301 moved permanently

Paul Gillin's Blog - Social Media and the Open Enterprise

Sunday, April 23, 2006

More bad news for terrestrial radio

From Bridge Ratings' Audience Erosion study 2005 Q4 Update:

"AM/FM radio listening among 18-34 year olds was significantly off fourth quarter 2005's pace as its increase in weekly quarter hours to "other media" than radio jumped from 50 to 60 quarter hours affecting the trend for both 12-24 and 25-49 year old metrics."

" MP3 device usage can consume as much as 80% of a radio user's audio entertainment during initial ownership weeks and months. This number tends to be generally lower among 30+ women and 35+ men."

"...music-specific radio stations are vying for the attention of their constituencies as MP3 players continue to be more pervasive than ever (75 million sold). Podcasting is beginning to show evidence of cannibalizing radio's time-spent-listening."

If you're terrestrial RM radio, what do you? All-music format is being eroded by satellite and MP3. Talk is AM's domain and very competitive. I'd like to see a radio hook up with a podcast network and syndicate the best shows. It would cut their costs to virtually nothing and maybe be a sustainable format. But you can't make that model work in 20,000 markets.

¶ 5:37 AM

Comments:

Interesting concept, the podcast network. But one premise is shake: "talk radio" is no longer AM radio's domain. Across the country, station after station in the NPR family is abandoning or cutting back on music, and going to the talk format. Some stations are using more syndicated content, others are trying their own local call-ins and demi-experts, the latter representing a dumbing-down of radio. The latest to fall is WBEZ in Chicago, renowned for its Jazz programming. Going all-talk at the end of the year.

# posted by

Anonymous : 7:43 AM

It's a good point. Listeners have so many music alternatives now that FM radio really can't add much value. Most radio will probably be talk and top 40 in five years.

# posted by