Any radio listenership has remained steady YOY at 86% of all adults (listened yesterday). Local radio has contributed to retaining this steady position showing a 2% increase in listenership and also improving their market share by 3%. Dublin Radio has experienced further growth improving its market share by 2% YOY. Although market share has increased for Dublin radio, there has been a slight decline in listenership, down 1% of all Dublin Adults who listened yesterday.
National
Each of the national stations have experienced a slight decline in total listenership figures this period with the exception of Newstalk who have managed to keep their listenership steady YOY. Radio 1 has experienced growth in the stations core ABC1 listenership, up 1% both nationally and in Dublin and up an impressive 3% in Cork. 2fm have experienced drops in total listeners by 2% and across key audiences 15 – 34’s (-2%) and ABC1’s (-1%). Today FM also shows declines in total listenership (-1%) however their performance was better in Dublin with gains across all key audience groups. As well as keeping their market share steady, Newstalk also showed a strong performance in Cork with total listenership up by 3% YOY.
Dublin
There have been slight declines for both FM104 and 98fm. FM104 showing a decrease in listenership of 1% but it still retains its position of the number one station in Dublin. Alongside this, popular Adrian Kennedy phone show continued to improve adding an impressive 5,000 listeners during this period. 98fm also shows a decline in total listenership of 1% YOY with a drop of 2% with the ABC1 and 15 – 34 demographic. In terms of programming, 98fm’s Morning Crew is now out performing rival station FM104’s show the Strawberry Alarm Clock this period. Spin 1038 have kept their listenership steady YOY for all adults and the stations core 15 – 34 year old demographic. Similarly, Phantom’s total listenership has remained static YOY with a slight drop of 1% with their 15 – 34 audience. Q102 boasts a good performance in this period with overall listenership increasing by 1%. They also have experiences impressive gains with the 15 – 34’s, up 5% YOY and an increase with ABC1s and Housekeepers both up 1%.
Cork
Cork’s 96/103 has seen a decline in total listenership year on year of 1% however they also boasted a strong improvement with the ABC1 audience which increased by 4% during the period. Red FM has seen an increase of 2% YOY with their core audience of 15 – 34 audience. Also, their TAP (0700– 2400) market share for 15 – 34’s showed an improvement of 5% YOY.
Multi Region Stations
4fm have increased their daily reach figure to 3. The station has recently re launched their brand with a new TV and outdoor campaign which will spread awareness of the station and of the available tuning frequencies in each broadcast areas.
NCI’s summer campaign continues in August. A wide variety of media, including TV, Press, Radio, Outdoor and Online will provide a platform to promote their brand and also to drive awareness to their upcoming Open Day Events. To find out more about the Open Days, you can log on to www.ncirl.ie or by calling 1850 221 721.
It’s good news for SKY Ireland, with Rupert Murdoch’s BSkyB recently announcing that they have bought exclusive rights to the entire HBO TV catalogue, which includes a huge range of American shows such as The Wire, True Blood, The Sopranos and Martin Scorsese’s eagerly-awaited crime drama Boardwalk Empire. The Sky deal will give Sky access to HBO’s archive and all forthcoming shows over the lifetime of the agreement. It is believed to be worth around £150m over five years. The acquisition forms part of a push by Sky to improve its non-sport content as it tries to increase subscriber numbers. SKY is on track to hit a 10 million target by the end of 2010.
Sky will now be able to screen some of the defining US television shows of the past decade, including The Sopranos and Sex and the City. It also has the rights to several series currently shown by rival broadcasters, including Entourage, which is shown on ITV2, and Curb Your Enthusiasm, which was broadcast on Channel 4. Sky will begin screening those series when the current deals with rival terrestrial channels expire.
The first HBO series to be shown on Sky will be Scorsese’s gangster drama Boardwalk Empire. Set in the east coast resort town of Atlantic City in the 1920s, it stars Steve Buscemi as a mob boss who makes a fortune importing illegal alcohol. It makes its debut on HBO in America in September and will be shown on Sky shortly after. After a very difficult first half of the year, with impacts falling considerably year on year, we can be more hopeful now that the situation will be more positive in the back end of the year with this much needed investment in programming.
