Monday, August 22, 2011

What's Happening To Country Radio In Canada?

What can ANY country radio station learn from these national averages, gleaned (as in stats shared last week) from BBM/Canada's 2010-2011 Radio Data Book?

Fortunately, A&O's Canadian country clients have been having a very good 2010-2011, a fact that looks even better when compared to national format shares from all diary survey markets, which are not pretty:

(click the chart to enlarge it) Ranking #4 nationally overall still isn't too shabby, of course, and many other formats would like to trade places with country, but Top 40 and Classic Hits were up at Country, Hot AC and Classic Rock's expense through last fall and the BBM national Spring 2011 country format 12+ diary market share continued the drop, to an 8.5.

The population demographic movements offer one helpful clue - as the format's 18-24 share is better than 25-34 and even 35-49 nationally and many listeners slid into the 55+ age groups, but there's more to it than just that.

Even more interesting are the locations where those trends happened and I'll share that info - which provides a clue as to what our clients in Canada have been doing to out-perform the trends with you tomorrow.

No comments: