Apr 06
15
Podcast Eats Radio's Lunch
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By 2010 – Podcasting will take 15% of radio's audience according to Bridge Research.
Not really surprising is it? Radio's golden age was a long time ago. Podcasting's has not yet arrived. It used to be that radio would join people together in real time. But in the world we live in “time and place shifting” is more critical than listening in real time. And this is the thing – other than personalization – that the old school corporate radio bosses don't seem to get.
Here are the highlights of the research
- Terrestrial audience erosion to alternative audio entertainment continues to occur in young demographics.
- Podcasting is beginning to siphon listening.
- MP3
device usage can consume as much as 80% of a radio user's audio
entertainment during initial ownership weeks and months. This number
tends to be generally lower among 30+ women and 35+ men. - MP3
player fatigue is slowing overall as the market continues to expand due
to consumer interest in these devices. Fatigue with MP3 players remains
high among those consumers who have owned the devices longer than 6-8
months. - Competition for traditional radio time-spent-listening
is more severe. Time spent listening to terrestrial radio is fighting
for its share of time with a multitude of digital devices. Even
television has regained viewership based on this quarter's data. The
most often given reason for this by our sample: better programming and
new shows. Meanwhile, music-specific radio stations are vying for the
attention of their constituencies as MP3 players continue to be more
pervasive than ever (75 million sold). Podcasting is beginning to show
evidence of cannibalizing radio's time-spent-listening. - Satellite
radio also suffers from attrition! For the first time, we are seeing
satelite radio consumers who have been subscribers for longer than 6
months are actually spending less time than they were six months ago
with their satellite service of choice. According to our panel, during
the second quarter of 2005 average time spent listening to satellite
radio was 16 hours per week. During this most recent study during the
period of January 1 through March 31, 2006, weekly TSL for satellite
radio among subscribers of 6 months or longer was down to 12.6 weekly
hours.