There’s an interesting article on e-Marketer about radio. It pretty much confirms through some research what I’ve suspected. Basically, eventhough there are a lot of alternatives to tradional AM and FM radio people still listen and are loyal. Of course they are. Who has ever said that podcasting or satellite radio would be the end of local radio stations? What these new media options mean is that consumers have more choices than ever. They will and have cut into listening time to radio stations and tv too for that matter. Thanks to MediaBuyerPlanner for the link.
The report states about the internet’s impact on radio, “far from killing the older medium, by adding more listening options and giving listeners more control, the Internet may actually be reviving it.” Let’s assume more people are willing to tune in again. I hope they have something interesting to listen to!
The report says that the internet radio listening audience is at about 52 million people, up from 37 million last time studied. The numbers they quote come from a variety of sources which are identified in the story.
Some other interesting tidbits include that Sirius and XM satellite radio services had about 9.2 million subscribers at the end of 2005 and 18% of people who don’t subsribe are seriously considering doing so in the next 12 months. 11% (27 million) of Americans have listened to podcasts and they estimate that number to grow to 51 million by 2010. There’s lots more in this article. I think it helps put new media vs. “traditional” media in perspective.
New media compliments old media. And as the numbers suggest, new media already captures a significant audience with projections showing that it will continue to grow quickly. For this reason I think marketers should be investing in these new media technologies now as they’ll be necessary if you want to have that edge needed in a competitive media world.
