Specifically, Mason proposes redefining three demographic categories to better reflect radio usage today. Starting near the bottom of the spectrum, he suggests expanding the 12-17 demo to 12-19. “I mean, what is the difference in a 16 year old and an 18 year old?” he asks. Under the Mason Doctrine, 18-49 would downsize to 20-40 and 25-54 would age up to 41-64. Note how the demographic cliff that currently ends at age 54 would shift to 64, thereby adding a slew of core radio listeners.

“The suggested changes, in my opinion, would give advertisers a more defined target and at the same time reflect a realistic change in who uses radio in 2023 verses 1970 when these categories were probably created,” Mason writes. “The current outdated demos seriously understate the purchasing power of 55-64 year olds. The new suggested demos incorporate that.”

Mason’s connections on the social media site like the idea. Calling 35-64 “the economic sweet spot for radio now,” Keith Cunningham, Program Director at Meruelo Media heritage rocker KLOS Los Angeles, says agencies prefer the 25-54 demo because “it’s an impossible demo to truly target with programming, so it’s therefore more difficult to have a higher Avg. Rating, which helps agencies get a [lower] CPP, and they target on a narrower cell inside the demo, but don’t always disclose that.” However, Cunningham believes it would require ad agencies to change the demos they want to buy in order to persuade Nielsen to reconfigure its demos.

Mark Chernoff, the longtime programming exec who worked with Mason at CBS Radio, agrees it’s time for demos to be updated. “Many media buyers are young and aren’t realizing that stations that do well in the upper demos should be ‘bought’ as those listeners are buying cars, going to banks,” Chernoff comments.

“Dan’s on the right path,” says Tom Langmyer, President/CEO of Great Lakes Media Acquisition & Advisory Group and a former radio manager and programmer. “A properly defined set of target demos and actually serving them content that’s commonly and separately relevant to each, are the two ingredients we need to RETHINK,” he writes.

Angie Balderas, Senior VP/GM at Entravision Communication in Sacramento, notes the absurdity of the 25-54 demo, one that has been called a family reunion and not an actual demographic. “25-year-olds are starting a family while 54 year-olds are sending kids off to college,” she says. “There is life after 54 and buying power too! Bonus they are loyal to radio!”

Calling it a broken demo, Daryl O’Neal, CEO of Recharge Media, says the “new agencies rely on old demos, driven in part by new highly targeted forms of digital media.”

And Bridge Ratings President & CEO Dave Van Dyke says his company is finding that audience breakouts are tighter that what Mason proposes, “based on life group, media consumption and spending levels.”

Best known for a 20-year stretch as President & CEO of CBS Radio, Mason is the former chairman of VSiN and currently serves on the board of directors of The Broadcasters Foundation of America.

Link to Original Article

The post Time To Redefine Radio Demos? first appeared on CMB.

The post Time To Redefine Radio Demos? appeared first on CMB.

Edison data shows smart speakers are still seeing more users: the fourth quarter figure was up eight percent from a year earlier. But there was no holiday gift-giving “pop” for the devices in either 2021 or 2022. That compares to the period from 2017 to 2019 when smart speaker ownership soared from 7% to 33%.

Liz Mayer, Insights Manager at Cumulus Media and Westwood One, says that while forecasters initially predicted a significant number of use cases for smart speakers, that outlook may have been overly optimistic. “Perhaps ownership rates have stalled due to limited consumer applications besides playing music and answering simple questions,” she says. “Since smart speakers are inherently at-home devices, consumer interest and attention might be more focused on out-of-home activities in the post-pandemic era,” Mayer says.

The latest data shows the gains smart speakers are having are among older Americans. Edison says the rate of ownership doubled to 26% between Q4 2018 and Q4 2022 among people aged 55 and older. That compares to an 88% growth rate for 13 to 34 year olds, who may be more focused on the latest mobile phone than smart speaker.

The rate was higher among 35- to 54-year-olds, which Edison tracked a 96% growth rate for ownership of the devices during the four-year period. Yet there may also be a ceiling for interest in smart speakers. Edison says about half (47%) of 13- to 54-year-olds own one.

“Only one in four Americans over the age of 55 own a smart speaker, perhaps due to limited perceived benefits,” Mayer says.

Despite the slower growth rate, Mayer says that smart speakers remain “vital” to AM/FM since they are now more likely to be the only radio device inside the home. Edison’s 2022 Infinite Dial study revealed that 40% of smart speaker owners do not have a radio in their home, which was up from 28% in 2018. “It is impressive that in five years, over a quarter of total AM/FM radio streaming is now occurring via smart speakers,” she writes.

