New radio stations RAMS now out

• Capricorn FM: 35 000 listeners per week (0.1% reach)
  
• MPowerFM: 5 000 listeners a week
  
• North West FM: 66 000 listeners per week (0.2% reach)

This third release combines fieldwork of mid-January to the beginning of March 2008, and mid-March to the beginning of May 2008.

Shifting audiences

Among the established stations, there has been no period on period growth, but several have gained audience over the previous year. Staying true to form, we find Gagasi 99.5 and Kaya FM 95.9 tenaciously sticking to their growth paths, but this release sees four new names on the list of significant audience increases.

Algoa FM's June 2007 audience of 683 000 (2.2%) has now grown to 853 000 across the week, giving the station a reach of 2.7%.

From the Eastern Cape to the Western Cape, the Mother City's Heart 104.9FM has spread its reach from 1.7% a year ago to 2.1% per week, with 646 000 listeners.

National broadcaster SAfm has shown similar growth, extending its reach from 1.7% in June 2007 to 2% currently, netting for itself an audience of 609 000 a week.

South Africa's biggest community station, Jozi FM, has further entrenched its ruling position, growing its weekly audience to 533 000, boosting its June 2007 reach of 5.9% to 8.3% currently.

Returning now to the old hands in the growth stakes, Gagasi 99.5's audience, though stable on the previous RAMS period, is up on June 2007, from 3.4% to 5.2% per week. Its 1.612-million-strong audience is almost 600 000 bigger than a year ago.

Kaya FM 95.9's current audience of 1.529-million (4.9% weekly) was just above a million a year ago, with a weekly reach of 3.4%.

Three stations have shown declines in their weekly audiences over the past 12 months: trufm (formerly CKI FM), from 2% to 1.6% reach; Ikwekwezi FM from 5.6% to 4.9% reach, with losses on the Reef; and Radio Pulpit from 1.1% to 0.6% reach.

In terms of demographic shifts alone, 5FM has grown its weekly Gauteng audience, and 94.7 Highveld Stereo has more listeners each week in Pretoria.

The big picture

Looking at the bigger radio picture, total radio listening has remained stable since RAMS April 2008. Weekly listening, however, has grown since June 2007, from 91.3% reach to 93.8%, beginning a trend seen in the RAMS April 2008 release. Average Monday to Friday listening stands at 76.7%, Saturday listening at 73%, and Sunday listening is at 71.1%, with gains in Port Elizabeth, Pretoria and on the Reef.

Despite gains in weekly listening, the declining trend for time spent listening is continuing. Adult South Africans listen on average nine minutes less than in June 2007. Time spent listening per week is now 30 hours, and four hours, 16 minutes per day. Over the previous survey, KwaZulu-Natal, the Western Cape, North West (despite the presence of a new commercial station), and the Free State have all shown declines in time spent listening.

Listening may be in decline, but listeners themselves certainly are not. The profile of radio listeners is steadily improving. Across an average Monday to Friday, there are significantly fewer SU-LSM 1-3 listeners, and significantly more SU-LSM 5, 6 and 10 listeners.

The fourth release of SAARF RAMS for 2008 is scheduled for 6 August 2008.

For more information on SAARF, go to www.saarf.co.za.