Programming -- Mission Impossible

Even So-Called Formatic Perfectionists Can Misinterpret The Numbers

It's important to know what the mission and goal of your station really is this fall. Depending on who you ask, the answers can vary from "Just get me some numbers, stay within budget and you'll never hear from me," to "I know we're a young-end appeal station, but our sales department needs more adults. Can you boost our adult numbers and still keep our young-end audience happy? Oh, and can you do it with one less person? We're going to have to pare down and lose our promotions director."

Does this sound familiar? Sometimes it's kind of like "Mission: Impossible," because often the amount of time it takes to make the adjustments necessary to capture some "side cume" may be considered unrealistic by most managers who do not come from, nor fully understand or appreciate programming.

If you are an experienced programmer, you already know to always look beyond the music for new ways to create great radio. Find ways to update and fine-tune your station's sound. Work on your marketing and production skills, and knowledge with constructive discontent and programming moxie. Also, experienced PDs know that issues are important to adult listeners. The theory is that music will keep the younger audience happy while you talk about some things adults want to hear. The fact is that many of the new members of Generation Jones are really into politics and would be more likely to spend some time with a station that recognized this and provided them with some opinions and answers

Programmers Must Think Like Politicians

We've reached a time when social convention suggests it's now appropriate to express these political concerns openly. Recent statistics show that in the privacy of the voting booth, many of our busy listeners are people who don't necessarily understand their own reasons for the choices they make much of the time. In between tunes, we can help them. This time voters must move their focus beyond race or gender.

This coming year is going to be an important one for everybody. It is going to be particularly important for the minority communities served by Urban radio and who are our primary target audience. We've got to encourage them to register and vote. We have a chance to not only to witness history being made, but to participate in the historical electoral process.

Twenty years ago, when a black man was running for president and a woman was considering it, the two were viewed mainly through the prism of identity politics: What would Jesse Jackson's campaign mean to black political ascendancy? Was he just a "spoiler?" What did Pat Schroeder mean to the women's movement? Neither was really expected to win; both were most valuable as kind of spotchecks for the state of the American psyche when it came to minorities, women and political power.

Schroeder's test of the waters I remembered mainly for the tears she cried when she announced she wouldn't run. Jesse Jackson's campaign rose at the margins of the electorate.

Now, the top Democratic presidential candidates are a woman, Hillary Clinton, and a black man, Barack Obama. Both expect to win. Both embrace their identities.

Then, too, neither one is a "typical" female or African-American candidate. Clinton, a New York senator and former First Lady, brings a wealth of fame and experience to the campaign, compared with Schroeder in 1988, who had served eight terms in relative obscurity as a Colorado congresswoman, or compared with Geraldine Ferraro, who was given the number-two slot on the Democratic ticket in 1984, after three terms as a House of Representatives member from New York.

Clinton also undeniably benefits from the boost of her husband's enduring popularity with many voters, but mainly her supporters see her as a knowledgeable candidate. Obama, elected to the Senate from Illinois after a memorable 2004 Democratic National Convention speech, is the first African-American to achieve national prominence independent of the civil rights movement.

Strikingly, several Democratic voters in the mostly white, early-voting states of Iowa and New Hampshire said they stopped consciously thinking about either candidate's race or gender months ago as they watched Clinton and Obama campaign.

To be sure, some voters have said they, or those they know, aren't sure they're ready for a black person or a woman in Oval Office. Some worry how either might fare in a general election. Some women and African-Americans say they can't help but get excited about supporting someone who looks more like themselves.

We see it as kind of a phenomenon and a sign of a maturing American society.

Political Comparisons

There's a really good comparison to be made between great programmers and strong politicians.

Like politicians, radio programmers are trying to get the most votes. Politicians want theirs from the electoral college, while programmers hope to collect theirs from those listeners with Arbitron diaries, and soon in the top-50 markets, meters. The big difference is that in politics, if you get one bad turnout, you're out of office. Programmers usually get two down books before they have to pack it in.

Understanding the numbers

It's important to understand the numbers that can make a difference in our careers and lives. The numbers we're referring to, obviously, are Arbitron numbers. Plus, there is a story behind the numbers. To better understand the story, it is also important to do a ratings analysis, whether you go to Arbitron world headquarters in Columbia, MD, or use PD Advantage, you should examine your numbers. Believe it or not, the best time to do an analysis is after you've had a good book. Why? Because it's hard to find something that isn't there. You have to market to develop new listeners. Usually, unless your station does something to reverse it, cume is always going down.

So, if you had a good Summer book you could easily say that yours has become a favorite station for your core audience. But that's somewhat illusory. "Favorite station" is a value judgment; it is not any measure of listening. Those diarykeepers who listed your station may or may not be partisans. Another common usage term is "loyal audience." That doesn't mean anything, either. There's no definition for loyalty. It's whatever you want it to be.

With no real consensus of what constitutes a so-called "heavy listener," it is probably best defined as anyone listening to a single station for more than 100 quarter-hours in a given week. Imagine someone who spends 25 hours a week with your station. Approximately 39% of your quarter-hours will come from heavy listeners. If they credit your station, you're glad, but it can't help but make you wonder what some of these people do with their busy lives in these fast times. Regardless, these heavy listeners dramatically affect your station's ratings. When stations are up in the Spring and down in the Summer, you should immediately look for these heavy listeners. Sometimes, a really strong, well-executed contest or promotion can cause these ratings swings.

The average diarykeeper tunes into their favorite station three to four days a week. Now this is a station with consistently strong ratings -- yet it could still mean you're not mentioned three to six days in a given week.

Not surprisingly and regardless of format, Arbitron's first survey day, Thursday, is the highest for listening. It triggers survey enthusiasm and you very typically find people get more involved with the process. They'll listen to more radio stations on Thursday -- the first day of the new diary week. While it's interesting, it doesn't mean they'll listen to your station more.

Stations get nearly 60% of their total week's cume on Thursday. Friday is about 55%. The quarter-hour is at about the same percentage level. But in examining successful Uurban stations across America, we've also seen Mondays, Tuesdays and Fridays as the day in which the highest listening occurred. While Thursday is obviously the day most smart radio programmers focus on, if it's cheaper to buy advertising Monday night on television, you might be smart to buy it.

Speaking of buying in, there are some GMs who overreact and figure that it's time to fire their PD and/or change formats behind one book of dwindling digits. We personally knew of an owner/ GM who was preparing for a major format change after his station's rank dropped from third to sixth in adults 25-54. What he hadn't noticed was that his average quarter-hour rating of 2.5 was the same in both books, while two other stations in non-competitive formats had enjoyed unusual upward spikes.

To help everyone avoid similar unnecessary pain owing to ratings misunderstandings, we thought we'd share a couple thoughts. Sample size and the size of the audience should be the key determinants of the theoretical error and range around an estimate in which weighting and sampling vagaries must be considered.

In the meantime, here is something to think about: If you had a great Summer book, make certain it really is great (statistically significant upward movement unrelated to seasonal patterns). Even if it truly is a great book, take it in stride and remember the law of gravity. If you had a bad Summer book, ditto to the above on significance. And if it's truly bad, don't take it too hard. Some of the best programmers in the business, me included, have "missed the mission," -- but would never have gotten their start without the help of a truly bad book. Sometimes we misunderstood the politics of the game.

Word.