Locating Lost Listeners

They're out there, waiting for someone to show them the way home.

Many urban programmers have felt for years that their stations weren't receiving all the listening credit they deserve. Now, new research seems to indicate that suspicion may be well-founded. Urban stations may be losing cume along with lots of shares.

We have touched on this phenomenon before, but I thought we'd examine it again this fall. It's called "the phantom cume." Phantom cume is the difference between real listening and reported listening. Studies show the problem occurs primarily in markets hosting either a lone or highly predominant urban station. Listeners in markets with more that one urban choice tend to be more radio and urban aware and the problem isn't as great. Phantom cumers are listeners who say they listen to a particular station, but don't name it when asked to identify or list the stations they listen to in the unaided recall section of a focus group or questionnaire. When pressed or prompted, these people are eventually able to recall the station's call letters, but they're unable to do it from top-of-mind. That, of course, is the kiss of death, seeing as Arbitron's methodology depends heavily on unaided recall.

Recent studies have shown that the urban audience is often underreported by as much as fifteen to twenty percent. That can represent two to three shares for stations in many markets.

Re-Defining The Product

The answer to the phantom cume question is to convert real listening to reported listening. The basic problem is that real listening isn't being converted. The first step is to take nothing for granted when marketing your station to either your core or peripheral cumers. In years of examining diaries, we found that merely saying you're listening to a station isn't enough. When we look at the comments of listeners who claim they listen to a particular station, we often find that the station they mention in their comments is not the station they credited with listening.

The solution is to properly serve your secondary and tertiary cumers. You must define what urban music is, especially if you're in a market where you're sharing audience and music titles with a Top-40, rhythmic or crossover station. Even smooth jazz listeners who drop by your station have their own frame of reference as to what urban is, so you must define it for them.

Don't overestimate a listener's product knowledge. Just because they say they listen to urban music, don't take for granted that they know the parameters of the music and have therefore granted you format exclusivity. Don't believe that because they hear a song they perceive as urban they automatically think of your station. The key is to make sure the casual cumer knows the call-letters and dial position of your station and that they recognize yours as the urban station in that market.

Imagine how much better urban could be if it could only get all the listening credit it deserves. And taking the time and effort to properly educate and condition the phantom cumers can increase both the cume and shares.

There are very few sure bets in radio, but one sure way to increase your chances of winning is to recognize the "phantom cume." And if you happen to be working in a new or "virgin" urban market, you're even more vulnerable to the phantom cume. Markets where the high-profile, ethnically well-off and cutting-edge audience would be less likely to admit to listening to an urban station until they find out that what all their friends are listening to. These conservative but down-to-earth listeners just naturally gravitate toward urban jams when it's time to party. And along with the music are personalities who obviously identify with the music and the lifestyle.

Personalities are what make the difference in many markets. Some of the urban format's brightest tacticians in discussing what will be required for continued growth and areas that are ripe for improvements, have said over and over again urban is a fun format. Personalities make it more fun.

Along with the fun personalities, urban stations have to constantly develop new marketing strategies. You may need to adjust your musical philosophies, select and carry out stronger positioning statements. And to counter the effect of phantom cume, you will need better development tactics to maximize performance, service your core and bolster cume. That way you can provide a new home for a lot of lost listeners.

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