Embargoed from anyone who doesn't buy the ratings....period. Other stations, other media outlets and the general public. I honestly don't think many people outside the industry and in the advertising game really care who is number one. They like the station or stations they like and that is all that matters to them.
As far as gauging results..For a station, it would be with billing, how much money you make from commercials, remotes, appearances and Non Traditional Revenue....for a business, it would be how effective is your advertising. Did the commercials you ran on your big sale have them banging down the doors or did you bang your head against the wall wondering why no one was coming in?
and for listeners, do you hear the music you want? get the information you want? Can you win cool stuff for listening?

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I am a proud 53 percenter....are you?

By how many people respond to a commercial.



MacDonald Broadcasting is still under contract with Arbitron... Arbitron is the company that conducts survey's to measure listenership. It is speculated that MBC will not re-sign when their contract ends. (the Saginaw MBC stations dropped Arbitron last year)



He doesn't subscribe to Arbitron but even stations that are not subscribers will get their hands on the results somehow. But they are not supposed to use those numbers to sell ads to clients.



More and more broadcaster have been dropping Arbitron since the economy turned for the worse several years ago. It ca cost hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to subscribe and when cutting the fat in a stations budget that's a lot of money that can be saved with one swipe of the pen.




The findings are not being hidden from those who listen to radio because the Arbitron numbers were never meant for you. Stations subscribed to Arbitron because it gave them data to take to an advertiser so they could say 'look, more people listen to us than our competition... buy from us'.

The results are embargoed when one or more stations refuses to subscribe so that those stations cannot receive and use that data without paying.

Word has it that in the Saginaw/Bay City market so many stations have dropped Arbitron that the figures are not simply embargoed... but the whole market has been dropped from Arbitron's survey schedule.

Arbitron may not produce a Saginaw survey, but they still survey Saginaw. Too important to the Detroit TSA to just drop. Plus there is a county by county national book that syndication providers use. So the diaries are still there and the info can still be pulled... Here's an interesting story that I don't know if it's true. In a small market (I think it was in North Dakota but I'm not sure) the local stations all cancelled their Arbitron contracts. The day after they expired, they contracted with a company to produce a custom report. That company was Arbitron. Released from the restrictions of the Media Research Council and not accredited, Arbitron produces a Custom Market Report with a higher diary intab that all the agencies accept and use, at HALF THE PRICE. Can anyone collaborate that?

I find it hard to believe Saginaw County is in the DETROIT TSA.

St. Clair County, yes, and maybe Genessee, but certainly not Saginaw and Bay.

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RIP Jim Northrup. You were great.

I can admit when I'm wrong. In PPM markets like Detroit, they no longer report a TSA area or numbers. They do produce county by county books which means they still distribute diaries but they would not be part of a Detroit report since according to Arbitron.com:

It's not too hard to fathom ...

When you measure the $$$ coming in from ratings driven sales, which are net-net (meaning both a rep and agency commission are paid on the gross $$$) and look at the percentage of the net that goes to Beltsville, it's really a no-brainer.

How as an industry we put ourselves in a position to purchase the sledgehammer wielded by media buyers for their use, I'll never quite comprehend.

Add to that every time radio audience numbers come out there is a spike in other media sales ... because the decision maker really doesn't care if you're number 1 in left handed dogs between 4:15 and 4:17p. They want to know if youcan help them sell THEIR products and services.

I can assure you that there are only a hand full of sledgehammer media buyers still interested in Radio. I think radio wishes it still had that problem.

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"Actually that's kind of the problem with Radio, for every real legend, you get about fifteen tired old gasbags who stick around too long."