Reach Declines Across All Demographics For Commercial Radio Whilst BBC Reports Upturn

The weekly reach of All Commercial stations declined by around 2% year on year for all demographic groups in Q4 2007, as well as falling over 1.6% period on period.

Meanwhile, All BBC’s weekly reach across all demographics was up both year on year and period on period, by 1% and over 0.7% respectively.

All BBC now has a weekly reach across all demographic groups of over 33.1 million, whilst All Commercial’s rests at around 30.7 million.

The most significant decline for All Commercial came for the Children 4-14 age group, which fell almost 11% year on year, despite an upturn of more than 3.5% compared to Q3 2007. Reach for this group now stands at just under 5.5 million.

The Children 4-14 group also saw the greatest decline for All BBC. This group dropped over 8% period on period, and around 0.5% year on year, taking it to over 3.5 million.

All Commercial stations’ share of listening was down almost 2.1 percentage points period on period and over 1.8 percentage points years on year across all demographic groups, to under 42.5%, whilst All BBC’s share was up over 1.8 percentage points, to just under 55.5%.

Commercial’s biggest fall in share was recorded by the 45-64 demographic, down almost four percentage points period on period and 1.5 percentage points year on year to 38.8%.

Children 4-14 saw the most successful upturn in share of listening for All BBC stations. This group bolstered its share by over 30 percentage points from Q4 2006 to Q4 2007, taking its share to 30.2%.

Hours per listener for All Commercial stations dropped from 14.6 in Q4 2006 to 14.0 in Q4 2007. Meanwhile, all demographics are tuning in to All BBC stations for an average of 17 hours, up from 16.9 in Q3 2007 and down from 17.5 in the same period the previous year.

Children 4-14 are now listening to less All Commercial radio, sticking with the stations for an average of under nine hours in the last quarter of last year, equating to a drop of over 8.2% year on year and quarter on quarter.

However, this age group has bolstered its hours of listening for All BBC stations – up over 12.7% year on year and 3.3% period on period to 6.2 hours.

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