Two new afternoon programmes, a drama about Bob Geldof and Live Aid and the search for Ireland’s best volunteer have been announced for RTÉ’s autumn schedule. The Afternoon Show, which was marred by allegations of bullying, is being replaced by a lifestyle programme presented by Maura Derrane called 4 Daily which will be followed by the more topical 4.50 Live presented by Claire Byrne and Daithi O’Sé.
Journalist Brendan O’Connor will get a full series of The Saturday Night Show after presenting a strand of it last year. A six-part documentary series called From Here to Maternity about a maternity hospital, the five-part The Story of Ireland , a co-production with the BBC, a three-part series on organised crime and a two-part documentary on Ireland’s banking collapse will also feature this autumn. There will also be a documentary about Phoebe Prince, the Irish schoolgirl who died by suicide in the US in January following a campaign of bullying, one about gifted children, another about former US president John Kennedy’s visit to Ireland presented by Ryan Tubridy and also one following the new generation of Irish emigrants. The popular Reeling in the Years series will be brought up to date by covering the Noughties. The public will also be asked to vote on Ireland’s Greatest Person. The final five involved will be John Hume, Michael Collins, Bono, James Connolly and Mary Robinson.
Overall, there will be 52 new home-produced series and documentaries for the autumn season. The drama schedule includes a four part series set in Dublin’s gangland called Love/Hate , Wild Decembers , a story written by Edna O’Brien and Hardy Bucks , set among twenty somethings in rural Ireland. Raw and Single-Handed , a co-production with ITV, also return. When Harvey Met Bob is a feature-length documentary about the circumstances in which entertainment impresario Harvey Goldsmith and Bob Geldof organised Live Aid, the biggest music event ever.
The reality television strand will include The Model Scouts , to find a new face for IMG, one of the biggest modelling agencies in the world and Dirty Old Towns will clean up some of Ireland’s dirtiest towns. A new initiative for children’s television will be announced in the autumn. RTÉ Television managing director Glen Killane said the broadcaster had managed to provide more factual programming, more entertainment and more drama despite the recession. “That has been made possible by rigorous cost-management with all available resources concentrated on programme-making,” he said.
IMAGE Publications launched IMAGE MAN, Ireland’s newest glossy aimed at modern Irish men. It is the latest addition to the publishing house’s ever-expanding portfolio of iconic titles, including IMAGE, IMAGE INTERIORS and various contract titles for premium clients like Brown Thomas and Goffs.
Developed in association with L’Oréal Paris Men Expert, the inaugural issue was distributed nationwide with The Sunday Business Post, on July 25, and is planned to appear quarterly thereafter.
Richard Power, MD and co-owner of IMAGE Publications, is delighted with the latest expansion saying, “There is a gap in the Irish market for a high-end magazine that’s relevant to Irish men. IMAGE MAN fills that niche with a beautifully-produced and editorially-rich magazine that will meet the needs of advertisers and readers alike.”
JCDecaux is being given permission by Dublin City Council to erect five new advertising structures in the city to fund the expansion of the Dublin bikes scheme. Councillors approved the construction of advertising display units,similar in size to bus shelter advertising, at Lower Mount Street and Nassau Street on the south side and North Earl Street on the north side of the city. They have also given approval for two “metropoles” – larger panels of 7sq m on poles two metres off the ground – at Merrion Road and Lower Gardiner Street. JCDecaux will have permission to advertise at these sites for 15 years. In return, it will increase the number of stands where bikes can be picked up and dropped off from 795 to 1,087, increase bicycle numbers from 450 to 550, and set up four new stations at Smithfield, Eccles Street, Harcourt Terrace and Charlemont Mall.
The huge popularity of the scheme, which already has more than 30,000 subscribers,had resulted in an urgent need for its expansion, the council said. However the extra bikes and stations would cost an estimated €6.6 million, which it could not fund from its own resources.
