DON’T WORRY ABOUT “NEWS FATIGUE” • MORE MARKETS WHERE NPR NEWS STATIONS BEAT ALL COMMERCIAL COMPETITORS

(The New Yorker)

We are getting tired of hearing about “news fatigue.” (lol)

It is true that some NPR News/Stations are not seeing the audience growth they experienced during the 2016 election and the months that followed. 

But, public radio is well positioned for the inevitable upcoming “news rush.”

You see, “news fatigue” is actually just a bad mood. Like most moods, it will pass. We are seeing the other side of the “Trump Bump.” Now it is the “Trump Slump.” The cumulative effect of the toxic news of the day is numbness. 

We are bored and want something new to talk about. 

Some folks are trying to cheer us up, such as PRPD CEO Abby Goldstein and MSNBC’s Chuck Todd.

Goldstein was quoted in Current [link] saying:

 “We all know it’s happening” with public radio listeners, she said, but no hard data connects news fatigue to a decrease in public radio’s audience.”

Todd offered a fictional new mood enhancer called Oblivia [link].

Recently NiemanLab published [link] the chart on the right from a UK study of people who avoid news content. 

As you can see, the top two reasons people say they avoid news are “Negative impact on my mood” and “There is nothing I can do about it.” 

Both are subjective and subject to change by unforeseen future events.

Compare the desperation in the UK study with the next chart from the Public Radio Tech Survey 2018. Respondents said the top five reasons they listen to news on public radio is the purposeful way the content is presented. We believe the core values of public radio are not based on moment-to-moment moods, they are based on the value they provide listeners every day.

FIVE MORE MARKETS WHERE NPR NEWS STATIONS BEAT ALL COMMERCIAL COMPETITORS

In early July we raised a ruckus with some commercial radio folks when we said the following about NPR News stations in PPM markets [link]:

What do heritage commercial News and Talk stations WBAP, KIRO-FM, KOGO and WBT have common? Not so long ago, each was the leading radio news source in their market. According to Nielsen Audio May 2019 PPM ratings, they were replaced in the top spot by a local NPR News/Talk station.

Now we are seeing the same pattern in Nielsen Audio’s medium and smaller sized markets where listening is measured by Diary methodology. Consider these examples:

In Anchorage, KSKA is not only the top radio news station in the market, it is the top station of any format. KSKA (9.4 AQH share) beats iHeart News/Talk KENI by three share points (6.4 AQH share). Alpha’s talk KFQD (2.6 AQH share) trails both of them.

In Asheville, North Carolina, dual format WQCS (9.8 AQH share)  has more than three times to AQH share as iHeart’s conservative talk WWNC (3.0 AQH share). WQCS’s sister station, full-time News/Talk WYQS (2.0 AQH share) also does well.

WGCU in Fort Myers (3.8 AQH share)  is the top radio News/Talk station in the market, beating commercial talk stations WGUF (0.5 AQH share) and WJBX (0.5 AQH share).

In Honolulu, Hawaii Public Radio’s news channel (4.9 AQH share)  has more than three times the listening as it’s closest competitor, iHeart’s conservative Talk KHVH (1.8 AQH share). A trend we are seeing nationally is that NPR News/Talk stations most often beat iHeart stations.

In Sarasota, Tampa’s WUSF (3.4 AQH share) is the top News/Talk station leading commercial WSRQ (1.1 AQH share) by a wide margin.

Nielsen Audio has released only around 25% of the Diary market ratings so far. We will continue to monitor the numbers.