Inside Music MediaJerry Del Colliano

Time spent listening to radio or TSL has declined every year since Arbitron (now Nielsen) started keeping track in the early 90’s.

Every year.

Every reporting period.

And just this week we saw that TSL went down again 3% on average.

Those are the two critical words – on average because some stations actually increase their TSL even as the greater number decrease thus the declining average.

I don’t know about you but I want to be one of the stations increasing TSL even as the industry loses.

TSL Boosting Tips

• Run more commercial breaks with fewer spots in them.
• Clump short 10-second or 15-second spots together in one break – no 30’s or 60’s.
• Put 30’s and 60’s in a separate break.
• For every spot you add to the log, take some other non-core programming element out.
• Consider a new way to eliminate about 2 to 3 minutes of current advertising without losing revenue or having to raise rates.  Stations with strong TSL do this.

To get more ways to build your stations TSL even while competitors succumb to the national average, consider attending my 6^th annual Media Solutions Seminar in Philadelphia March 18^th. It’s in the curriculum.

Among the TSL strategies you’ll discover …

• Counter-intuitive ways to add one or two extra quarter hours to PPM listening. Remember, just making sure that you get 5 minutes of listening in each quarter hour apparently isn’t working out so well since TSL is down by Nielsen’s own account. PPM or diary, it doesn’t work.
• The one thing that trumps short attention spans – do this and listeners will stay with your station longer.
• The connection between content and commercials – discover the proven sweet spot between core content that drives listening and ads and promos that drive revenue. Nail this and get it right.
• How to get listeners to actually listen to an entire song all the way through – increasing evidence shows younger money demo audiences do not even stay tuned for an entire song. An iPod mentality is now affecting radio listeners.  Stop it in its tracks by countering with this smooth move.
• 5 things Millennials crave – I figure the more we do these things, the longer they will stick around.
• Do more of the things younger audiences admit they like in commercials and less of the things that turn them off.  Right now, it’s the other way around.

Commit to doing something this year to turn around eroding audience time spent listening.

Reserve a seat today – currently $200 off the registration fee here.