Arbitron's sampling methodology isFARmoreimportantthanMrorMrsDePetro's misdeeds

[David Tomm]

Many smaller market stations I've worked with that sell on the  
ratings usually quote a four book rolling average.  This tends to  
even out the big swings that inevitably happen from book to book.   
Obviously format changes have to be taken into account when doing  
this, but it's a fairly accurate gauge of what's happening in the  
market over an extended period of time.  It makes clients more  
comfortable buying time on a station rather than trying to explain  
why the ratings swung from a 7 share in the previous fall book to a 4  
share in the spring book then back up to a 6.5 in the current book.

Dave Tomm
"Mike Thomas"

On Aug 24, 2008, at 12:24 PM, Don A wrote:

>>>
>>> Part of why people in the industry take it so seriously is that the
>>> numbers are relatively stable month after month.
>>
>> In smaller markets, there are only two ratings periods per year  
>> and fairly big swings are not unusual.
>
>
> Even with 2 ratings periods per year, that's 6 individual months of  
> results.
>
> If there is an abberation it can still be seen.