Katz Radio Group, the top national sales representation firm in the radio industry, today announced audio listening trends over the past year. In the most recent RADAR findings, the gold standard measurement system for radio, which measure national listening behavior from October 2011 to September 2012, broadcast radio continues to strongly dominate listening ” reaching 243 million listeners per week and representing 92.4% of all listening (1). In comparison, digital listening currently represents only 7.6% of all audio listening (2).
“The latest findings bear out what we continue to find from all our research ” and hear from consumers ” that broadcast radio is still by far the overwhelming leader in audio listening,” said Mary Beth Garber, EVP/Radio Analysis and Insights at Katz Radio Group. “Broadcast radio isn’t losing listeners ” in fact just the opposite, which makes it clear that digital listening actually represents incremental listening. So as digital listening ” which is both AM/FM digital listening and personal music collection digital listening ” continues to grow, it is an expansion of broadcast radio listening, additive to it rather than a substitute. Research from Infinite Dial 2012 shows that digital listeners are also heavy broadcast users (3); digital extends the reach and popularity of broadcast radio to new devices and new listening opportunities. We’re pleased with digital’s growth and how it has added to the broadcast radio experience.”
Garber continued, “A digital-only “˜music collection’ audio service like Pandora only has 4.4% of total audio listening, even if you assume the Triton measurement of when the service is left on is comparable to the measurement of actual listening that Arbitron does. That said, even though it is still a relatively small percentage of all listening, we remain excited about the role of digital listening in extending radio listening to new devices, further enhancing radio’s role as the major mobile entertainment and information service to the consumer.”
