INSIDE THE HOUSTON PPM RESULTS

Anthony Acampora – AllAccess

The first PPM currency for the Houston market was released last week by Arbitron -- and it delivered some very telling stories. The resurgence of Rock radio has now been confirmed in both the Philadelphia and Houston markets -- with Clear Channel's KTBZ/HOUSTON the 12+ and Adults 18-34 leader, along with a stellar No. 2 ranking 25-54.

AllAccess asked RadioCrunch President Anthony Acampora (RadioCrunch@aol.com) to review the results of the June 2007 PPM currency and compare it to the Winter 2007 diary data. What follows is a look at the top stations in the popular 18-34 and 25-54 cells. We also have insight on listening location and audience composition - as well as the dramatic changes in Cume and TSL.

Adults 18-34

While we saw a lot of shifting in the 12+ arena, the 18-34 was relatively steady. As we had seen during the trials, older-skewing formats such as Classic Hits performed better in the first PPM months - especially Cox's KHTC and Univision's Spanish Adult Hits KOVE. Other than that, there wasn't a dramatic shift among 18-34's.

Adults 25-54

The clear dramatic shift was in the 25-54 cell. While KTBZ was a bit of a surprise as the 12+ and 18-34 leader, the station was also just 0.1 out of the top spot 25-54, beat only by sister Classic Rock KKRW. Clear Channel actually grabbed three of the top four spots in the cell, with heritage KODA slipping from first to fourth. While Cox didn't place any stations in the top eight spots among adults 25-54, they did see growth all around, with KKBQ (13-9), KHPT (17-10), and KHTC (16-11) all scoring decent moves.

The decreases for Urban-formatted stations, which were noted in the Philadelphia results, continued with Houston's Urban AC KMJQ (2-6), Urban KBXX (6-13), and Gospel KROI (11-19).

The PPM shows about 6% more listening being done outside of the home. Not a dramatic difference - but noticeable.

CUME

As we have seen, Cume has increased across the board. For the Cume comparison, we used 12+ only.

TIME SPENT LISTENING

The one consistency we've seen with early PPM results is the large Cume growth, but a TSL decline. While this tends to even out for a lot of stations in the AQH share categories, this may be the new paradigm for radio from here on out, and their sales departments will have to react accordingly.

One of the bigger surprises we saw was the low TSL by female-targeted stations -- especially those that tend to generate solid office listening. TSL declines ranged from 43% to 73% so it doesn't seem to be a quirk in the methodology. Time will tell.

AUDIENCE COMPOSITION

The PPM has shown some major shifts in audience composition. While AC formats have traditionally skewed heavily female, we're seeing quite a bit more male listening to these formats. We've heard over the years that women control the radio and a lot of men listen along. That theory has truly been put to the test here and may be correct. Hot AC KHMX, '80s KHPT and Urban AC KMJQ -- which were decidedly female -- now skew slightly more male, as does Rhythmic KPTY. Even Top 40 KRBE, which skewed almost 2-1 female with adults, is now just slightly more female. Meanwhile, the Rock formats are skewing more male as well. This also could be a function of better return rates from male respondents. These comparisons aren't exact, because we now have children 6-11 to include, but as we can see, the male-to-female ratio has changed dramatically in some areas:

What does this mean to the bottom line? Judging by data from just two test markets, it would be unwise to make definitive statements. What this data does suggest is that radio stations will have to judge their audience composition with more of an open mind and being more responsive to future data. While early numbers suggest that some of the preconceived notions about radio listenership are correct, not all of them seem to be. Stay tuned.

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