How can any commercial station survive if they don't subscribe to Arbitron? I could have maybe seen it before Arbitron introduced the subscriber only rule since, while exact shares in keys demos aren't released publicly, we know and I'm sure they could find out just as easily as we can, where they are ranked, so they can tell advertisers that they were #1 in 25-54. Now, if a station doesn't subscribe, it seems as if they don't exist in the views of Arbitron, so how can a commercial station survive without subscribing?
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Ratings is revenue so...
- Thread starter bobdavcav
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In smaller markets, Arbitron has priced themselves out of market. Ratings are mostly irrelevant for local direct. We don't get enough from regional/national to justify the cost of an Arbitron subscription. Besides, national spot rates have gone done so much compared to past years, so for many buys we may be getting net rates that are below many local direct buys.
Also, the agencies have "the book;" only reason for us to buy is to do the work for the media buyers by doing the demographic breakouts.
Also, the agencies have "the book;" only reason for us to buy is to do the work for the media buyers by doing the demographic breakouts.
If they have a good reputation, good sales staff, or both, ratings are irrelevant. When everyone knows that everyone listens to the station, it doesn't matter that they pull an x share in y demo.
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ok walters
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You can even make it in a large market without ratings. Thousands of stations are doing it everyday.
How many stations not in a large market do much agency business anyway? Most of the sales are local direct.
How many stations not in a large market do much agency business anyway? Most of the sales are local direct.
Even if you are getting agency business, you can still get revenue without subscribing to ratings. The agency gets the ratings whether or not the station subscribes. They will call any station with significant ratings and ask them to submit for an upcoming buy. A station can get a copy from one of several friendly sources and NEVER quote them. They just need to know what ratings the agency is seeing and price accordingly. Not that I've ever done that personally but it could be done.ok walters said:
ok walters said:
Of course they do.
The 80% of AMs that do not program competitively due to bad metro signals have generally taken religious, brokered or ethnic alternatives that don't sell on ratings rank.
Many small signal, suburban and rimshot FMs that don't cover the market or which have niche formats... or both... can't use ratings with any success even if they have them.
Major stations even in markets outside the top 100 do agency and transactional business... but it is a lower and lower percentage of total business the smaller the market.
The fact is that ratings are close to essential for those stations hat are in the top tier of a market. Los Angeles is a good example; it's the highest billing US market and has 72 stations licensed to the metro.
Of those 72, a major broadcast industry analyst only considers 28 to be viable, meaning that they have signals and facilities capable of covering pretty much all the market day and night.
The other 44 stations are pretty uniformly outside the top 30 in ratings, so even if they bought ratings, they have nothing to sell with them. Those stations end up doing religious formats and ethnic formats ranging from Farsi to Vietnamese, and a few broker out blocks and hours to people or groups that want to "be on the radio."
The real issue is that there are so many facilities licensed in metros, even down to smaller ones, that don't cover those metros adequately to compete "with the big dogs". In fact, take market 138, Palm Springs, with 8 AM stations... not one of which fully covers the market day or night.
On the other hand the danger of not having ratings is real. For that business which is transactional, a metric is required. I was in a market that is currently in the top 15 where in one span of several years there was no book; rates fell by about 50% as agencies said "there is no proof of value, so we will give you this much and take it or leave it." Since that was a market where the top 10 stations did about 90% agency business, the effect was felt in a near 50% drop in total market revenues.
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