I’ll once again preface this piece by saying that these are my personal views and don’t represent those of my employer.
I wrote a week or so ago about the poor showing of commercial radio compared to BBC radio in the recent RAJAR results for Q1 2008. What we saw was commercial radio fall to a low share of hours while the BBC continued to rise.
And I mentioned at the time that all radio hours are holding up, but does that really show the whole story? I hope nobody minds too much, but I need to dispel a common myth. Commercial radio will often gloss over the “all adult” numbers and point to 15-44 year olds where commercial radio has been traditionally stronger.
But what’s been going on there? Well here’s the chart for overall listening among this audience:

The audience is holding fairly firm, although there has been slippage. But let’s look a bit closer and compare commercial share with BBC share in this market:

This is one scary chart. Commercial radio is still leading the BBC, but it’s obvious that the gap has closed considerably in recent years and we’re now down to 51% plays 47%. At the current rate, the BBC is going to overtake commercial in the coming year.
So why is that? Well let’s look at the commercial sector a little more closely:

This is even scarier. It’s clear that the losses are coming from local commercial radio. National commercial radio hasn’t done too badly – helped by national brands coming on-board largely via digital radio. But those small gains don’t make up for the losses sustained by local commercial radio.
So why is this?
If there was a simple answer, I’m sure they’d all be doing it. But I’ll return to investing in the product. That can be the only way to regain some of those audiences. Is that going to be achieved by networking? I’ll let you decide that.
But let’s return to something I glossed over a little earlier on – that overall decline in 15-44 listening. It’s modest, but is it a sign of things to come? Am I just painting a picture of gloom? Well here’s a chart that’s a little better to look at – 15-24 listening:

Overall – a flat picture of listening hours. So they’ve not all gone to last.fm then! Phew.

Commercial radio’s lead over the BBC is a bit better than among 15-44s, although there is a little recent dip that commercial radio could do without. But the next generation is still there to be won.

The one disappointment remains the continued slippage in local commercial radio. It’s still significant, and again is only partially made up for by national brands.
So some scary charts, but ones that need to be faced up to. Some remedial action is needed, and it can’t all be the BBC’s fault.