TREND

[radiobootie]

25-54
1-KCMS
2-KISW
3-KUBE
4-KZOK
5-KMTT
6-KWJZ
7-KJR-FM
8-KMPS
9-KQMV
10-KKWF

 

[TakeItFromMe]

Hold on there cowboys. This was the usual odd summer trend in Seattle. August was a train wreck. KUBE was number one 12+, 18-34 and 25-54 ??? yOUR KIDDING ME RIGHT.
KUBE is the station most loved 25-54 in August beating the closest competitor by a good point and a half ??? (KZOK was #2). Bootie got the rolling averages right, but things looked damn weird for the single month KUBE jumps to number one in older demos, get REAL. How did KQMV lose 2/3rds of their audience in August ??? How did the WOLF morning show get cut by 2/3rd ??? This is summer in Seattle. One thing is for sure, Steve Rivers is about to look like a hero. KBKS ranked 28th in the market 25-54 and the morning show at KXXO in Olympia got a better number, seriously dudes. J@B show didn't even register a one share, not even a point eight. Big changes there should calm down the KUBE numbers. Outside of the WOLF getting a fluke month, mornings looked typical. Winners in demo were KUBE, KZOK, KISW, KMPS, KOMO, KMTT, KJR, KPLZ, KCMS, KWJZ. ITS SUMMER. Does anyone really believe that KUBE is tops 25-54, that JACK dropped to 26th in demo, that KRWM is out of the top 15 25-54 or that the WOLF is tied with KPLZ for 10th 25-54 ??? KCMS and KQMV had fluke months in July, KUBE had one this month. I LOOVVVEEEEE summer books?

Fall is here...let the realllll battle begin. WOLF is all over TV and howlllingnggggggggg.

 

[talkerdjdude]

Yeah, I do believe KUBE is doing as well as the trend (though unweighted) shows. Solid programming, music, staff and they know their audience. Movin losing some of their audience doesn't surprise me. Nor does the Wolf losing in the morning. And as for their howlin' commercials, you only get one chance to be "new" and the Wolf isn't "new" anymore. Howl all you want, the audience has tried the station and many of them migrated back to KMPS or discovered they're bored with country all together. Even more likely, they're not listening to radio anymore.

 

[djdan]

Trends are indeed unreliable and so is the summer book. Many agencies throw the book out because listener patterns are different due to summer vacation, kids out of school and low return of diaries causing over sampling. Each summer you see similar behavior, especially in trends. I preach four book averages and here is another reason to look at a four book: you get to see yearly trends. KUBE typically does well in the summer, KQMV also had a similar one month spike last summer. The young formats benefit from summer. KBKS has been on a long-decline and unfortunately this summer reveals how sick the station really is and why they hired a new well-respected programmer to revamp things. KOMO benefits from summer due to the Mariner numbers. The AC stations tend to decline in summer, but pick up in Fall and Winter. This is because the soccer mom's don't have kids in school and aren't in regular listening patterns. You get the idea.

Single trends are good to look at because they do show the spikes however You like to see real growth or decline over a pattern of multiple trends. For example, KQMV may have a moderately good summer book after several down trends, but you can see it is all one trend and it went away the following month. KKWF had a terrible month in mornings in August, but every other month looks fine, compared to KBKS mornings that have been in decline for several months. I will say that over the last few trends KMPS is increasing their lead and I am not sure the same "new WOLF" commercials will have as much impact. Same thing goes for the KQMV and JACK commercials. All three of these stations are not doing as well as they did a year ago. Looking year to year is also very helpful. Are you doing better this summer compared to last summer?

Agencies never buy off trends, they look at two and four book averages and want to see year to year growth. I will admit that August was a bit more erratic than usual, but that also seems to happen every summer. I actually agree with takeitfromme. It was a odd summer trend, but it happens every summer and when you look at a four book, it isn;'t that odd afterall.

