The new Arbitron ratings are out..
Who subscribes to them?
Where is your station / stations in the line up?
Never been a beleiver in Arbitron. Almost any station can find a category and make a legitimate claim to #1. That is very confusing to local business people. Samples are normally way too small to be accurate. And, I'm aware of at least one case where they admitted a big mistake in the published results but would do nothing to correct it.
We're an unrated market and I'm glad for that. Arbitron is irrelevant here.
Having seen a few Arbitron county-by-county breakouts for our small market over a period of years (ages ago), and having been both at the top and bottom of the heap from one year to the next, I'm inclined to join other broadcasters who've characterized them as worse than worthless.
Fact is, every station reaches enough people to make an investment in advertising pay off for the advertiser, IF (and only if) his message is compelling.
And it's too easy to manipulate the results of a listener survey simply by giving a whole bunch of stuff away during the survey period. Advertisers are generally smart enough not to be taken in by a "We're #1" pitch these days. Agencies like to have ratings to justify their buying decisions, since they rarely invest the time and effort to do their own research in the markets they're buying. Here's where a great account rep can play an indispensable role, providing the agency buyer with local information and insights they're not going to get from Arbitron.
oh I love this...!!!
what local information and insight?
