Nielsen Media ditched the Hobart survey last week ostensibly because they couldn’t get enough young people to cooperate in filling in diaries. Yet, not so long ago stations targeting 40+ demographics were complaining that young people who received diaries, over-keen on seeing their favourite station ‘win,’ were skewing results towards under 40’s or FM stations and away from AM. The times, they are a-changin’.
Could the difficulty in recruiting youth for traditional surveys be contributing to the resurgence of AM radio in recent years?
Two weeks ago McNair Ingenuity’s Matt Balogh told the community broadcasting conference that it is very hard to engage young people with traditional survey techniques. They don’t answer the home landline phone because they think it will be someone selling something. Anyone they really want to talk to rings them on their mobile.
Should the radio industry be seeking new ways of reaching them?
As the old saying goes, ‘fish where the fish are.’ Well, the fish are now on facebook, twitter and a multitude of online sites, but radio surveys are not reaching out to them there. Nor is radio tracking their listening habits through their mobile phones where recent research from the US says much of their listening is happening.
Is it time radio got into new measurement techniques so that it can keep track of the increasingly elusive young audiences?
Get them to fill it in online.
A biro or pencil might confuse them.
Sorry but it's about time we all embraced social networking in this industry!
We've seen what twitter can do to TV personalities - are we radio people scared to do the same thing ? Surveys will only be accurate when we get these people meters operating showing what stations are actually in earshot!