August (really Jul 18 to Aug 14) ratings time

[CAwasinNJ]

KSL dipped a little bit more. So did KNRS. What more can we say? About half of the next release will be in September so we'll have to see how that goes.

In other news, I'd like to briefly comment on BYU's stations. We're a week and a half away from the 1st anniversary of BYU Radio taking over 107.9 and it's gone almost nowhere. Granted the results likely would have been a little better if BYUR was on the 89.1 full market signal instead of a rimshot, but I still don't think they'd equal what the classical format gets. My opinion is that they dodged a bullet. What do you think?

[levoix]

Question- for stations that simulcast AM & FM (KNRS and KSL) do they total the ratings between the two signals, or are they only counting the one signal (for example, Nielsen reports ratings for KSL-AM)

[tuttle]

Regarding BYUradio, I don't think success in Nielsen ratings, or the lack thereof, figures into their calculations. I believe they were relieved to find a terrestrial signal available for their format and happy to have 'dodged a bullet' and avoid to make adjustments on KYBU.

[seattlefollower]

Sept 9, 2019 14:48:58 GMT -6 levoix said:

Question- for stations that simulcast AM & FM (KNRS and KSL) do they total the ratings between the two signals, or are they only counting the one signal (for example, Nielsen reports ratings for KSL-AM)

If they are a 100% simulcast, they can request "total line reporting." This is what most stations have done for their internet streams in PPM markets. This means any in DMA listening is combined into one ratings number.

I am not sure in Salt Lake City, but the stations I've listened to do all seem to run the same on-air commercials as they do on the stream. I live out of market and know a little bit about the streaming insertion systems, so I heard when Broadway Media switched KXRK (for example) to insert national ads instead of local ones. However, once the national clients have served their impressions, it almost always goes back to some local content before the music/DJ resumes.

In my market, a sports station was trying to report their stream separately from the on-air station but quickly realized that was a mistake and combined them back up. A public broadcaster in my market does have a small ratings share for their online stream, which they choose to report separately from over the air.

[CAwasinNJ]

A 100% simulcast is not required for total line reporting. At least for an AM/FM simulcast the feeds can separate for 134 quarter hours (33.5 hours) per ratings period. I'm not sure about streams but it makes sense that the requirement would be the same. There was an issue at WMVP in Chicago where the stream and broadcast signal should have been combined but wasn't, so I know it's possible to do that. That could explain why a station like X96 would only substitute some ads and not all. They could limit the non-simulcast time so they can keep TLR. I know there was also an issue at one point with the unions where they wanted more money to allow their commercials to be streamed online and that resulted in a lot of problems for stations that streamed. I don't know if they ever got that worked out. I know that in New York there are two Entercom stations that break out their stream in the ratings and at least WCBS-FM replaces all of their ads on their stream.

tuttle, you're right that BYU probably doesn't care about ratings per se. At least not in the same way a commercial station does. On the other hand ratings do show how many people are listening. For a non-comm station the more people that are listening the more people are likely to donate. No listeners, no donations. Had they flipped 89.1 it's almost certain that the listenership and the donations would have gone down. I would be surprised if there wasn't financial support from the University and/or the Church, but they depend on listener donations by their own admission.

[tuttle]

CAwasinNJ, I don't listen to the BYU broadcast properties on a regular basis but I don't think I've ever heard anything like traditional non-comm 'fundraising'. I figured they were basically supported by their parent organizations, be it BYU or LDS Church (can I still call them that?).

[CAwasinNJ]

I don't know much about what they do on-air, but their donations requests are prominent on the websites.

[David]

I'm pretty sure that KBYU-FM, as well as KUER and KRCL, have on-air fund drives at least 2-3 times a year. That's standard procedure with non-commercial FM's. With NPR affiliates like KUER, their radio pledge drives are usually scheduled to coincide with KUED's PBS pledge drives.

[henry]

BYUradio (like BYUtv) never asks, nor accepts, donations.

KBYU 11 (as a PBS affiliate) did. This ceased when BYUtv took over the signal.

Can't speak for Classical 89 if they still do fund drives anymore.

[henry]

Sept 9, 2019 15:54:44 GMT -6 tuttle said:

Regarding BYUradio, I don't think success in Nielsen ratings, or the lack thereof, figures into their calculations. I believe they were relieved to find a terrestrial signal available for their format and happy to have 'dodged a bullet' and avoid to make adjustments on KYBU.

BYUradio is playing the long game. The station gets incrementally better each year, and management barely looks at the ratings book. The goal is to give the university something to be proud of. There's a whale of a lot of in-house programming and a lot of interviewing of experts both at BYU and other universities.

Podcast numbers matter more than ratings points, frankly. It's been too long now since I worked there, but I remember some shows seeing fantastic download metrics -- most of the audience is outside Utah, frankly.

[CAwasinNJ]

Sept 30, 2019 0:03:00 GMT -6 henry said:

BYUradio (like BYUtv) never asks, nor accepts, donations.

That may have been true at one time, but isn't at this time. The donate link on byuradio.org says "As a listener supported station, we rely on your financial support to make this service possible." and BYUtv has its own donate website www.supportbyutv.org