Study: 92% of Listeners Stick Through Breaks... yeah, right.

[SmokeRing]

Actually, most people who have a favorite station... and especially, a favorite morning show, do not dial push. Only some very specific demos do that.

Again, you're retreating to specific situations. The study is making the broad claim that 92% of all listeners stick through breaks. I know you can't defend THAT. And your responses, by beating around the bush, continue to confirm it.

 

[klifhanger]

Smokering: Its called "spinning" which he has mastered so well and heexpects people who have common sense like you, Grant Chester,myself and a few others to believe it. He knowth not what he talketh about here. He is not about to agree with you that listeners do not stay with a station thru the long tuned out commercials ,otherwise he would be out of a job. We keep praying,believe me.

 

[OldGringo]

MASTER OF GRAND ILLUSIION " NO IT WAS NOT"

tsk tsk..It was Plagerizer. Nyah!(p Not on the RI Boards as you well know. sheesh.

As I am pretty sure the sysop can confirm, I have never even logged onto the RI board. Try again.

 

[OldGringo]

Actually, most people who have a favorite station... and especially, a favorite morning show, do not dial push. Only some very specific demos do that.

Again, you're retreating to specific situations. The study is making the broad claim that 92% of all listeners stick through breaks. I know you can't defend THAT. And your responses, by beating around the bush, continue to confirm it.

Jeesh. The lack of knowedge of PPM here leads me to suggest a quick visit to the Arbitron site and the review of the PPM methodology descriptions there.

The PPM tracks each station nearly second by second as it is listened to. The data can be broken out to the by-the-minute level each day and hour for each station in Houston. And this data can be tracked against MediaMonitor's commercial logging, where one can see to the exact sentence when stopsets start and end, and which spots are in them.

If 92% of listeners stay with a station during entire stopsets, then the data is there to prove it.

 

[Kent]

I've got to admit that I'm left scratching my head over this study. After all, aside from that small 10 watt non-commercial college station, I've never worked at a music station that didn't base its clock on what everyone else in the market was doing. It's always been, "We MUST get back to the music sweep before XXXX!" If the listeners would stay through the breaks, why would it matter if we got back to the music at :21 or :25? Something just doesn't seem to add up here.

 

[john77]

I've got to admit that I'm left scratching my head over this study. After all, aside from that small 10 watt non-commercial college station, I've never worked at a music station that didn't base its clock on what everyone else in the market was doing. It's always been, "We MUST get back to the music sweep before XXXX!" If the listeners would stay through the breaks, why would it matter if we got back to the music at :21 or :25? Something just doesn't seem to add up here.

I agree with you... 1+2 doesn't = 4... something's rotten in Denmark...

In my circles, I hardly know anyone that doesn't spin the dial... whether it's a commerical, or just a song they don't like...

 

[ElCheapo]

I'm going to admit up front that I haven't really been following this, so please don't slaughter me here...

Just a few thoughts...

I believe the 92% figure could be credible for some formats. A few years ago, there was an Arbitron/Paragon study out that showed how likely listeners were to punch out during stopsets by format. For some formats like N/T and country it was very low. For other formats, it was alarmingly high - mostly youth formats like hip-hop.

This is probably why a few hip-hop stations do one really long stopset per hour. They realize they're going to lose virtually all of their audience, so why not get all of the tune outs in at one time?

Again - this is from memory so correct me if I'm wrong - but didn't the first PPM study show the Houston AC station to be the hands down AQH share winner there by far? I suspect that probably has something to do with at work listening. Most radios you see in office environments aren't digitally tuned and probably aren't changed very often.

I'd suspect most at work listeners sit through every stopset. In car not so much.

 

[OldGringo]

I'm going to admit up front that I haven't really been following this, so please don't slaughter me here...

Just a few thoughts...

I believe the 92% figure could be credible for some formats. A few years ago, there was an Arbitron/Paragon study out that showed how likely listeners were to punch out during stopsets by format. For some formats like N/T and country it was very low. For other formats, it was alarmingly high - mostly youth formats like hip-hop.

