Commercial radio stations have a number of other medium to compete with for the advertising dollar, notwithstanding the large number of other radio stations on the airwaves. This is why it is important that each station establishes a relationship with a specific target audience. Stations such as The Edge and More FM gain valuable information about their audiences through radio diaries, surveys and their own data gathering. They use this information to up their ratings and thus make more money.
Both The Edge and More Fm are part of the radio diary/survey system conducted by Research International. This way of measuring audiences is totally funded by the radio stations themselves. A diary is pre-printed with all known radio stations within a listed region, with the twenty four hours of each day divided into quarter hours. Diaries are placed, in person, in randomly selected households with anyone over 10 years of age who is willing to record their radio listening for a week. Over the week the respondent is requested to indicate the radio station listened to for each period of 8 minutes or more or each quarter hour. A respondent is contacted at least once throughout the week to ensure the instructions have been clearly understood and that there are no problems.In the latest survey period (October 07) The Edge was third in Nelson in terms of station share and More FM was fourth. In the number of listeners, The Edge was first and More was second.
The target audience for the Edge is 15-29 year olds with a female skew. The listeners are into the latest music, celebrity gossip, and are technology savvy. One way The Edge attracts listeners in this group is through their competitions and promotions. During the week when listeners were being surveyed, The Edge ran a “3 Strangers and a Wedding” promotion. This involved interviewing potential brides and grooms and organising a wedding for those who were best suited. The suspense was built up over time and the audience became involved in the relationship between the bride and the groom. Other promotions which encourage the audience to listen include giving away concert tickets to My Chemical Romance, revealing who the bands will be at The Big Day Out (and interviewing them), and staging big events such as Singled Out, where people can get together to potentially find boyfriends and girlfriends.
Personalities are a key ingredient in establishing a relationship between the audience and a media product. Breakfast presenters are the most important as the time slot between 6am-10pm is when most people listen. The Edge has The Morning Madhouse which includes Mike Puru, JJ Feeney and Dominic Harvey. Each of the presenters has a high public profile through television appearances, newspaper columns and womens’ magazines. The personalities relate to the audience because they are of a similar age, talk about topics that are of interest to young single people and play jokes on each other. Until recently More FM had local breakfast announcers but this year changed the Nelson network so that it now has the popular Simon Barnett and Gary McCormick who have for a long time rated No 1 in Christchurch. It was interesting that soon after the change, Nelson listeners were surveyed by Radioworks as to what they thought about the change and whether this had swayed them to listen to More FM or not.
Listeners are now able to have a seemingly more close relationship with radio stations through the use of new technology. You can text the announcers while they are on the air and they can respond to the text at the time, for example when Mike plays his ‘Pick of the week’ a song that he wishes to promote, people text in to say whether they like it or not. The audience may also feel that they have some control over the playlist because they can vote for their favourite songs online. The songs with the most votes are played at a certain time.
It is important the audience feels some loyalty to a radio station so that they will continue to listen to it especially at important advertising times (breakfast and drive-time). Studies by The Radio Bureau show that radio listeners do not ‘channel surf’ like they do on television and therefore advertisers are able to hit listeners at crucial times ie as they drive into the supermarket carpark. Radio stations like the Edge need to be able to deliver a specific audience to advertisers and they are able to prove who is listening through the survey information.
Without its audience it is impossible for a media product to achieve success. Advertisers depend on a commercial media product to rate well with its specific audience, if not advertisers will find it difficult to get a return on their advertising investment. The Edge and More FM have taken a hit in Nelson this year because Radio Hauraki which is new to the city has taken a significant chunk of their audience. In response to this Radioworks will have to think of significant promotions/competitions to entice local listeners back.