Since Wollongong has its own radio thread, I thought that it should have its own ratings thread.
i98 maintains its #1 position, going up 4% to 29.1%. Wave went up 3.1% to 18.5%, the first time since 2006 that the station has risen in the overall ratings. ABC Illawarra went down 2.7% to 13.5%, whilst JJJ went down 2.3% to 9.8%. Nowra-based Power FM scored a 1.2% share, beaten by most Sydney stations.
In the demographics, i98 wins the under-55s, Wave wins the 55-64s & ABC Illawarra wins the 65+.
Power is included but 2ST isn’t, which seems odd. And The Edge which is way outside the licence area is included!!
That’s because unlike Power, 2ST is not heard very well across many parts of the Illawarra, which is a pity.
And yes, it is strange that The Edge is included in the Wollongong survey, but never in the Sydney survey.
It’s worth noting that The Edge is more popular than 2DAY in the Illawarra. Likewise, WS is more popular than Smooth, whereas it’s the opposite in Sydney.
Despite both stations rising from last year’s survey, the gap between i98 & Wave is still in double-digits, at 10.6%. That said, at least Wave has the same audience share as Grant’s two Geelong stations combined, as revealed in last week’s Geelong survey.
Both i98 & Wave have a combined audience share of 47.6%, which is quite huge for a market in the footsteps of a metro market.
Congrats to Deano with Wave.
A good start with breakfast, Mel Greig began a few months into the year.
Habits take a long time to change, the increasingly irrelevant WIN TV licence will be of an ever diminishing assistance to i98 in coming years.
On the flipside, the same can be said about Magic 2CH being included in Sydney’s surveys but not Wollongong’s.
I think that might be reception related? From memory, WSFM has one of the stronger Sydney commercial FM signals while Smooth FM’s signal is a bit weaker.
Looking at the demographics in more detail, the gap between the two stations has closed in the 10-17s, 40-54s, 55-64s & 65+, whilst it was increasing in Overall, 18-24s & 25-39s. Here are the figures below:
Overall
Last Year: 9.7%
This Year: 10.6%
10-17s
Last Year: 26.7%
This Year: 21.9%
18-24s
Last Year: 20%
This Year: 24.4%
25-39s
Last Year: 21.6%
This Year: 26.1%
40-54s
Last Year: 7.9%
This Year: 6.6%
55-64s
Last Year: 6.1%
This Year: 5.8%
65+
Last Year: 5%
This Year: 3.3%
As you can see, the two stations are rating more closer to each other in the over-40s than in the under-40s.
That’s a good point.
Yes, I’ve observed that whilst travelling around the Illawarra.
When DMG began with Nova, the signal was weaker as its TX site was/is the ABC tower at Gore Hill (BA).
The existing FM stations used the TXA sites.
A current look at the radcom db shows differently now:
http://web.acma.gov.au/pls/radcom/assignment_range.search?pLOW_PCODE=2000&pHIGH_PCODE=2199&pLATITUDE=&pLONGITUDE=&pDATUM=GDA94&pDISTANCE=&pDISTANCE_UNITS=&pLINKED_PATHS=&pLOW_FREQ=89&pHIGH_FREQ=108&pLOW_FREQ_MULT=MHz&pHIGH_FREQ_MULT=MHz&pLOW_AUTH_DATE=&pHIGH_AUTH_DATE=&SUBMIT=postcode&pSORT_BY=frequency
Seems to be a listing at each site for the commercial broadcasters.