Does This Look Like A Format That's About To Fragment?

Since roughly a third of all radio users give all radio stations some 70% of their total hours of listening, it's safe to say that as goes the core, so goes the radio station they use.

That's why A&O&B has been tracking annual "Roadmap" online perceptual studies for many years.

In 2014, 8,874 very local fans in more than 70 markets in the U.S. & Canada gave us their opinions.  Nine of ten were "P-1," since just 9.3% choose country as 2nd or 3rd choice.

As Mike O'Malley blogged that passion for today's country runs very high:  "even among 55-64 year olds, six in ten like new country frommillennial stars 'a lot.'"  

That's driving improving total hours tuned:

It's especially the case with younger demos:

The biggest increase came 18-24, but is across all demos:

Loyalty (likely to switch if something new became available) is also on the upswing:

That's not say that there aren't individual radio stations failing to perform at these benchmarks whose listeners might jump at the chance to try something different and new.  As Radio-Info's Mike Kinosian reported on Friday, one third of the Nielsen rated country stations in his last tracking study failed to join the national up trend for the country format.

I hope you aren't one of them, but it appears that the average country station among A&O&B clients is well-positioned to fend off a niche competitor!

If you aren't among the majority, A&O&B can help,

Bye Bye P-1 Report, Hello Cluster Analysis "Junkies"

It has been fascinating to watch Nielsen decide to stop offering a report that was created almost thirty years ago even as radio researcher Mark Kassof released a report that indicates almost exactly the same statistical relationship of a radio station's heaviest users to their total averages.

35% of all listeners, multivariate data pioneer Kassof finds, account for about 70% of all listening for the typical radio station.

As "Research Doctor" Roger Wimmer and longtime researcher Pierre Bouvard recall, a bright programmer/researcher - Gary Donohue - originated the concept of segmenting radio tuning into quintiles for programming and marketing.

Donohue's "Fingerprint" stats from back in the diary-only days proved that about 30% of radio listeners gave stations roughly 70% of their listening.

When you see two completely different research approaches yield very close to the same result over a very long period of time, you have to believe that you are approaching that rare entity:  THE TRUTH.

Just because Nielsen has unplugged the "P-1 report," it's still vital to know who your heaviest users are, where they live and how they perceive and behave.

If you need assistance in creating your own reports to analyze their use of your station, A&O&B would be delighted to assist.

Digging Deeper, Unearthing Better News

My blog last week (Country Fans & Republicans) reflecting on the headline of researcher Mark Kassof's latest national "Listener Think" study (Country Fans: Born This Way?) and the fact that after all the great new country music of the last five years the largest group of our listeners proved to be what seems like the same folks who have been listening all their lives made me feel a bit like Reince Priebus, Karl Rove, Ralph Reed, Frank Luntz and other leaders of the Grand Ole Party who are juggling expectations of a life-long-loyal core with their own hopes, attempting to grow their pie.

I took solace in the latest CMA Insider Panel research showing how active, youthful and family-oriented our users are, but also asked Mark to crunch his numbers to see what was there below the headline picked up last week by the trades. 

He was kind enough to do so:

Some observations on his data from Kassof:

    •    RAISED ON/GREW UP WITH IT is #1 with both younger and older country fans.
    •    Younger country fans are more motivated by RELATES TO ME/MY LIFE, REAL/TRUE/HONEST and SOOTHING/CALMING/RELAXING than the older group.
    •    Older country fans are more motivated by UNDERSTAND THE WORDS, LIKE THE SOUND and >THAN/DIS OTHERS (translation: like it more than or dislike other genres) than the younger group.
    •    Men are more motivated by RAISED ON/GREW UP WITH IT  (30%!) and RELATES TO ME/MY LIFE than women.
    •    RAISED ON/GREW UP WITH IT  still ties for #1 with women.  Women are more motivated by TELLS A STORY/STORIES, UNDERSTAND THE WORDS and SOOTHING/CALMING/RELAXING than men.

As strong as country radio's ratings are, it still has more room to grow by leveraging the music's relatability and power to keep building appeal among men and younger listeners.

Country Fans & Republicans

• “I’ve been a Republican all my life." - Phyllis Schlafly
• "Raised on it/Grew up with it." - one of five of the 121 who named country as their preference of 805 18-64′s nationwide on WHY IS COUNTRY YOUR FAVORITE KIND OF MUSIC TO LISTEN TO ON RADIO? when questioned by Researcher Mark Kasoff

This poll came out yesterday just as news of the Faith and Freedom Coalition's "Road to the Majority Conference" chairman Ralph Reed calling on Republicans to learn how not "to preach to the choir," but rather make the message spread also hit my browser.

We've been hearing these comments on both our music and many of our core listeners' vaues for 30 years.

Maybe it's because 18-64 is too wide a swath to accurately reflect what Roadmap 2013 and rating trends across North American are documenting, but as Mike O'Malley said after seeing Kasoff's report "nothing about exciting new acts, nothing about how the format has evolved, nothing about the powerful younger demo growth?"

Fortunately, another new research study on country music partisans also just came out yesterday from the CMA:

The latest member-only research tracking the country music "Insider's Panel" by the Country Music Associations research department shows a young, active, well-educated group of country fans lead active, busy, youthful family oriented lives.

Top single-day family activities include going to the movies, attending a concert or music festival, and visiting family entertainment centers. 

To grow a country brand:  don't be like Republicans.

Be like Disneyland.