay people's salaries and benefits and the costs of simply keeping a station on the air and a business...in business.
"Stale? No. On target? Yes. KRTH is at the very top of the rating, #1 or #2, for the last two books. People like it. Two and a half million people like it. You don't. So listen to your music collection and stop making the same complaints, over and over and over and over and over and over and over and...." - DavidEduardo
I guess you absolutely LOVE 400 song playlists, every song burnt to a crisp since 1985 (or earlier). I can only stand enough Journey, Eagles and Doobie Brothers on my radio. And in major markets like L.A. SEVERAL stations will air Journey more than once a day.
-crainbebo
I guess you absolutely LOVE 400 song playlists, every song burnt to a crisp since 1985 (or earlier). I can only stand enough Journey, Eagles and Doobie Brothers on my radio. And in major markets like L.A. SEVERAL stations will air Journey more than once a day.
-crainbebo
B
BOZ Profit
Guest
Is this statement about focused on ratings or focused on revenues?
Would you say that means that #10 cannot make more than #1, ever? Because having the most listeners does not always mean making the most money.
It's not about whether David loves it or not. It's about whether it works. And KRTH is doing extremely well doing what they're doing.
There's a difference between "largest audience" and "majority." To the best of my knowledge, no radio station is getting a 51% share. If you scan through the top rated stations in every market, a 10 share or better is huge. So no station will reach a majority.
A bit of both. That's why it seems like we're talking out of both sides of our mouths. Because every time we test, we test different people. If we keep coming up with the same results from different people, then we start to see a pattern. We also have done exactly what the music enthusiasts want. I've worked at progressive rock stations with no playlists, and have seen the results. I've worked at stations with 800-1000 song playlists and have seen the results. And we ask the enthusiasts on this board about their favorite stations, and their answers confirm our experience. So it's a continual process.
Music research is very specific. So you're not going to get it approved by "the Industry as a whole." Consulting with "stakeholders" gets to the credibility of research. Nielsen PPM ratings are approved by the stakeholders who are the radio companies and the advertisers, observed by an outside agency that oversees the accuracy of these kinds of things. There are lots of different kinds of music research. Every day, we study new releases. The minute a song is released, we want to know the hit potential of the song, and also know the risks of playing it. Our stakeholders are ourselves and the record labels. They also do their own research on the same songs. Artists do research with their fan base. Everyone is doing research, and it's an ongoing process.
OK, fine. Research is not perfect. That's why we do it so much, that's why we consult so many different studies, and for me, that's why I participate in RadioDiscussions. It's a form of research. Albeit, it's skewed. And I know that going in. So if we keep doing research, and keep varying the process, keep changing the questions, keep changing the people being researched, and we still come up with the same results, then we start to see a trend. But also know it will probably change at some point.
Once again, "radio" is not one thing. There are thousands of stations, thousands of owners, thousands of employees, and thousands of different theories on what works best. The rules are there are no rules, expect for what works for us at a particular point in time. So in this thread, we're talking about the #1 most popular radio station in Los Angeles. There is nothing higher than #1. What they're doing, however objectionable to a few, is working for them. So those are the rules for KRTH. You can bring up another co-owned station in Philadelphia. Fine. Those are the rules for WOGL. The listeners to those stations obviously LOVE what they're hearing. Otherwise they'd listen to something else. There will always be a group who feel the station is not playing the right songs. That's fine. It's their right, and they can listen to something else. But as long as a station gets the results they seek, that station will continue providing that service to its listeners. That's how you cultivate loyalty and ensure your station will remain top-rated for a long time.
- Status