The ratings just came out. I’m thinking the holiday season and peoples interest in Christmas music is why everything went down
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Philadelphia ratings
- Thread starter CassChopper96
- Start date
The Holiday book, of course doesn't matter at all, but there it is. Some things look boring but there are some interesting things there too.
B101.1 got a 16.6 with all-Christmas. (Cumed almost 2,200,000!) Without any competition from WOGL, I thought they'd do better but I guess this kinda makes sense since even [edit: many of] their non-Christmas numbers have been lower than usual lately.
WDAS gives back their December jump. WMGK drops 0.7 to their lowest number in recent memory. But again, it doesn't matter.
People kept saying "Why does WOGL do Christmas" and I kept saying "Because they'd lose more listeners if they didn't." And lookie here: They lost almost a point-and-a-half to a 5.0. That's the worst number I can remember them having. (They are still 2nd place in cume though.)
WMMR dropped a full point. Do people switch from News to Christmas? Because KYW also has it's lowest-in-memory number at 4.3. Power 99 went up a tic! WXTU goes low as well, dropping 0.7 (do you see a trend here?) all the way to 3.6. WTDY is unphased by Christmas, ticking up 0.1.
WISX is at 3.0 for its first book as Soft AC. What does it mean? I told you already: It means absolutely nothing! (Cumed 701,000, in case you're interested.)
Q102 is another station that dropped 0.7 to its lowest number in memory. BEN-FM doesn't care about Santa either: They dropped just 0.2 (though in cume they lost about 100,000).
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My biggest takeaway:
WTDY beat WIOQ in the CHR battle. Something Wired was never able to do. Yes, it's the throwaway Holiday book, and these are the vanity 6+ numbers, but that's a bit eye opening.
The Breeze at a 3.0 and UP in the Holiday book? Seems promising!
Other than that... the Eagles helped WIP/WPEN... Christmas hurt basically everyone else.
WTDY beat WIOQ in the CHR battle. Something Wired was never able to do. Yes, it's the throwaway Holiday book, and these are the vanity 6+ numbers, but that's a bit eye opening.
The Breeze at a 3.0 and UP in the Holiday book? Seems promising!
Other than that... the Eagles helped WIP/WPEN... Christmas hurt basically everyone else.
I think the breeze could be a quiet success
I didn't even notice that since Entercom decided to steer clear of a CHR battle by leaning more AC. With as many times as 96.5 has flip-flopped, I wouldn't be surprised to see them take it back to CHR to see what happens!
They did take it back to CHR. They flipped from AC "Today's" to CHR "96.5 TDY" last March. They even use a positioner "We Out-Do Q" on air. Have live talent 6A-Midnight too. Whatever they're doing, it's working. (Having some cross-promotion from B101 saying "If you don't want to hear Chrismas, try 96.5 TDY" I'm sure helped a bit.
No one mentioned the drop at WXTU, and it's consistent with a weak month for the format in most other markets.
Still, they're down almost 2 points in 2 months. Not a merry Christmas.
https://ratings.radio-online.com/cgi-bin/rol.exe/arb007
Still, they're down almost 2 points in 2 months. Not a merry Christmas.
https://ratings.radio-online.com/cgi-bin/rol.exe/arb007
I gotta disagree about the various major market stations who go all-Seasonal music (often jumping the gun) 'meaning nothing'. They are selling the promise of LAST year's ratings .... and those solid numbers of the year before .... and the double-digit numbers from the year before .... and the years before that. The syndrome is a lead-pipe monopoly. These stations know they own the market at these times and can capitalize on the fact that sponsors know it's the ripest time of the entire year to get their message or brand out there.
Yes, stations that traditionally do "all Christmas" sell on prior year ratings.
But this is not a slam-dunk. While such stations often get around a 10 share, they still are not reaching, at any time, 90% of their market.
And the composition of the audience is predominantly female so clients that don't want to directly appeal to that audience are not going to use such stations. And clients that are not seasonal appeal specialists won't want that environment.
The benefits exceed the gains, but it takes work.
I would bet that there are some advertisers who will only advertise at this time of year on this kind of station.
It doesn't seem Kosher, I have never seen a book where so many consistent powerhouse raters took really big hits. Can it be possible or did it ever happen that ratings were wrong. The only legit thing I can see is the Breeze hurting OGL, I hear them all over the place and the playlist is unique with many ""Oh WoW" past tunes.
Are you kidding...or is that sarcasm?
I was an UN-believer in the Christmas format, thinking that when the ratings came out, advertisers would pay no attention saying "But you were a different station back in December".
Then I learned that next December...they will sell the previous Holiday ratings to advertiser...at confiscatory rates.
Rates go up, demand goes up, listenership goes up.
And what advertisers DOESN'T want to be associated with Christmas? ;-)
Year after year of great Holiday ratings make selling the next Christmas sales easier and a proven thing and not just a fluke.
I believe many Christmas formatted stations have 30 shares Christmas week.
I would love to know what percentage of yearly billing occurs between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Anyone know?
The Holiday book is always "off" from the norm, and each year there is a slightly different outcome. This is not only due to the Christmas music station (or, in other years, stations) but also because the holiday season finds people doing non-routine things in all aspects of life.
Also, due to "calendar math" the days of the Holiday book are slightly different each year, with the start being closer... or not... to Thanksgiving.
Country stations often see a big drop in the holiday book, then rebound after the holidays.
Sorry, I was unclear. I meant that the Holiday Book is meaningless for most of the stations in it. I'm pretty sure the sales departments at the non-Christmas stations just pretend the Holiday book doesn't exist!
Yeah, they (the “other guys”) may well prefer to imagine there is no 13th month.
R
radio99011
Guest
The January ratings (January 3 – January 30) will be out on 2/19/2019
Do the sales staffs at the non-Christmas stations in the market -- especially those with female-leaning formats like AC and country that are impacted most by their target audiences' annual mass migration to sappy sentimentality and tired tinsel tunes -- offer a discount to advertisers on December, knowing their numbers in the demographic sweet spot aren't going to be as strong as they are the other 11 months?
Wow...."offer a discount?" I'm not sure one approaches a negotiation that way. I think what you're trying to do is make a long term deal, rather than a weekly or monthly deal. How's that for being diplomatic? I mean, you're selling numbers. That's what this is. So if you don't meet your numbers in December, then there's a January buy that will be affected in some way.
No, but they can say: "If WXXX's (insert Christmas Station here) prices are too high for you...then maybe our normal prices are more to your liking and a more efficient buy for you!"
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