Metro Radio Ratings: Survey 1, 2016

New topic for Survey 1, 2016

The first metro radio ratings for 2016 is now out: https://www.radioinfo.com.au/news/survey-1-2016-first-results-year

In Sydney, KIIS starts off the new year as the #1 FM station with 9.8% share, with Smooth taking out #2 FM with 8.6%, followed by JJJ at 7.6%, 2MMM at 7.1%, WS at 7% & Nova at 6.8%. 2Day went up 0.7% to 4%, although breakfast ratings for Rove & Sam remained stagnant. Magic 2CH fell 0.6% to 3.5%, whilst 2UE also fell 0.6% to 4%. In the demographics, JJJ is #1 in the 18-39s, whilst 2MMM is #1 in 40-54s & Smooth is #1 in the 55-64s, even beating out 2GB & 702 in that demographic.

In Melbourne, Gold 104.3 is the #1 FM station, beating Fox by 0.3%. KIIS fell 0.4% to 6.4%, whilst Nova fell 0.8% to 6%, getting beaten by JJJ in the process. Magic 1278 fell to a new low of 2.8%, as the station lost its Melbourne-only focus, due to its programming also heard into Sydney & Brisbane.

Speaking of Brisbane, where Magic 882 also fell to a new low of 2.8% (whilst 4BC rose slightly), 97.3FM is still #1 with 12.1%, followed by Nova (11%), 4MMM (10.8%) & hit105 (10.3%). AM music station 4KQ rose 0.2% to 8.2%, whilst JJJ rose 1.1% to 8.4%.

In Adelaide, the unthinkable has happened: Mix 102.3 is no longer the #1 station, with 891 ABC taking the top spot. Further to that, Mix also lost the #1 FM position to Nova by 0.2%, with 5MMM & hit107 not far behind. And in Perth, Mix 94.5 continues to be the most popular station in Perth, whilst 96fm continues to be the least popular FM station, even though it rose 0.2% from the previous survey.

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Hmm, interesting Sydney numbers, 2DAY’s up a bit, but Breakfast is stagnate, (guess Rove & Sam aren’t working). Next Breaky crew to 2DAY studios please!

Smooth95.3 is No.2 FM, only 1.2 behind KIIS & actually flogging WSFM.

Magic Melbourne, & Brisbane are going down, Magic 2CH Sydney will probably join them next survey, 2CH is better than it was, so it may reverse the trend & pickup, but with Smooth’s strength they’re not going to be able to compete now.

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Interesting to see that the ratings of 2DayFM actually increased for this survey and actually managed to beat 2CH for a change (hopefully beating 2UE is next :stuck_out_tongue: ) ! But surely SCA expected an increase from 3% ratings for the Rove & Sam breakfast show?

The ratings drop for 2CH is concerning, but probably not surprising considering that there hasn’t been any external promotion for the relaunched station as far as I can tell. I’ll wait and see what it’s doing like in Survey #3 before coming to conclusions, but I do think that the “Magic” branding on 1170 will probably only last about a year (if even that!) similar to how the last station called Magic in Sydney switched back to it’s callsign-based branding after a short period of time.

2GB has lost some ground although I don’t think they should be too concerned at this stage. They’re still the #1 station and are by far the leaders in the breakfast and morning timeslots.

All in all, it was a rather interesting survey in Sydney especially with most FM music stations getting an increase. Just a Summer thing? Who knows…

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Good to see Tragic 882 falling further. Classic Rock for Triple M in Brisbane is working for them - great to see! They were the big winner in this survey with big gains across the day.

Triple J in Brisbane also rose, as to be expected around Hottest 100 time. Spencer Howson is still No.1 for Brekky despite a 3% drop. On the flipside Triple M Brekky rose nearly 4% (no doubt Jamie Dunn over Xmas had an impact on that!) and 4KQ brekky also rose.

Only 1.7% between the bottom of the FM commercial stations and the top. This has to be the tightest it has been in a while?

nope, they expected a slight drop.

The signs are actually quite positive for 2Day, especially across the workday with quite large increases… they just have to get the bookends working through better liners and more promotion and they’d be back to 5 and 6 instead of at 4.

Hit 105 and Hit 107 also had good results. Melbourne’s got too much change to really notice anything at this point.