 

[AQH.PRS]

Is KJR up slightly? What about KBSG?

 

[LITTLEBOYBLUE]

To me ... the interesting issue is WHAT WILL WE DO TO REPLACE THE RATING SYSTEMS THAT ARE THIS BAD? Method #1 relies on diaries and next-to-nothing compensation for doing that. You have to WANT to help radio industry to be any good at it ... so we expect people to take an active role in the most passive habit of their lives. Creates a weird sample set right there. As Dan says....someone goes on vacation and there go twenty billion households they represent.

Method #2 requires electronics, encoding, etc. and now we're asking people to be active again...and actually wear something that may garner only slightly more respect than a pocket protector.

ALL methods currently out there say "to heck with non-comm's" so it doesn't accurately reflect who is listening to what ... just who is listening to the Geico spot on which station.

Yet the industry revolves on this incredibly flawed system...revenue goals are made and missed...careers are made and lost....board ops (and this is where most of you will REALLY perk up) suddenly find gainful employment because a station decides it's easier to jam a patch cord into a Denny's Jukebox and still hire a real person to jam the "j-j-j-j-j-j-j-JAMMIN' 109 (109...109....109...) ---- the MOST (most most most) MUSIC [the most music]" canned liners between every third song.

In the last 24 hours I have seen so much self-patting emails from PD's around the country telling me about everything from how they tweaked the station voice to "pitch it up .000001%" to how they added extra spin of Bobby Sherman nostalgia gold .... and how that clearly has had an impact on "27 year old men with diapers".

BIG PICTURE, PEOPLE.
BIG PICTURE.

When and HOW are we going to find a way to fix this? Eastlan, at least, simply polls people from time-to-time and using that sample set derives ratings in the market. To me that's a much better start than what we're doing. My own bias is that the "right" answer isn't ONE solution....MAYBE it's a hybrid of "all of the above" (polling, diaries, PPM's, internet gateways that redirect you to stream, etc.). TV has solved the problem ... but that is much easier because people WANT the content and are THERE for the content (TivO/VCR arguments excused) so attaching a measurement device is much more practical than relying on recall or ambient encoding. One option = a tuner similar to that which is given to the respondents and it records which station or whether it's an MP3 source being played. Then we also answer my plea of "I don't listen at all" or "I listen to something else altogether" having better representation in the BIG PICTURE.

BIG PICTURE, PEOPLE.
BIG PICTURE.

 

[djdan]

Answering a couple of the ratings questions. KBSG has had a couple of bad months. KJR-FM a good August, same with KZOK.
On the ratings front, I think Arbitron is trying to improve the diary system, that results in every increasing horrible trends and books with huge jumps caused by lack
of diary returns and increasing use of weighting to deliver demos.

The PPM is a completely different methodology, but suffers from the same problems. Participants aren't wearing them and so samples have to be wieghted. The concept that
a statistically perfect sample would carry the meter for a couple of years to eliminate wild shifts, is not happening. 30% are dropping out. In the end PPM is not working either.

Not too familiar with Eastlan, but believe it is same day telephone recall, like Birch ratings of years gone by. It may be better than diary because samples are not wieghted because you just call until you get the number you need in a demographic cell, but is it accurate? It still relies on people trying to remember what they listened to and when over the last 24 hours. Diary participants theoretically write down what they listen to, as they listen. Course we all know most participants just fill it out at the end of the week and guess.

What better answer is there? My guess is ratings will end up a combination of PPM and telephone or diary, much like TV ratings are today.

 

[radioschmoozer]

Hey LBB-

In the last 24 hours I have seen so much self-patting emails from PD's around the country telling me about everything from how they tweaked the station voice to "pitch it up .000001%" to how they added extra spin of Bobby Sherman nostalgia gold .... and how that clearly has had an impact on "27 year old men with diapers".

BIG PICTURE, PEOPLE.
BIG PICTURE.

Calm down dude. I think you might blow a blood vessel!