PPM Says 'Good Morning, New York'

PPM Comes To The Big Apple

ARBITRON hosted a NEW YORK market Radio breakfast THURSDAY (10/4) at the GRAND HYATT in MANHATTAN, with a full compliment of radio programmers and salespeople, as well as agency planners and buyers on hand to hear about the rollout of the PERSONAL PEOPLE METER service in the Big Apple.

ARBITRON opened with a video featuring N.Y. radio personalities such as SEAN HANNITY, SCOTT SHANNON, WENDY WILLIAMS and ELVIS DURAN, as well as N.Y.'s own DONALD TRUMP extoling the merits of radio.

ARBITRON Pres./Sales & Marketing PIERRE BOUVARD opened by saying "this is a big day -- 15 years in the making -- as PPM comes to NEW YORK."

Pres. STEVE MORRIS then addressed the sales people directly: "We've answered the clarion call of agencies asking for information," adding that programming would be revolutionized by PPM.

ESPN Radio GM and NYMRAD head TOM MCCARTHY and RAB CEO JEFF HALEY further discussed PPM's effect on radio sales opportunities, before those in attendance settled in for the P's and Q's of NEW YORK's upcoming PPM world.

BOUVARD reitarated that "working people will drive PPM. Data has show significantly more listening among those who work daily, versus those that stay home or are not employed." He pointed out that radio, unlike TV (where homebodies use the medium more), gets 75% of its listening from people working, or commuting to and from work."

SVP/Ratings Services JAY GUYTHER was the point person for many of the questions posed. ALL ACCESS asked about In-Tab, and the issues ARBITRON ran into in HOUSTON -- specifically rotating respondents out of the system. Questions regarding how people are kept in "the pipeline" weren't directly answered, as ARBITRON officials responded by noting that there's a 5-7% monthly turnover, and that 20-25% stay the full two years as responders.  Expect this to become an ongoing issue for ARBITRON to address. 

To deal with the In-Tab issue, the presentation dealt with both the positives and negatives. Predictably, 18-34 continues to be a problem demographic, as it was in the old diary system. ARBITRON remained "confident" in the N.Y. data, with the following Panel Build numbers based on data as of 9/26 provided:

INSTALL IN-TAB 
N.Y. CORE: 2,805 - 3,055
NASSAU/SUFFOLK: 1,440 - 1,556
MIDDLESEX/SOMERSET/UNION: 925 - 987

152 stations were invited to encode in NEW YORK, 109 have agreed and 81 are currently "ready for reporting." NOVEMBER 7th will be the first data release for THE BIG APPLE.

VP/PPM Sales JOHN SNYDER commented, "Being top 3, top 5 or top 10 isn't going to be what it was in the diary world. Expect cume to rise and TSL to drop." He predicted the top NEW YORK stations would cume approximatly five million.

Looking forward, GUYTHER said "we can incorporate PPM into other devices" and added new looks and new skins were planned to help keep the PPM device more user friendly and fashion-consious.

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