Arbitron’s Gary Marince delves into the topic of a station’s position in the market in this week’s Programming To Win. Are you the “home for the best Classic Rock”? At least in the eyes (and ears) of the listening public? And if so, how does this relate to building TSL and cume?
By Gary Marince
Gary Marince
One of the many benefits of being around so much ratings data is that over time, you get to see patterns and commonalities among leading radio stations. What appears to be the single most identifiable trait among winning stations is their position. Owning a clearly defined and highly desired position can lead to tremendous rating’s success. Interestingly, in radio, we often spend a lot of time working on position’s counterpart, execution.
Here’s why focusing on execution rather than position can work against a station. Yes, growing and nurturing Cume remains Job 1 for any programmer. After all, “Cume – when left unattended – erodes!” Assuming we accept this tenet of broadcasting, we can move to the next component of ratings, Time Spent Listening (TSL). Time Spent Listening is based on two elements; time spent per occasion and number of occasions. When we refer to time spent per occasion, we’re talking about the duration or how long someone stays with us when they tune to us. It’s how we sound in the moment which is going to impact how long someone spends with our station. On average, when listeners tune to a station, they spend about 10 minutes – plus or minus a couple. In addition to “how we sound in the moment,” I think duration is tied in large part to lifestyle.
The second of the two elements for Time Spent Listening is the “number of occasions.” Think about it, if, on average, listeners spend ten minutes each time they tune to a station. What really impacts TSL is how often they tune to a station – the more ten minute occasions, the greater the station’s TSL.
If “how we sound in the moment” impacts our time spent per occasion, what impacts the number of occasions we get from each listener? Position. And to help explain position, here are four questions we can ask as we work to understand position as it applies to listeners: #1 Can listeners identify what a station is known for? For example, if a listener was asked about a specific station in the market, could they readily identify its format . . . “oh, that’s the rock station.” #2 And possibly more importantly – does that station have a leadership position in the mind of the listener, e.g. “oh that’s the best rock station.” #3 Do listeners understand who the station is for, e.g. “that’s for people who want sports (or news or weather).” And #4, do listeners understand how to use the station? In the case of an Adult Contemporary station, listeners might say “oh, that’s the station I listen to at work.”
If listeners can easily conclude “that’s the rock station, the best rock station in town, I can get my Led Zeppelin and Springsteen there . . . and I can listen to this station as I drive home from work . . .” there is a pretty strong likelihood that station will get multiple “occasions of listening” from those seeking a station filling that position as the leading rock station.
Is “execution” important? Yes, very much so. But, based on informed intuition, for every four points (share) a station has, three of those points are coming from the stations position – getting people to tune in routinely and only one of those four points are coming from execution – how well we execute the format. We have to get listeners to tune to us before we can get them to listen to us for any length of time.
This looks like a 75/25 ratio, with 75% of our ratings coming from our position and only 25% of our ratings coming from our execution. However, at the station level, it is very common to see the PD spending more time on execution rather than position. The priorities might be backwards. We often devote too much time worrying about commercial placement, where to play the powers and where the station promo runs and not enough time building the brand or position.
Another dimension to the position/execution element is promotions and marketing. Interestingly, if you think about it, which of these two components is most affected by any off-air activity? It’s certainly not execution – meeting the talent or performer at a concert meet-and-greet can’t impact “how we sound in the moment.” But, whether it’s through curiosity or a meaningful encounter, off-air tactics are very likely to drive on-air occasions.
So, execution is important, make no mistake, but we really need to own a clearly defined and desired position for starters. Position drives occasions and occasions drive TSL. A strong TSL and a healthy Cume are the basic and essential ingredients for rating’s success.
Another topic which warrants a re-visit at this time is “talent vacations.” As a reminder, typically a talent’s one-week summer vacation falls on top of two Arbitron rating periods. And when we have a talent with a daypart share greater than the station’s total week share, we have some vulnerability or exposure. As numbers for August and September are analyzed, we can/might see dips in station ratings during the weeks when high profile talent take vacations. It’s bittersweet! On one hand it’s reassuring to know our talent is appreciated and their appearance on our air does favorably impact our numbers, but it does create anxious moments understanding a talent’s Monday through Friday vacation falls directly in the middle of Arbitron’s Thursday through Wednesday week. As we’ve reported here before, there are a number of stations who create virtual shows or have shows “in the can” which are used during talent vacations. Another point to ponder; it is one thing to run a “repeat” or “best of” show, but it’s another thing to draw attention to that. Many very smart programmers will run best of shows without calling them that. They try not to draw attention to the fact that something is different and might be perceived to be “not as good.”
Here’s hoping you found this article helpful and here’s to your continued success!
Gary Marince is Vice President of Programming Services and Development for Arbitron, Inc.. He is available to answer your inquiries regarding the Arbitron PPM or Diary services. You can reach him at gary.marince@arbitron.com
