Post by william on Feb 24, 2004 21:01:10 GMT -5
This article featured in Canadian Music Network was sent to me last week. It's a great read for all you internet and traditional broadcasters out there. It was written by Liz Janik.
How many spins are enough to establish a new song with the listeners of a radio station? How many spins are needed before a song can be tested? There's no single answer. Many factors affect the speed with which an audience becomes familiar with a song. The strength of the song and how the spins are managed through each of the current categories are critical in establishing success.
First, a song has to be evaluated on its overall appeal. How strong are the melodies, lyrics, "hookiness" and talent performance? A weak song won't win fans no matter how much airplay it gets.
Secondly, a song needs to be properly managed for a station's format, and the way its audience listens and absorbs new music. The number of spins and the length of time a song stays in current and recurrent categories are critical programming decisions. The strategy for managing current songs is a key factor in a station's success in ratings.
What about the charts?
There's an overwhelming tendency for programmers in radio to rely too heavily on music industry charts when making key decisions about songs. They'll use them as a map for their format and will evaluate whether or not a song is "safe" to add based on the adds of other programmers in their format. The song's chart position is more important to them than listening with their own ears and intellect - or serving the music needs of their local audience. Industry charts are a useful resource, but they track the success of record company promotion people in convincing radio to try their new songs. Charts don't measure the potential appeal of the song for listeners.
Charts also don't indicate how familiar a song is with the listeners. There's a tendency in radio to boost a song's spins at the same time that it moves up the chart. This is always much faster than the majority of listeners is able to become familiar with the song. The result is that songs are frequently moved to slower recurrent categories at the time when they've just become established with listeners. It might annoy record promo people when radio hangs on to songs, but that's what most listeners need from their radio station.
Record industry salespeople probably already know that the longer the period is for heavier spins, the more potential there is for sales.
Age does matter
Age plays a huge factor in how quickly songs can be absorbed. Younger listeners tend to be more active about music. They latch on to songs very quickly and move on in relatively short cycles. For younger listeners, songs are stale when they are more than six months old. To them, oldies are songs that are two to three years old. In focus groups, younger listeners refer to bands from the '90s like Soundgarden and Nirvana as classic rock.
Older listeners' interest in current music drops with each passing decade. They don't have the time or the passion to keep up with new music. Typically, their awareness of new music is minimal by age 45. The exceptions are people with younger music fans in the home and those listeners who are "music active."
Thresholds of familiarity
Call-out and audience research -- plus local indicators such as requests, CD and concert ticket sales -- help establish the pace at which a station breaks songs. Here's a general guideline to give a sense of the number of spins that it takes to establish new songs on mainstream formats:
150 spins: This is the minimum number needed to establish the first level of familiarity. It's generally the earliest a song can be put into call-out research, but only with a younger audience. Testing songs with less exposure isn't recommended.
300 spins: At this point the audience can recognise having heard the song. This is a better level of exposure for call-out testing. Generally, this is the level of spins needed before sales kick in on a new artist.
450 spins: This is the threshold where most of the audience is familiar with, and enjoys, the song. It's an optimum level of spins for new music testing.
600 spins: This is when it's usually safe to assume that all of the audience is familiar with the song.
With very catchy and memorable songs, the required spin levels drop a little. With a more subtle-sounding song, one without strong hooks or memorable, cut-through lyrics, those spin numbers can increase dramatically.
Reach and frequency
How can you determine the speed at which your station can safely establish a song? The best place to start is to identify what the "reach/frequency" numbers are for the station. The sales department uses this formula to determine the right number of commercials needed for a client to have success with a campaign.
The "reach/frequency" number will give programming a sense of the spins needed for songs to be absorbed by a station's audience.
Here are some sample realistic numbers from a large market on the reach and frequency of spins for four major formats and their audiences:
CHR:
# of weekly spins: 70
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 5.9
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 26.4
ROCK:
# of weekly spins: 42
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 3.2
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 9.4
COUNTRY:
# of weekly spins: 35
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 3.3
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 13.7
OLDIES:
# of weekly spins: 4
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 1.3
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 4.1
With time spent listening typically being longer, people expect the country format to be more effective in introducing songs. Yet only 14 percent of the country audience members heard their favourite new songs slightly more than three times a week.