This is probably why a few hip-hop stations do one really long stopset per hour. They realize they're going to lose virtually all of their audience, so why not get all of the tune outs in at one time?

Again - this is from memory so correct me if I'm wrong - but didn't the first PPM study show the Houston AC station to be the hands down AQH share winner there by far? I suspect that probably has something to do with at work listening. Most radios you see in office environments aren't digitally tuned and probably aren't changed very often.

I'd suspect most at work listeners sit through every stopset. In car not so much.

Good, solid observations.

In Houston, we have now 16 months of PPM data, and the last 3 months have given us weeklies.

KOVE, which behaves like an AC, is tied with KLTN in Houston Hispanic, too.

Many companies have done proprietary PPM studies, and I can see you have a good grasp on the fundamentals and why we are seeing some of the changes the PPM system will bring. Kudos to you.

 

[OldGringo]

I've got to admit that I'm left scratching my head over this study. After all, aside from that small 10 watt non-commercial college station, I've never worked at a music station that didn't base its clock on what everyone else in the market was doing. It's always been, "We MUST get back to the music sweep before XXXX!" If the listeners would stay through the breaks, why would it matter if we got back to the music at :21 or :25? Something just doesn't seem to add up here.

I have not cared when the competitors have stops for at least the last 20 years... playing methodology games simply takes your eye off the target, wich is pleasing the listener.

 

[SmokeRing]

Jeesh. The lack of knowedge of PPM here leads me to suggest a quick visit to the Arbitron site and the review of the PPM methodology descriptions there.

If 92% of listeners stay with a station during entire stopsets, then the data is there to prove it.

What if this specific study in Houston can be shown to be correct? I doubt it, and never in a million years will anyone care enough to fact check it. But what if it is? Will it ever be duplicated in other studies? No way. Because 92% is flat wrong. Knowing the radio industry the way I do, I wouldn't be surprised if there were 20 different studies being done at the same time, and they hand picked the one study with the results they liked.

And you continue to miss the point, David, every time you refer me to PPM methodology. Go back and read the link I posted at the top of this thread. The intent is clear. Throw out a number in a news story (because that will give it credibility, right?) so that everyone in the industry can point to it when they make sales calls. This very morning, I guarantee you that A.E.'s are sending that link to their clients. Or printing it out and putting it in a sales package.

If you are anything more than an industry charlaton, then you'll admit that you don't expect that 92% figure to hold up study after study, PPM survey after PPM survey. It's such obvious B.S.

 

[OldGringo]

What if this specific study in Houston can be shown to be correct? I doubt it, and never in a million years will anyone care enough to fact check it. But what if it is? Will it ever be duplicated in other studies? No way. Because 92% is flat wrong. Knowing the radio industry the way I do, I wouldn't be surprised if there were 20 different studies being done at the same time, and they hand picked the one study with the results they liked.

This really was not a "study" but a tabulation. They took many days of data on many stations from PPM and compared it to the times when stopsets ran. It is 100% replicable. The only thing that would indicate it were NOT replicable would be if market TSL changes in Houston, and the data if pretty much stable for every one of the 16 PPM books they have done in the market.

And you continue to miss the point, David, every time you refer me to PPM methodology. Go back and read the link I posted at the top of this thread. The intent is clear. Throw out a number in a news story (because that will give it credibility, right?) so that everyone in the industry can point to it when they make sales calls. This very morning, I guarantee you that A.E.'s are sending that link to their clients. Or printing it out and putting it in a sales package.

The intent of the study was to sell through the cost increases stations have to pay to get PPM. Nobody is currently licensed to use PPM to sell.

If you are anything more than an industry charlaton, then you'll admit that you don't expect that 92% figure to hold up study after study, PPM survey after PPM survey. It's such obvious B.S.

16 surveys with similar (statistically identical) radio usage and TSLs is enough to convince me. Givent he methodology and the size of the panel, two or three are enough.

 

[Kent]

I have not cared when the competitors have stops for at least the last 20 years... playing methodology games simply takes your eye off the target, wich is pleasing the listener.

