Listeners tune in and out of local radio stations

By Katie Maurer

The Dayton radio market saw some ups and downs this spring.

WHKO-FM 99.1, a country station owned by Cox Radio Inc., again scored the Dayton area’s top slot — gathering 10 percent of the share — according to the spring, 2007 Arbitron results released July 30.

Share ratings are the percentage of listeners in the 12 and over demographic who listen to the radio between 6 a.m. and 12 a.m.

Rob Riggsbee, president of Cincinnati-based Inside Media, said WHKO is one of the best-run country music stations in the nation.

“A lot of the success goes to the program and music director,” he said. “They have mastered the art of playing the music listeners want to hear.”

Riggsbee said stations do a lot of marketing to boost listeners during ratings periods with the most common being billboard campaigns.

Some stations will even change their formats or add personalities to the station to get a boost in ratings, he said.

Meaningful promotions such as car giveaways, all-expenses paid trips and money giveaways are other ways stations try to increase listenership, Riggsbee said.

“If they have a strong enough promotion it will likely increase ratings,” he said.

Clear Channel’s WLQT-FM 99.9 netted the second-most listeners and saw an increase in the share from 7.6 last spring to 8.2 this spring.

The adult contemporary station most recently kicked off a new morning show in June with Kim Faris as the host, but it did not play a role in the high ratings, said Bob Zuroweste, Dayton market manager for Clear Channel.

The ratings for spring 2007 are from April 5 to June 27. Faris started in June, which was toward the end of the ratings period.

Zuroweste said 99.9 began marketing Faris’ show before it began, which may have boosted ratings because people were sampling the station.

The station also has found a way to appeal to upscale, mostly female listeners, which has helped with the high ratings, said Zuroweste, who took over as market manager in May.

“99.9 plays a wide variety of music and appeals to both young and old listeners,” he said.

Clear Channel’s rock derivative stations — including alternative rock, light rock and top 40 — also have increased ratings.

Riggsbee said rock stations across the country are getting hit hard, but Dayton stations are doing something that isn’t being realized in other markets.

WMMX-FM 107.7, WTUE-FM 104.7 and WXEG-FM 103.9 all fell within the top ten stations for spring 2007.

“We have a very powerful footprint here,” Zuroweste said. “WTUE is one of the most powerful rock stations in the country, and the key is to play music people want to hear, which is what we are doing.”

WTUE, however, dipped a few percentage points to 6.2 in the recent ranking. WMMX also felt a decline going from an 8 share to 6.8.

Dayton’s two urban stations owned by Maryland-based Radio One Inc. have done well in the market, both seeing an increase in shares.

WROU-FM 92.1 saw an increase from 4.3 last spring to 6.1 this spring. Don Griffin, general manager of Radio One in Dayton, attributes the ratings bumps to drastic changes in format, which caused a little controversy.

After taking over the station in 2003, Radio One took Doug Banks off as the morning show host and replaced him with Tom Joyner, who was not familiar to Dayton listeners.

“Joyner has done well with the primarily African-American adults,” Griffin said. “Sometimes, things take longer to catch on, but the station has done very well with the programming and marketing.”

WROU is not the only station whose format was changed once acquired by Radio One. After acquiring WDHT-FM 102.9 six years ago, Radio One changed the format of the station from classic rock to hip hop, which has proven to be successful. The station — which ranked number five in total listenership — saw its ratings increase from 6.2 last spring to 6.5 this latest ratings cycle.

Radio One may see smaller changes in a few months as its five Dayton radio stations, as well as its Louisville stations, will be sold to Philadelphia-based Main Line Broadcasting.

Ratings for radio stations are important as they correlate into higher advertising prices.

The cost for radio spots vary, but on average, 30-second commercials on Dayton radio stations cost between $70 and $100 while 60-second spots costs between $170 and $200, local media watchers report.