Google is changing its trademark policy for Canada, Ireland and the UK. Effective from 14th September the policy shift moves the three markets in line with the US practice of allowing certain advertisers the right to bid on trademarked names. This will allow resellers of branded items, such as Meteor, select trademarks such as HTC or Nokia, as keywords. For more information, click below for an article from the IAB UK on why they welcome the change:
http://www.iabuk.net/en/1/googlestrademarkchangeiscommonsense040810.mxs
The Founder of Bebo Michael Birch is embarking on a new venture with the launch of a new website jolitics.com. Jolitics.com will be aimed at encouraging “open, constructive and entertaining political debate.” Startup is based in Silicon Valley but is doing something which has been described as a little “unorthodox” by deciding to grow the website from Ireland and not Silicon Valley. Birch has said that he believes Ireland to be the perfect place to start with a few early adopters before rolling it out in the US. An email has been sent out inviting the first 50 people to become members and join the new service. You can join the waiting list and be notified as soon as site becomes open to the public www.jolitics.com If the rollout from Ireland is successful it could be the start of a trend where we get to see and test new sites and apps first.
Global advertising spend grew by 12.5% to £73.2bn in the first quarter of 2010 according to Nielsen’s latest Global AdView Pulse report. The report also noted that the market had turned the corner. The findings of the report compare with the findings contained in the UK’s Bellwether Report for the same period, which predicted marketing spend would increase at a slower rate than expected during 2010. According to Nielsen growth in the UK at 8% lagged behind France, which recorded the biggest ad spend growth in Europe at 11%. Spain, however, continued to struggle and posted a decline of 3%. Advertising spend in the US, the world’s largest advertising market increased 4% on the year. Latin Americawitnessed the biggest uplift, ballooning 48% over the same period. Across categories, television attracted thelargest share of advertising, up 16% globally on the year. Nielsen noted that advertisers returned to TV as their main medium, once ad spend was on the way back. Radio and newspaper ad spends rebounded with 10% and 9% growth respectively. But magazine advertising remained flat on a global basis.
TGI offers insight into the full range of consumer groups including the over 50s…
35% of the island of Ireland – 1.7m people – are aged over 50. The over-50s fall into a range of TGI Lifestage groups: 40% are Empty Nesters (aged 55+, married and do not live with son / daughter) and a further 26% are Hotel Parents (aged 35+, live with son / daughter but no child aged 0-15).
The over-50s represent 40% of those with a personal income in excess of €75,000 (£50,000) and the proportion still in work climbed from 23% in 2004 to 36% in 2009. The over-50s control the majority of wealth in society. Over 70% own their home outright and they are 50% more likely to hold stocks and shares. They are 20% less likely to have a loan and 30% more likely to have private medical insurance (full in-patient cover).
The group is a key target for advertisers from sectors such as alcoholic drinks and travel. They are 50% more likely than the average to be heavy users (3 or more measures a week) of gin and 50% more likely to be heavy users of brandy and Irish whiskey.
Leisure is important to this time-rich demographic. The over-50s are twice as likely to have taken a sea cruise and 30% more likely to have taken a multi-country tour in the past year, and 20% more likely to have been to the theatre in the past month.
Those aged 50-64 are particularly likely to make major home improvements. They are 40% more likely to have bought a conservatory in the past year, 30% more likely to have replaced windows and doors and 20% more likely to have bought a new kitchen.
Attitudinally the group tends to be ethical and discerning. Two-thirds buy goods produced in Ireland ‘whenever they can’ (compared to a population average of 52%) and half buy fair trade products when they’re available (compared to an average of 40%).
The over-50s are more likely to adopt green behaviours. 45% make an effort to cut down on gas / electricity usage at home (compared to a population average of 36%).
Although traditional media remains crucial, almost 60% of over-50s now use the internet and 45% have a broadband connection at home – up from 50% and 30% respectively in 2008. More than a quarter of over-50s use the internet every day, up from 18% in 2008.
A quarter of over-50s regularly visit travel websites and 10% visit newspaper sites. Those aged 50-64 are 30% more likely to purchase financial services and alcoholic drinks online on a regular basis.
Source: TGI 2009. Base: All Adults
