WCRB to simulcast on 88.7 in R.I.

[Bob DeMattia]

I got called by Arbitron.  After asking all kinds of questions such as age
and gender of
everyone in the house, they told me I'd be receiving a package from them
next week.

I got a letter then next week saying they didn't need me after all. :-(



On Fri, Jun 3, 2011 at 9:23 PM, Mark Laurence <marklaurence@mac.com> wrote:

> On Jun 3, 2011, at 6:18 PM, Garrett Wollman wrote:
>
>  <<On Fri, 03 Jun 2011 19:04:41 +0000 (GMT), Mark Laurence <
>> marklaurence@mac.com> said:
>>
>>  PPM ratings for the most recent month in Boston show:
>>>
>>
>>  94.1% of people age 18-24 cumed radio in April.  They listen an average
>>> of 10 hours 15 minutes a week.
>>>
>>
>> I'm generally pretty suspicious of these numbers, for three reasons:
>>
>> (1) The sample is very small, particularly when sliced down into
>> narrow demos like this.
>>
>
> I'll agree when you are ranking individual stations and dayparts.
> The sample size can't be depended on to tell you accurately who's
> in 5th or 6th place, 18-24 males, 10A-3P, for a single week.
>
> But for a massive number like total market listening cume, the PPM
> should be fairly accurate, especially considering that the number
> doesn't vary too much from week to week over the course of a
> year.  It's obvious that an extremely high number of young listeners
> spend hours every week with radio.
>
>
>  (2) The sample is highly biased.  What non-user of radio is likely to
>> agree to participate?  How much compensation is Arbitron even offering
>> these days?  (Is it still $5?)  For a lot of young people, that's not
>> nearly enough to get them to carry a pager-sized device with them
>> wherever they go.  How does Arbitron even identify the sample?
>>
>
> Bill said he got $5 a month, but I've heard of payments much higher
> for younger demos and hard-to-get ethnic groups.  Plus, Arbitron
> chooses entire families to participate, so a household might earn
> several hundred dollars for taking part.  I do agree there's probably
> a bias against non-listeners.  If you consistently sent reports of
> zero listening, you'd probably get kicked off.  But that doesn't
> exclude low-level listeners who would drag down the average TSL
> (now called Average Weekly Time Exposed), and 7-10 hours of
> average listening is still a hefty amount.
>
>
>  (3) People are exposed to radio in many different places over which
>> they may have little or no control.  They can hardly be said to be
>> listening in this situation.
>>
>
> As an advertiser or a programmer, you don't really care if the
> listener LOVES the program, your goal is to get them to hear the
> program and the ads that accompany it.  But that's the way it's
> always been, except with diaries you had to get listeners to
> remember the call letters.  Now, you're getting a more accurate
> count of who's in the room, hearing the radio and the ads.  It
> doesn't really matter if they have control over the radio dial.  One
> goal of programming for PPMs is to create a station that dial-
> owners (in stores, workplaces, etc.) will play for captive audiences.
>
> Of course they don't hear every word, just like a Sunday Globe
> reader might toss out a section without reading it, or an
> American Idol viewer might fast-forward the DVR or head
> for the bathroom.  Actually, passive listeners are much more
> likely to be exposed to an entire ad than people who are sitting
> next to the button on the car radio, so maybe an advertiser wants
> them even more.
>