Should Talk Stations Stop Subscribing to Nielsen?

[Small Market Guy]

You righties will accept anything if it's what you want to hear.

OK, if you want to count that as actual ratings, go ahead. Tell us, what's your share and cume? How do you do in in the money demos?

Like many, I morn the demise of local radio as more and more stations become computers in closets. Thank you for reminding me how truly horrible local radio can be. I know it can't be that apparent back in Maryland.

Set up...

The Nielsen circulation study is "real ratings" as a sample is drawn from every county in the nation. It does not have the granularity of a full local market survey, but it is definitely a "ratings report" with shares and such. The limitations on its use for other than local sales are severe, and I doubt that they can be posted or published.

Look at

http://www.americanradiohistory.com/Archive-Arbitron/WI14DOM.pdf

... and go to Radio County Coverage for details on the local ratings.

And knocked down...

Fred, how do you think ad agencies know which stations to buy time from in unrated markets? This is how. It's certainly not a large sample in a market of 45,000, but it's ratings that can be used when time to go sell spots.