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Anything new is always subject to hesitation. After reading a lot about PPM (Potable People Meters) I recommend the reading of this page by Mike McVay & Dave Rogerson www.mcvaymedia.com/infopac/02articles/peoplemeter.htm as it makes your mind spin with our current perceptions of listener habits.
The diary can have floors the biggest, “Have they been filled out hour by hour day by day”?. Another question, “Is every push of the button (dial twisting) logged?
One concern for the PPM is will it be attached the person every time they are near a radio (ie, having a shower while the PPM is beside the bed while the radio alarm clock has been singing/talking away for the last half hour)?
Knowing that the PPM will record an exact time a person changes the station, the question for the PD is, "did they DELIBERATELY change, or WALK in & out of another room where the radio is tuned to different station"?
I believe the PPM when used correctly will give all PDs and other Execs an exact picture of how the target audience responds to their programming!
I would hope that electronic rating would give a more accurate and honest assesment of the listening habits of people. This would then give us a more accurate feel for who is there and when and so could then help to target the audience and so increas revenue from advertising.
It would also let us know how we should be programming and what the local people want from their radio.
Lets go full speed ahead with education of the listener a priority. The old system is just so inacurate that I really dont see how the industry has embraced it so well for so long.
Thanks go to Andrew Clerihew for his comments about my article on the McVay Media site. In answer to Andrew's question regarding "will it be attached to a person everytime they are near a radio?" ... keep in mind that respondents (ie those who carry a PPM) are incetivised by their daily PPM carriage. In other words, the more they carry , the more "frequent carriage points" they earn and in turn the more cash they receive. Arbitron's trials in the UK, USA and Australia show the average carriage time per day is 15hrs. You can check more details at www.arbitron.com and follow the international links to the Australian site. Regardless, the PPM still picks up a station's encoded audio signal whether the PPM is in the recharging/docking station or being carried by the respondent. We encourage PPM respondents to keep their recharger/docking station on the bed side table. So, this means that the audio from a clock radio will be picked up late at night or early in the morning before they rise even when the PPM is sitting in the docking station. So, when it is taken out of the docking station in the morning, with the in built motion detector inside, Arbitron - TNS knows when it is being moved around by the respondent. In short, we know when the PPM is in motion, and when it is detecting a station's encoded signal. However, we never know at any stage with the diary whether it is being carried around and being filled in , or indeed whether diary holders are complying with the tasks we expect of them in order to report their radio listening.
Finally, whether a person deliberately changed station or just decided to move into another room is probably best answered by attitudinal research. The reasons why listeners change stations often is a product issue and in the end all we can ask of "the ratings" is to meaure the change, not necessarily the motivation for that change.