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(Expect gains by News95.7)
 Let the spinsters begin. The kind that ‘spin’ their take on an event.
Yes, the BBM’s come out Monday December 3rd and the spinning will start. The BBM’s of course are the ratings and they will come out for radio. TV ratings will be later this month or early in January.
Let’s stick to radio.
And let’s divide the radio stations into those who play music and much more music and those that don’t. The music stations are the easiest to look at.
Depending on how you want to look at the ratings you can have as many as 4-6 stations, standing on a pedestal and screaming “We’re #1, We’re #1” and they probably have a case.
I recall spending nearly a full day dissecting ratings when I owned and managed radio stations so we could get ‘Our message out”. And it’s totally about getting that message out, not so much to your listeners but to the advertisers. You want to let them know that your great, or getting good and the advertiser is doing a good thing in spending money with you.
I came up with nearly 50-60 ways to ‘tell my story”.
The ratings are conducted by a firm called the Bureau of Broadcast Measurement and it samples people, a (in the hundreds per segment) then it formulates the result which is known as the rating book.
But let me give you a few examples as to how stations will “spin’ what works for them.
BBM will calculate the listening patterns from those 12 years old and up to 64.
That is a remarkable and wide swath.
So station A could have a lot of 12-to 18 year olds and claim they are #1 in that bracket.
In the past these were the teeny bopper stations. The trouble is that 12-18 year old audience is almost meaningless because what buying power do they have? They don’t. A 12 year old isn’t into buy cars, furniture and food.
So most stations will take the reading of 18 years and older, called 18+ in the BBM’s and this is where the fun starts.
We have 18-24 year old males, 18-24 females (desirable to advertisers), then we have the 25-34 males and the same with females. This female demographic or demo as it is called is the most desirable. They are usually working women with income and decision (over their partners) making prowess.
Then we have 35-54 year old, male and females and older.
Stations like Q104 and C100 seem to automatically do well and will score (barring a significant pattern change) in the valued male (Q) and female (C100) demos.
The interesting question will be what Z-103.5 can do? They did very well a few books ago some say it was a novelty approach but now it will mark their fifth or sixth book and they will have been here for two years. Z-103.5 is after C100 listeners.
I’m curious as to what Hal-Fm does. They are after Q-104 listeners. The “Q” has pulled off many promotions this past year to retain their numbers so that Q-Hal-FM battle should be interesting to see.
There are a few more battles, one between CBC Radio especially the Info Morning Don Connolly-Liz Logan combo of news and plenty of information versus the News 95.7’s ‘all the news – all the time” format with morning host Doug Reynolds and co-host Erica Munn.
It is the CBC (Info Morning and Mainstreet) that News Radio has targeted from day one and so far the results have been miniscule for the Rogers owned station.
While I don’t expect much movement of numbers of the morning shows on either station (CBC has more listeners to lose) I do expect an increase of numbers in News 95.7 talk shows segment.
We’re talking about the Maritime Morning talk show with Andrew Krystal (9-noon), which is really HRM morning since August and the Afternoon News with, the John Diefenbaker sound alike, Tom Young.
I’ve noticed an increased volume of calls since August on both shows. And a big change in focus for Maritime Morning.
I’m not much into the prediction business but expect an increase in the 9-noon segment and a good increase in the noon – 3pm Tom Young show.
Young has the biggest chance for gains as there are many who are driving in their cars and calling in. Morning radio is a staple but once the noon hour hits many who tune in to morning talks shows now hit the soap opera scenes, especially the women.
Young has cultivated a good audience an audience that wasn’t there. People listen to radio in the morning not in the mid-day. That traditionally was soap opera of TV time. But with cell phones those driving in their cars that can’t stand the choice by the music stations may have found a strong alternative.
It seems News95.7 are putting both Krystal and Young against CJCH open line vet Rick (Hotline) Howe.
The real unbiased fact is (and I’ve known Howe for years) is that News 95.7 should destroy this guy.
I said should, as they have the money, the promotion, the spot on an FM dial. But they haven’t since News95.7 came on board in October of 2005.
They (News 95.7) are on the FM band; they go all over the Maritimes and have spent money, money and more coin in promoting Krystal in Nova Scotia and perhaps Young in NB. TV ads, print ads and Billboards all over the place. Now, that’s called promotion.
The fact that Howe still does very well and has not lost any numbers is an accomplishment for him. In fact, I can’t get over why CJCH don’t use any ‘clips’ or ‘sound bites’ from the Howe show the way News 95.7 does with its talk show host Andrew Krystal.
There’s also another reason why I expect the News 95.7 Maritime Morning show to finally get some decent numbers after not getting much over the last two years and that is the switch or ‘focus’ of their morning talk show.
Forget the ‘Maritime Morning’ handle. It’s more like HRM or Nova Scotia morning and while I might be teed off if I was listening in Moncton, or New Brunswick hearing day after day from guests who are from HRM, living in Nova Scotia I like it.
Guests that used to be the sole prerogative of Rick Howe such as councilor Dawn Sloane, Mayor Peter Kelly, deputy chief Chris Neil, WTC czar Fearless Fred MacGillivray and so many others, are now on the Krystal show.
In fact some weeks they both have many of the same guests. Howe is 95% local and HRM, so what News 95.7 is doing is simple and smart. Halifax is the crown jewel of Atlantic Canada; it has the biggest advertising scope and leads in population and just about everything else (other than concerts). It makes sense to aim for this city; I’m surprised it took News 95.7 so long to do so.
As for open line shows, we have five of them available to metro and I will do a full column on these guys in the near future.
C101 should win the country battle over 780 KIXX. Small stations like Seaside FM, CJLU (the alleged religious station that always wants your money and 97.9 information radio with the likes of Harry Fleming and other commentators, don’t subscribe to the rating services and all of those and others will be listed under a category called other.
The exact details come out on Monday. Stay tuned. We’ll listen to the spin, and decipher the details and be back with a ratings column next week.
To those in the media business…if you have some details or info on what you are doing, send me an email.
You can reach me at
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