FREE JACOBS TECHSURVEY NEXT WEEK • PMBA CANCELS CONERENCE • DC PPM RATINGS & FREE PROGRAMMING FROM “UNDERCURRENTS”

Attention fans of Jacobs’ Media Techsurveys. 

A webinar has been set for Thursday, March 26th at 2:00pm ET to present the results of the 2020 Techsurvey.

 The webinar is free but folks must register here to participate.

Consider Techsurvey 2020 to be the older brother of the Public Radio Tech Survey(PRTS). 

Like PRTS, It looks at listener behavior and media usage by commercial station audiences.

Fred Jacobs was scheduled to present the results of the Techsurvey 2020 at All Access Media’s Worldwide Radio Summit. Because that conference was canceled, Jacobs is holding the webinar to inform commercial clients about the findings. Public media folks are also welcome.

In past years, the results of the commercial Techsurvey and PRTS have been similar but there are important differences. Techsurvey 2020 has a much larger sample. The in-tab data comes from 500 commercial stations and more than 46,000 respondents.

Also, Techsurveys tend to reflect listeners to commercial music stations. PRTS tends to reflect listeners to NPR News stations. 

Each survey has a few unique questions.  According to Jacobs, Techsurvey 2020 has several new questions including: headphone usage, “Hearables” such as AirPod-like devices, at-work listening and the 2020 presidential election.

The 2020 PRTS research is scheduled for later in 2020.

The webinar will also show updated music discovery data, as well as the annual look at “Why Radio?” and media usage and brand pyramids. The 2019 media usage pyramid is above.

PUBLIC MEDIA BUSINESS ASSOCIATION (PMBA) CANCELS CONFERENCE

PMBA announced on Wednesday (3.18) at 5:00pm ET:

We regretfully announce that the annual PMBA conference scheduled at the MGM Grand National Harbor for May 26-29, 2020, is canceled.

The safety of members is our highest priority, and based on the updated recommendations of the CDC as well as federal and local governmental authorities, this is in the best interest of all attendees.

WASHINGTON, DC, NEWS/TALK COMPETITION REMAINS CLOSE

According to Nielsen Audio’s February PPM ratings, WAMU and WTOP were tied with a 7.4 average quarter hour (AQH) share. 

WTOP leads WAMU in estimated weekly listeners.

Something strange is happening with Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) WGTS. 

According to Nielsen, WGTS’ AQH share went from 7.2 in January to 4.7 in February. However, WGTS’s estimated weekly listeners remain around the same.

There are two possible reasons this happening: 

(1.) The dog ran away with the PPM meter again, 

Or (2.) The local K-Love station – WLVW –  was doing something that changed AQH listening patterns. 

It is hard to tell because WLVW didn’t subscribe to the February PPM ratings.

All three DC News/Talk stations increased their AQH share in February. However, the number of estimated weekly listeners to each station of was similar in both months.

Conservative News/Talk WMAL [link] has increased the size of its news coverage and Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin and Ben Shapiro are still doing their usual stuff.

UNDERCURRENTS IS OFFERING NONCOM STATIONS FREE PROGRAMMING DURING THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC

Gregg McVicar, host and producer of UnderCurrents [link], announced on Tuesday that the AAA-ish music service is offering stations free access to a 4-hour block of hosted programming.

McVicar said in a press release: “When your hosts can't come into the studio or are away because of COVID-19 responsibilities, we want to help. UnderCurrents is available free to stations for use in any day-part.”

UnderCurrents is available to stations via PRSS and FTP. The programming is compatible with most automation systems.

For more information, contact the program’s distributor, NVI [link] at nola@nvi.org or (505) 999-2403. Stations do not need to be an affiliate of NVI to access UnderCurrents.