Even so, Triton Digital reports the proportion of total U.S. AM/FM radio streaming occurring through a smart speaker is also no longer growing at the pace in has been during the past few years. During the past two years, AM/FM radio streaming via smart speaker has grown slightly, rising from 23% to 26%.

The latest Edison Share of Ear data, also made public by Cumulus, points to on-air promotion paying off for AM/FM radio. It says that more than a third (36%) of the ad-supported audio time on smart speakers goes to AM/FM. That is ten points higher than second-place podcasts.

Those numbers are likely higher in the big cities. Mayer points out that in the top 10 DMAs, smart speaker ownership is 12% more likely than average according to Nielsen Scarborough. In markets 51 and smaller, ownership is 20% less likely. Salt Lake City had the highest rate of smart speaker ownership. There, people were 47% more likely to own one, with higher than average rates also in Austin, Chicago, Dallas and Indianapolis.

Mayer says Cumulus Media has seen first-hand growth in how important smart speakers are to its streaming success. Nearly a third (32%) of all streaming to its more than 400 radio stations during February went to a smart speaker. That is up 168% from February 2019.

Link to Original Source

The post Smart Speakers Have Become ‘Vital’ To Radio, But Device Ownership Growth Is Slowing first appeared on CMB.

The post Smart Speakers Have Become ‘Vital’ To Radio, But Device Ownership Growth Is Slowing appeared first on CMB.

“That has never happened before,” Bouvard says. “This is occurring because of the stiff and steep erosion in 18-49 linear TV reach and time spent. This is being fueled by cord cutting and streaming.”

Beyond the milestone, the pace of the change is also remarkable. In 2018, AM/FM radio’s 18-49 average audience was 63% the size of live and time-shifted TV. But the latest Nielsen report shows AM/FM radio now reaches 41% more persons 18-49 than live and time-shifted television. Nielsen says broadcast radio reached 83% of 18-49 year olds each week during the third quarter compared to a 59% reach for broadcast TV.

It’s not just reach where radio is gaining ground. Nielsen says 18-49 daily time spent with TV and AM/FM radio are now virtually tied. Television has a mere three-minute advantage over broadcast radio – 1 hour and 13 minutes versus 1 hour and 10 minutes.

“That is quite a head-snapper,” Bouvard says. “Radio’s advantage and reach is what’s causing it to beat TV in 18 to 49 average audience,” he explains in a video detailing his findings.

The Nielsen data shows 18-49 weekly reach of live and time-shifted TV has declined 28% during the past five years and TV’s daily time spent has plunged 56%—or a roughly 90-minute reduction in linear television viewing each day among the age group that means more to TV advertisers than any other.

Bouvard points to what he calls the “cliff drop” in pay TV penetration during the past decade. In 2009, almost nine out of 10 Americans had pay TV. But in 2022, less than half (48%) did. The result is the reach for linear television has fallen so significantly that Bouvard says it means 41% of 18-49 year olds will never see a linear TV ad in any given week. Nielsen Scarborough said in 2016 that the typical local broadcast affiliate station would reach six of ten people during a typical week. But in 2022, local TV station’s reach has sunk to about four in ten.

“A lot of [those] GRPs and impressions have vanished,” Bouvard says, while the definition of TV is also hurting linear TV. Today, a lot more people consider watching connected TV and subscriber TV services as “watching television.”

He points to a December 2021 Tremfya campaign by Johnson & Johnson. Their $14 million budget allowed them to reach roughly half of 25–54-year-olds. But J&J then began advertising the drug on radio for the first time. Their $1 million radio buy increased the brand’s reach by 45%. Bouvard says the added reach comes across the demographic spectrum.

“So how does radio make your TV better? It gets you folks under the age of 60 that you simply aren’t reaching on American linear TV these days,” Bouvard says. He notes in a blog post that it also helps reach people who do not watch all that much TV in the first place. “Radio does come to the rescue though because when you introduce it into the TV media plan, you generate really extraordinary increases and reach among 18 to 64 year olds who are light TV viewers,” he said.

Link to Original Source

The post In Historic First, Radio Beats Television Among 18–49-Year-Olds first appeared on CMB.

The post In Historic First, Radio Beats Television Among 18–49-Year-Olds appeared first on CMB.