If you haven't, good for you. There doesn't appear to be many who follow that philosophy. In some ways, I understand it as there are lots of self-described "button pushers" out there. However, it's easy to go too far with it. The classic rock station I worked at that had a walkman in the studio and two radios in the PD's office set to the competition (the PD had more radios set to the competition than our station!) so we always knew when they were in stopset seemed taking it too far to me! I know we were an upstart struggling against an established station and eventually failed, but still...

 

[Kent]

I believe the 92% figure could be credible for some formats. A few years ago, there was an Arbitron/Paragon study out that showed how likely listeners were to punch out during stopsets by format. For some formats like N/T and country it was very low. For other formats, it was alarmingly high - mostly youth formats like hip-hop.

I would expect the fewest tune-outs would be news/talk and morning shows, something I believe David has already mentioned. I've been at talk stations that have well over 20 minutes per hour of commercials and are consistently at or near the top. If everyone was pushing the button during commercials, logic would say we couldn't have done as well as we did.

This is probably why a few hip-hop stations do one really long stopset per hour. They realize they're going to lose virtually all of their audience, so why not get all of the tune outs in at one time?

I know this is the Dallas board, and I'm about to be talking about Chicago, but what you're saying makes sense. WBBM-FM in Chicago runs a hip-hop/rhythmic format and has had, or at least used to have, horrendous TSL. Don't know if this is typical of that format or if it's been corrected at 'BBM, but it goes along with what you're saying.

Again - this is from memory so correct me if I'm wrong - but didn't the first PPM study show the Houston AC station to be the hands down AQH share winner there by far? I suspect that probably has something to do with at work listening. Most radios you see in office environments aren't digitally tuned and probably aren't changed very often.

I'd suspect most at work listeners sit through every stopset. In car not so much.

Once again, what you're saying makes pretty good sense, at least on the surface. I have occasionally been in an office that has changed the station because of something the station was doing, but it's been very rare.

 

[SmokeRing]

This really was not a "study" but a tabulation. They took many days of data on many stations from PPM and compared it to the times when stopsets ran. It is 100% replicable.

You're high. If/when PPM's are adopted nationwide, that 92% number will go away. In fact, it will go WAY down.

What I mean is that if you put PPM's in every single U.S. market and tracked every single U.S. station for a year, and then came up with an average listen-through-spot break percentage, it would be NO where close to 92%.

You know it, and everyone on this board knows it.

 

[SmokeRing]

They took many days of data on many stations from PPM and compared it to the times when stopsets ran. It is 100% replicable.

By the way, the issue isn't whether you can use the same method to gather data again, it's whether the results can be replicated. I hope you know the difference.

And aren't you the guy who told this board that Corporate Radio wouldn't take losses on stations when it started selling them off. But Infinity-San Antonio barely made half of what it paid for that cluster. And that's a market you should know something about. But you didn't see that coming? Oops.

 

[OldGringo]

They took many days of data on many stations from PPM and compared it to the times when stopsets ran. It is 100% replicable.

By the way, the issue isn't whether you can use the same method to gather data again, it's whether the results can be replicated. I hope you know the difference.

And aren't you the guy who told this board that Corporate Radio wouldn't take losses on stations when it started selling them off. But Infinity-San Antonio barely made half of what it paid for that cluster. And that's a market you should know something about. But you didn't see that coming? Oops.

Station prices are based on cash flow, revenue, real estate and other assets as well as stick value.

The Infinity properties were negative cash flowing when sold, while they had been strong earners when purchased.

In this particular case, CBS could not hold the value of the stations due to the combined competiton of WOAI with KTSA, and KBBT which decimated KTFM. Obviously, I knew about this one because KBBT was the main reason why CBS could not get a good value for a station, particularly since there was no cluster to hold up the overall value... Infinity had a combo, not a cluster, so there was no "cluster" as you say, anyway.

There are a number of specific cases where stations have lost value... KKBT in LA, where about $410 million was allocated for the purchase, is probably worth less than $300 million.

On the other hand, most stations purchased at the offset of consolidation are going, today, for the same or more money than they did in the 1996-1998 time frame. Values are not up over this 8 to 10 year period in the traditional amounts, but they are up. Except for the odd "failed station" that has lost the underlying revenue and BCF, the values are high.