Even with the high CHR rotations of 70 spins a week, just one-quarter of the audience heard an individual song a maximum of six times during the week. Everyone else who listened would have heard the song even less.
Radio tends to over-estimate the loyalty of its audience. Just because people are tuned in doesn't mean that they hear or notice songs -- or promotions or contests, for that matter. This is compounded by the lack of effective song identification by most stations.
What about burn?
The old adage holds true: "When the staff is tired of a song, the audience is only starting to love it." Very few people at a CHR station (spinning heavies 70 times a week) would guess that three-quarters of its listeners heard the most played song less than six times in the past week.
Burn is generally not an issue for listeners, unless they hate the song. Polarizing (or poorly rotated) songs are usually the ones that burn. When people love a song, they enjoy listening to it over and over again without getting tired of it. Successful programmers keep a song in heavy rotation as long as the passion scores are there, regardless of burn levels.
Today some stations keep the hottest songs in heavy or power current categories well past 1,000 spins. They'll allow burn levels of 35 percent and higher as long as the audience still loves the song. That's why it's important to measure "like" and "burn" separately in music research.
After managing many music tests, and working with very successful programmers, two truths stand out about radio "burning" songs: well-loved songs rarely burn; and ratings come by playing the songs that the target listeners know and love.
The bottom line on spins:
It's a huge risk for any radio station to add a new song. A four-minute song will use 20 hours of airtime by the time it reaches 300 spins and is ready to be tested to see if the audience really likes it.
To minimize the risk, programmers need to listen to new songs carefully to determine if the songs will appeal to and connect with their listeners. They must pick their adds with a sense of commitment to establishing the song. Then they must follow through by supporting the song with sufficient weekly spins throughout its life cycle in the current categories.
- Liz Janik is the president of Media Mix Inc. She can be reached at (905) 454-3865 or liz@theplanet.fm.
How many spins are enough to establish a new song with the listeners of a radio station? How many spins are needed before a song can be tested? There's no single answer. Many factors affect the speed with which an audience becomes familiar with a song. The strength of the song and how the spins are managed through each of the current categories are critical in establishing success.
First, a song has to be evaluated on its overall appeal. How strong are the melodies, lyrics, "hookiness" and talent performance? A weak song won't win fans no matter how much airplay it gets.
Secondly, a song needs to be properly managed for a station's format, and the way its audience listens and absorbs new music. The number of spins and the length of time a song stays in current and recurrent categories are critical programming decisions. The strategy for managing current songs is a key factor in a station's success in ratings.
What about the charts?
There's an overwhelming tendency for programmers in radio to rely too heavily on music industry charts when making key decisions about songs. They'll use them as a map for their format and will evaluate whether or not a song is "safe" to add based on the adds of other programmers in their format. The song's chart position is more important to them than listening with their own ears and intellect - or serving the music needs of their local audience. Industry charts are a useful resource, but they track the success of record company promotion people in convincing radio to try their new songs. Charts don't measure the potential appeal of the song for listeners.
Charts also don't indicate how familiar a song is with the listeners. There's a tendency in radio to boost a song's spins at the same time that it moves up the chart. This is always much faster than the majority of listeners is able to become familiar with the song. The result is that songs are frequently moved to slower recurrent categories at the time when they've just become established with listeners. It might annoy record promo people when radio hangs on to songs, but that's what most listeners need from their radio station.
Record industry salespeople probably already know that the longer the period is for heavier spins, the more potential there is for sales.
Age does matter
Age plays a huge factor in how quickly songs can be absorbed. Younger listeners tend to be more active about music. They latch on to songs very quickly and move on in relatively short cycles. For younger listeners, songs are stale when they are more than six months old. To them, oldies are songs that are two to three years old. In focus groups, younger listeners refer to bands from the '90s like Soundgarden and Nirvana as classic rock.
