[BC] Audio Quality (what's that?)

[Rich Wood]

------ At 12:38 AM 9/21/2008, Alan Alsobrook wrote: -------

>While WSOS was rated down around #18, of the rated stations no other 
>station had a TSL of even 1 hour then when you hit WSOS the TSL was 
>8-12 hrs. that stood out like a sore thumb.  Note: at the time WSOS 
>was running full AC, and the signal only covered around 35% of the 
>market. To me it says that audio quality and making it sound good, 
>even if not consciously perceivable, does make a huge difference in 
>how long we keep the listeners.
>
>Then again on the flip side, sometimes I listen to Sirius for 
>extended periods just to see how bad their audio encoding is today!

I wish I could get my hands on the research that was done for an Easy 
Listening syndicator in the early 70s. I seem to remember Balon as 
the company that did it, though I'm not sure. Once I got access to 
all the Arbitron books I did a little unscientific research in 
markets I had visited around the country and audio quality (with 
disciplined format execution) virtually always brought high TSL in 
the 8-12 hour range.

With the PPM it looks like Cume is going to be the ratings currency. 
At the networks and syndicators media buys were based on AQH and only 
stations like WINS and other high turnover News stations used cume. 
Cume doesn't tell me much more than the number of people who sampled 
the station and is driven, generally, by factors outside the station 
like TV and Newspaper promotion. It doesn't tell me if the station 
has converted the sampler to a long-time listener. AQH and TSL tell 
the agencies how likely and how often a listener will hear a spot. 
The general rule is that it takes 11 impressions before a listener 
begins to pay attention to a spot.

Even WINS might not be a representative example since it's considered 
New York's "crisis station." During 9/11 it set a monster record for 
listening. I saw an Arbitron presentation shortly after and no one 
had ever seen listening levels that high. When the chart came up in 
the presentation there was an audible gasp of disbelief from the 
audience. I believe it set a record. As are most AMs it's very 
heavily processed but the content was so compelling that it overrode 
the fatigue.

I think the key is stuff that's not consciously perceivable. It's 
fatigue that a  listener can't pinpoint. They simply know it makes 
them uncomfortable enough to cause them to turn it off, at least for 
a while. They need a breather. With bad recordings, grunge processing 
and cascading codecs I find myself listening to radio much, much less 
than ever before. Dull programming doesn't help but even stations I 
enjoy that are well processed get turned off much sooner than before. 
Unfortunately, those stations use IBUZ and make me feel like I did in 
5th grade when the teacher scratched her fingernails on the 
blackboard., I can listen to analog for longer periods but still 
nowhere near as long as I did before codecs. When the station plays 
material with solo violins it sounds like they're being bowed with a 
hacksaw. I force the radio to analog.

I don't have expectations of listening to my iPod or Internet 
stations for long periods. Younger listeners have a much shorter 
attention span, so long TSL is only a dream. That assumes you can 
find a young person who still listens to radio.

Rich