As to the PPM data about stopsets and tune-out, unless TSL changes significantly on a significant number of stations, the overlay of MediaMonitor stopset times with PPM listening minute by minute will produce the same results over and over and over and over. It is 100% replicable.

 

[OldGringo]

You're high. If/when PPM's are adopted nationwide, that 92% number will go away. In fact, it will go WAY down.

Unless market TSL and TSL per station falls, there will be no such happening. The Philly data, the Québec and Montreal data, and 16 books on PPM in Houston show this is a constant as it is based on TSL per station and TSL per listening incident. These figures are not changing except in the normal order of competitive broadcasting where some staitns go up and others stay the same or go down.

What I mean is that if you put PPM's in every single U.S. market and tracked every single U.S. station for a year, and then came up with an average listen-through-spot break percentage, it would be NO where close to 92%.

Well, since we will not have PPM in anything but the top 50 markets int he next 4 years, we will never know about "every market." But in every market the PPM is being used in or has or is being tested in, that figure stands.

The only difference is that we now have minute by minute granularity on stations based on encoding and detection (essentially foolproof) and the ability to know, via MediaMonitor, when stopsets ran on every significant station and even what spots they were.

You know it, and everyone on this board knows it.

I have known it for decades. While the diary can not prove minute to minute listening, it is obvious from the TSL per listening incident that nearly all listeners are listening through 3 to 4 full stops on each occasion. Most people have a few... or just one... favorite station(s) and they have better things to do than play with the radio dial all day.

 

[OldGringo]

I know this is the Dallas board, and I'm about to be talking about Chicago, but what you're saying makes sense. WBBM-FM in Chicago runs a hip-hop/rhythmic format and has had, or at least used to have, horrendous TSL. Don't know if this is typical of that format or if it's been corrected at 'BBM, but it goes along with what you're saying.

CHRs and their brothers, Churbans, are essentially Top 40 stations with limited playlists. Often, the non-specialty show list is no more than 100 to 120 tunes, with many above 50 spins a week.

There is a fine balancing act to be done with CHRs. You play too many songs, and you are not longer playing "the hits" which is why listeners come to them. If you play too few, or, worse, some of the wrong songs, you get zapped on TSL.

So any CHR or derivitive is going to be a low TSL format. This is why there are no Spanish CHRs in the US... there is not enough potential cume to support the low TSL level and still get good share!

We like to call Cumulus "Cumeless" and other derogatory terms. Yet in Houston, they have readied the cluster for PPM by shifting KRBE from a teen and 18-24 driven CHR to a very Hot pop AC, and in the process expanded the playlist and increased TSL considerably without a (PPM) cume loss. These people have done a near miraculous job of repositioning a station and increasing its share at the same time as moving into a more salable demo.

In the most recent book, WBBM-FM has just under 5 hours TSL and about an hour per incident. The TSL is within 3 minutes for 12-24 and 25+, in fact. This is just a station that you listen to for a dose of the hits, which has always been why Top 40 / CHR was used. We just have more ways of analyzing the data today than we used to.

 

[klifhanger]

MASTER OF GRAND ILLUSION:

"As I am pretty sure the sysop can confirm, I have never even logged onto the RI board. Try again."

You are very narrow focused. Never go on a sight seeing trip. You would stare at the road not the view. You have logged on the "RI" Board Countryboy. Its called RADIO -INFO". I was referring to "other boards outside RI". No wonder,layoffs are coming at Lunavison. You can't focus enough while busily copying others thoughts and making them your own. AYE Caramba!

 

[SmokeRing]

Unless market TSL and TSL per station falls, there will be no such happening.

So you say the 92% number will hold. I say it won't. And, furthermore, I say it's a lie to begin with.

You've done precious little to answer my original post DIRECTLY. The news at the end of my link broadly states that 92% of radio listeners listen completely through spot breaks. There are no caveats. So the smallest most unsuccessful stations in every market must get averaged in with the largest and most successful ones. The talkers with the most loyal listenerships must get averaged in with the music stations with modest listener sampling and bottom of the bucket TSL's.

The number is B.S. Own it, homeslice.