Older listeners' interest in current music drops with each passing decade. They don't have the time or the passion to keep up with new music. Typically, their awareness of new music is minimal by age 45. The exceptions are people with younger music fans in the home and those listeners who are "music active."
Thresholds of familiarity
Call-out and audience research -- plus local indicators such as requests, CD and concert ticket sales -- help establish the pace at which a station breaks songs. Here's a general guideline to give a sense of the number of spins that it takes to establish new songs on mainstream formats:
150 spins: This is the minimum number needed to establish the first level of familiarity. It's generally the earliest a song can be put into call-out research, but only with a younger audience. Testing songs with less exposure isn't recommended.
300 spins: At this point the audience can recognise having heard the song. This is a better level of exposure for call-out testing. Generally, this is the level of spins needed before sales kick in on a new artist.
450 spins: This is the threshold where most of the audience is familiar with, and enjoys, the song. It's an optimum level of spins for new music testing.
600 spins: This is when it's usually safe to assume that all of the audience is familiar with the song.
With very catchy and memorable songs, the required spin levels drop a little. With a more subtle-sounding song, one without strong hooks or memorable, cut-through lyrics, those spin numbers can increase dramatically.
Reach and frequency
How can you determine the speed at which your station can safely establish a song? The best place to start is to identify what the "reach/frequency" numbers are for the station. The sales department uses this formula to determine the right number of commercials needed for a client to have success with a campaign.
The "reach/frequency" number will give programming a sense of the spins needed for songs to be absorbed by a station's audience.
Here are some sample realistic numbers from a large market on the reach and frequency of spins for four major formats and their audiences:
CHR:
# of weekly spins: 70
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 5.9
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 26.4
ROCK:
# of weekly spins: 42
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 3.2
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 9.4
COUNTRY:
# of weekly spins: 35
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 3.3
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 13.7
OLDIES:
# of weekly spins: 4
maximum times song was heard by a listener: 1.3
% of listeners who heard the maximum spins: 4.1
With time spent listening typically being longer, people expect the country format to be more effective in introducing songs. Yet only 14 percent of the country audience members heard their favourite new songs slightly more than three times a week.
Even with the high CHR rotations of 70 spins a week, just one-quarter of the audience heard an individual song a maximum of six times during the week. Everyone else who listened would have heard the song even less.
Radio tends to over-estimate the loyalty of its audience. Just because people are tuned in doesn't mean that they hear or notice songs -- or promotions or contests, for that matter. This is compounded by the lack of effective song identification by most stations.
What about burn?
The old adage holds true: "When the staff is tired of a song, the audience is only starting to love it." Very few people at a CHR station (spinning heavies 70 times a week) would guess that three-quarters of its listeners heard the most played song less than six times in the past week.
Burn is generally not an issue for listeners, unless they hate the song. Polarizing (or poorly rotated) songs are usually the ones that burn. When people love a song, they enjoy listening to it over and over again without getting tired of it. Successful programmers keep a song in heavy rotation as long as the passion scores are there, regardless of burn levels.
Today some stations keep the hottest songs in heavy or power current categories well past 1,000 spins. They'll allow burn levels of 35 percent and higher as long as the audience still loves the song. That's why it's important to measure "like" and "burn" separately in music research.
After managing many music tests, and working with very successful programmers, two truths stand out about radio "burning" songs: well-loved songs rarely burn; and ratings come by playing the songs that the target listeners know and love.
The bottom line on spins:
It's a huge risk for any radio station to add a new song. A four-minute song will use 20 hours of airtime by the time it reaches 300 spins and is ready to be tested to see if the audience really likes it.
To minimize the risk, programmers need to listen to new songs carefully to determine if the songs will appeal to and connect with their listeners. They must pick their adds with a sense of commitment to establishing the song. Then they must follow through by supporting the song with sufficient weekly spins throughout its life cycle in the current categories.
- Liz Janik is the president of Media Mix Inc. She can be reached at (905) 454-3865 or liz@theplanet.fm.