Nielsen begins its monthly release of PPM ratings with today’s Day 1 update including New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston/Galveston, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Long Island, Riverside/San Bernardino, San Jose, and Middlesex/Somerset/Union.
All the numbers can be found at RadioInsight.com/Ratings.
This was a monthly unlike any other. The first half of the monthly was fairly normal, with the affects of the coronavirus beginning to be felt in week three and especially in week four as shutdowns of businesses went into effect. To the point where Nielsen sent a letter to all subscribers telling them, “Given the anomalous nature of audience behavior during the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency, it is Nielsen’s position that future buying and planning decisions for periods that fall outside the COVID-19 crisis should not be made using COVID-19 impacted audience estimates.”
Even with only half of the monthly really thrown out of whack by the current pandemic, listening trends changed in an instant. Stations where listening is driven by well driving and office listening nosedived. News and non-Conservative Talk stations, especially those on FM surged.
The biggest gainers for the month were FM News stations with Entercom’s 780 WBBM/105.9 WCFS Chicago rising to the top of the market with a 5.8 to 7.7 gain and 740 KCBS/106.9 KFRC San Francisco jumped from an 8.7 to an unprecedented 9.9 share. Cox Media News/Talk 750 WSB/95.5 WSBB Atlanta was up from 11.4 to 12.9.
All-News only on AM rose, but not as high as their FM bretheren. Entercom’s combo of 1010 WINS and 880 WCBS New York rose 3.6 to 4.7 and 2.4 to 2.9 respectively. 1070 KNX Los Angeles was up 3.0 to 3.8, while 1060 KYW Philadelphia jumped 4.7 to 6.6.
A trio of Public News/Talk stations set station records in the monthly. 91.5 WBEZ Chicago rose 3.6 to 4.3, 90.9 WHYY-FM Philadelphia was up 4.9 to 5.4 and 93.9 WNYC-FM New York was up from a 3.1 share to 4.0. While not a record, 88.5 KQED-FM San Francisco rebounded from. a 6.6 to 8.1 share and 90.1 KERA-FM Dallas was up 2.8 to 3.4. In other markets such as Los Angeles, Houston and Atlanta there was no real growth or drops on the Public News/Talk end.
Among the non-News based stations showing growth this month were SBS’ Spanish Tropical “Mega 97.9” WSKQ-FM New York up 5.9 to 6.5, Univision Regional Mexican “Estereo Latino 102.9” KLTN-FM Houston from 5.7 to 6.7, Beasley Classic Rock 102.9 WMGK Philadelphia from 6.4 to 7.3, and Temple University Classical 90.1 WRTI Philadelphia from 1.8 to 2.5.
Those in the Conservative Talk bubble seemed to stay right where they were as most of those stations were down slightly. 710 WOR New York dropped 2.0 to 1.9, 770 WABC New York 1.4 to 1.3, 890 WLS Chicago from 2.3 to 2.1, and 820 WBAP Dallas 4.0 to 3.9. 560 KSFO San Francisco rose 1.8 to 2.0 while sister 810 KGO stayed at a 1.8 share. 1210 WPHT Philadelphia fell 2.1 to 1.7, while the biggest fall was 740 KTRH Houston from 5.7 to 4.6.
The lack of Sports was not a good thing for All-Sports stations. 660/101.9 WFAN New York fell 2.3 to 1.9, while 98.7 WEPN-FM dropped 1.7 to 1.5. 670 WSCR Chicago was down 2.7 to 2.5, while 1000 WMVP held at a 1.2. All three in Dallas slid as 105.3 KRLD-FM was down 1.9 to 1.4, 1310/96.7 KTCK 1.6 to 1.4, and 103.3 KESN 1.0 to 0.7. WZGC Atlanta fell 3.9 to 3.4. 94.1 WIP Philadelphia held on the strongest with a 5.8 to 5.7 drop, though 97.5 WPEN-FM tumbled 2.9 to 2.1.
With the exception of News stations, the cumulative audience was down nearly across the board. In New York with the exceptions of WCBS, WINS and WNYC-FM every other station in the top 25 lost CUME. The same happened to all in the top 20 in Los Angeles except KNX. And this goes down the line for every market released today. The top music stations in New York were all down nearly 400,000 to 600,000 listeners. AC “106.7 Lite-FM” WLTW continues to be the highest CUMEing station in the country, but fell from 4,177,900 listeners in February to 3,736,700 in March.
In a non-coronavirus related note, Entercom Alternative 106.7 KROQ Los Angeles fell 2.5 to 2.0 following the cutting of “Kevin In The Morning with Allie and Jensen”. The station’s morning slot lost over half of its audience in the final two weeks of the monthly.
