Tough Time For Market Leaders

Michael Hedges July 17, 2013 Follow on Twitter

Market leaders have a certain competitive advantage. There’s experience, coverage and, not to be forgotten, financial security. Competitors, particularly in the digital age, have advantages too. A shift in the landscape is no surprise.

That shift is apparent from fewer German radio channels counting over a million listeners in the twice-yearly audience survey (ma 2013/II). There are now but four.  And one, perennial leader Radio NRW network, is counted differently by many German media watchers. Big regional adult-contemporary channel Antenne Bayern held second position nationally – or number one, if you like – but rolled off 2.7% year on year of its 10 plus Monday through Friday daytime audience, ranking unchanged.

The pop music channel of public broadcaster Südwestrundfunk, SWR 3, held third place nationally, up just under 2% year on year, and still with more than a million listeners. Fourth place went to another public radio youth channel, EinsLive from Westdeutscher Rundfunk, a non-mover. Next was general interest channel WDR 2, which was nearly unchanged in daily reach year on year, 979,000 listeners. Largely valuable for ego enhancement, WDR 2 had busted the million-listener threshold in the previous Media-Analyse survey (ma 2013/I) but it was a rare occasion.

Soft A/C regional public channel Bayern 1 (Bayerischer Rundfunk) also fell out of the million-listener club, dropping nearly 10% of its daily reach. Norddeutscher Rundfunk’s big regional adult contemporary channel NDR 2 followed, ranked 7th, up 20% in daily reach year on year. Of the top 10 radio channels in the national survey, excluding Radio NRW, eight are public broadcasters, six of which gained listeners year on year. The two private broadcasters in the top 10 – Antenne Bayern and Hit Radio FFH – are traditional adult contemporary stations with broad regional coverage.

The 53 public radio channels reached 53.1% of the measured population, slightly up from the previous survey. Radio has been “often already declared dead by the internet,” said NDR radio director Joachim Knuth in the requisite press release. “Public radio programs are modern and more alive than ever.”

The Energy (NRJ) franchise was a notable winner among private stations, reinforcing the view that local stations fare well against the big regional public channels. Energy Hamburg was up 26.1% in daily reach, against the previous survey. Energy Bremen was up 10.6%, Energy Stuttgart up 14.8%, Energy Berlin up 28.3%, Energy Munich up 33.3%, Energy Sachsen up 50.9%.

Klassic Radio bent the tide as a super-regional private channel. The multi-platform station plays light classical music and film scores not unlike classic FM in the UK. Its daily reach rose 26.9% in Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein, 39% in Bavaria and 14.6% in Berlin.

Radio audience results in Berlin-Brandenburg showed some of the biggest gains for stations in Germany. In addition to the gains of Radio Energy, privately owned kid’s station Radio Teddy was up more than 60% against the previous survey period. The general interest channel radioeins from public broadcaster RBB gained 33.7%. Star FM, radio B2 and Jam FM were up 40.6%, 33.3% and 26.9%, respectively. Three other stations were up at least 10%. Stations losing audience in Berlin-Brandenburg were all among the highest rated.

See also in ftmKnowledge

Europe's Radio - Western Europe

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