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All three CHRs in Melbourne fell, yet triple j jumped back up after a couple of backwards books. And so the market volatility continues.

Looking at the Sydney ratings more closely, Magic 2CH gets beaten by ABC Classic FM in the 65+ age group! :open_mouth: Meanwhile, in the 55-64s, 2MMM rates higher than Magic 2CH in that demographic, which hasn’t happened before.

As for the performance of WS, it’s no longer #1 (music or overall) in any demographic, even getting beaten by sister station KIIS (& 2MMM) in the 40-54s, which traditionally is WS’s target market. Gold in Melbourne, on the other hand, continues to top the 40-54s, as well as being the most popular music station in the 55-64s.

Problems for Nova in Sydney too. Not only being crushed by JJJ in the demographics they are targeting, 18-39, but now they’re getting smashed by KIIS in every demographic except 18-24. And they lose everyone after 40. Might need a rethink of the way they alienate certain demographics if they want to compete with the other hit music stations.

Kate, Tim and Marty no longer number one, being beaten by Dave & Kate now.

Not only that, they’re also beaten by JJJ’s Veronica & Lewis in Sydney.

Big drop for John & Gary on 2UE breakfast. Not a good sign for them considering all the talk of format changes.

Also big drops for Hadley and Smith on 2GB. Probably just a one off, but I bet they aren’t too happy today. Hadley in particular does like to talk about ratings.

Nova’s media release

Rare triumph for Gold 104.3 in Melbourne. SCA will be worried with Fox’s performance on breakfast and drive both of which fell by more than 2 points. Solid starts for the new breakfast teams at Nova and KIIS.

The thing with Melbourne is that the ratings have been ‘wild’ for a few years now across the board - big increases and drops are pretty much the norm and seems to happen one way or another in each survey. We need to wait and see whether the Fox drops points to a trend (or as I suspect), simply a victim of the Melbourne swing and roundabouts.

I wouldn’t say the new Nova and KIIS breakfast shows have had a ‘solid’ start when they’ve barely moved the needle from the last survey

not really, it’s called new competitors and people trying out the competition, it will settle.

15.9% for “others” in Brisbane - I wonder what rating River 94.9 would get if included; no reason it shouldn’t be IMO.

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I have said this before IMO Nova 96.9 needs to implement the Nova 106.9 exact playlist and fun sweepers they have to improve their ratings. The throws backs they have introduced are good but then they go ultra safe and repetitive as we all know.

Nova 106.9 today played a throwback ifrom Cyprus Hill Insane in the Membrane. They also do mix tape weekdays at 1pm playing the normal network playlist plus more out there throwbacks e.g Nirvana Lithium which is not a normal song you would hear on Nova.

In the Sydney market Triple J performs exceptionally well, you have KIIS, 2day, The Edge all doing CHR. Nova needs to differentiate from the other CHRs and I believe the Brisbane sound is the only way to do this. It will not happen as it is always safety first in Sydney and Melbourne.

When driving around Sydney working I listen to Fitzy and Wippa on Nova and Kate Tim and Marty, the rest of the time I stream Nova 106.9.

[quote=“Ant5476, post:25, topic:593”]
I have said this before IMO Nova 96.9 needs to implement the Nova 106.9 exact playlist [/quote]
I don’t know if going old school is the solution but I know that the repetitiveness is killing Nova 96.9. I listen to them at night and on the weekends when they play music outside the top 40 or recent hits from last year or the last couple of years and I think “Why can’t they do that all the time instead of playing the same few songs every two hours?”

I agree Old Skool is the positioner for 2day fm.

If Nova 96.9 was as adventurous as Nova 106.9 with their playlist and less repetitive it would make all the difference. Maybe knock a couple of percentage points of Triple J who have been smashing Nova 96.9 recently.

Just going back through the Sydney results, Smooth 95.3 is #1 on weekends with a 10.3, beating both ABC702 on 8.7 & 2GB on 8.5. Closest music station is KIIS on 8.0, then WSFM on 7.6.

I love Melissa Doyle’s Breakfast show, but given the entire weekend on Smooth is AFAIK, voice tracked automation, how does it rate so high?

Maybe that’s what people want to hear on weekends, just chill-out & relax, listening to some easy music with no shit talk.

I expect those figures to change next survey though, with the football calls on ABC702 & 2GB bringing in listeners, footy calls on Triple M to a point also.