Radio Ireland

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Where will the Audience come form?

• Radio Ireland, which begin broadcasting on March 17th, have stated that their core target audience will be 25-44 adults.
  
  The aim is to reach, on average, 40,000 within this age group, each quarter hour between 7 am - 7pm.
  
  Much speculation surrounds the possible areas to lose out in order for them to achieve this goal.
  
  The purpose of this analysis is to try to pinpoint vulnerable areas within the current Radio audience mix.
  First let us look at the potential audience:

25 - 44 yrs

• The reason for choosing 25 - 44 yr olds is, according to Radio Ireland that 61% of RTE Radio 1's audience is above this age group (45 +) with 40% of 2 FMs audience below it (younger than 25). In other words, they believe there is a gap in the market.
  An interesting addition to this argument which has yet to be realised by many is the fact that 51% of the Local Stations Audience (Excl. Dublin and Cork) is also above this age group.
  
  A full list of Audience Profiles, by age, follows and some interesting facts emerge.
  
  First is a comparison between the population profile and the Total Radio Audience:-

Age	Total		Any Radio Listnership
	'000	%	'000	%
15 - 19	342	12	310	13
20 - 24	292	11	257	10
25 - 34	511	18 ]	442	18 ]
35 - 44	491	18 ]	436	18 ]
45 - 54	409	15	360	15
55 - 54	295	11	258	11
65 +	415	15	364	15
TOTAL	2755	100	2427	100

• We can see from this that the Radio audience matches the population profile almost exactly and as we have already noted, the Radio Ireland core audience accounts for 36% in each case
  
  The next comparison is RTE v Local Stations

Age	Radio 1		2 FM		Home Local (National)
	'000	%	'000	%	'000	%
15 - 19	23	3	172	22	142	11
20 - 24	26	3	149	19	143	11
25 - 34	107	11 ]	220	28 ]	254	19 ]
35 - 44	209	22 ]	124	16 ]	246	19 ]
45 - 54	194	20	76	9	202	15
55 - 64	162	17	26	3	143	11
65 +	233	24	27	3	191	14
TOTAL	954	100	794	100	1321	100

• It is clear from this, first of all, that the local station profile mirrors quite closely, that of the total Radio in population profiles.
  However, it is also clear, that the RTE stations have specific strengths, generally speaking Radio 1's profile is older and 2Fm's is younger. They complement each other as they are meant to.
  
  When the Radio Ireland target audiences 25 - 44 yrs is isolated and split into its two component groups 25 - 34 and 35 - 44 it becomes evident that these are two specific and quite different audiences. This will make the job of targeting a difficult one. These differences are born out by the above tables which show 2FMs biggest age group is 25 - 34 (28%). Radio 1's second biggest age group is 35 - 44 (22%).
  
  This begs the question, how big is this perceived gap in the market or if there is, in fact, a gap at all.
  However, if there are vulnerable areas here (within the Radio Ireland target group) they must be the older 2FM listeners (16%, 35 - 44 year olds) due to its specific targeting of younger audiences and the younger Radio 1 audience (11%, 25 - 34 year olds) given its older profile.
  
  It must be pointed out here that Radio 1 have revised their programming in recent times to try to consolidate if not increase this younger age group. If they are successful, the perceived gap will narrow even further.
  
  The following tables compare the Dublin and Cork local station age profiles against that of the Local Stations excluding Dublin & Cork.
  Unfortunately, information on age profiles for the stations outside Dublin / Cork is not available on a station by station basis:-

Age	Home Local Stations (Exc.Dublin/Cork)		Dublin 98 FM		Dublin FM 104		Cork 96 FM /County Sound
	'000	%	'000	%	'000	%	'000	%
15 - 19	5	7	21	12	52	23	{38	{21
20 - 24	60	7	32	18	49	22
25 - 34	130	16 ]	51	28 ]	63	28 ]	37	21 ]
35 - 44	153	19 ]	41	22 ]	28	13 ]	31	18 ]
45 - 54	136	17	22	12	20	9	{70	{40
55 - 64	110	14	7	4	5	2
65 +	157	20	8	4	7	3
TOTAL	805	100	182	100	223	100	176	100

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• When Dublin/ Cork stations are taken out the profile of the Local stations becomes significantly older and more in line with Radio 1.

Radio 1		Local (Exc. Dublin/Cork)
Age	%	%
35 +	83	70
45 +	61	51

• Given that Radio Ireland's programme schedule is geared towards young to middle-aged, this older Local station profile must make their younger listeners vulnerable.
  
  Similarly, as with 2 FM, the biggest audience age group for 98FM and FM104 is 25 - 44 (28%) leaving their older 35 - 44 groups (22% and 13% respectively) also vulnerable.
  
  The fact that their biggest age group is 25 - 34 (28%) again reinforces the question mark over the percieved size of the gap in the market.
  
  The following table shows an analysis of average quarter hour performance by Radio Ireland time block for Radio 1, 2 FM and Home Local.
  
  From this we can see what Radio Ireland will have to achieve in terms of share of total listnership to reach their 40,000 average per quarter hour target (7am - 7pm).

1996 JNLR Adults 25-44 Years Average Quarter Hours (000's) x Time Block

Radio Ireland Time Blocks	Radio 1		2FM		Home Local		Total Market
	'000 AQH	% Share	'000 AQH	% Share	'000 AQH	% Share	'000 AQH	% Share
07.00 - 09.30	83	42	68	34	47	24	198	100
09.30 - 12.00	93	31	127	42	80	27	300	100
12.00 - 2.00	70	32	73	34	73	34	216	100
2.00 - 5.00	38	25	61	39	55	36	154	100
5.00 - 7.00	25	25	38	39	36	36	99	100

Time Blocks	Radio Ireland - on target required share
	%
07.00 - 09.30	20
09.30 - 12.00	13
12.00 - 2.00	19
2.00 - 5.00	26
5.00 - 7.00	40

• To try to reach these type of share levels will be a daunting task for Radio Ireland.
  If they succeed, however, it will be a great achievement.