Bitch as we will about Dori, Don, and Luke, but something's working over at KIRO.
The September Arbitron ratings show that Bonneville's KIROFM has reached up to share (with rocker KISW) the no. 1 spot in the market. It's the first time in our memory that it's been higher than no. 3. This is definitely the highest ratings any talker has gotten in this market in the PPM era.
KOMO comes in at fourth place, which ain't bad- especially without Mariners baseball which it had in previous years when it’s surged, according to Radio-Info's Tom Taylor.
Public radio talker KUOW is at 11th place as usual.
Rush Limbaugh's KTTH (also owned by Bonneville) is still scraping along at 24th place but they're beating CBS's KPTK progressive talk which is in the tank at 30th.
As always, these are the most general of all ratings- the only ones publicly available- of those age 6 and older. The most valuable demo is the age 25-54 (folks who allegedly buy most stuff that might be advertised) and the aged 35-64, the group that apparently are the second most liable to buy stuff they hear advertised on the radio.
Here's a fair explanation of radio ratings.
Who knew? All KIRO needed to do is switch to FM and dumb down the format and they surge to No. 1.
Come on, solid blue Seattle, we've got to support progressive talk or it will go away.
Yeah, I know it is all automated and local CBS doesn't seem to care. Yeah, I know Rachel Madow, Al Franken and Ron Reagan went away.
But the ratings are bad so CBS cuts back which makes the ratings worse which means CBS cut back even more.
We have to stop the vicious cycle somewhere.
Posted by: Erictheeditor | October 05, 2011 at 11:58 AM
I can see it now, As Monson Goes So Goes KIRO.
No doubt he'll want to thanks his faithful listeners at the Blather such as T008 and his no less faithful 'accidental' listeners such as Sparky.
Keep those earbuds tuned to the broadcast or the PODCAST so as to keep Dori-Fever alive.
Posted by: Puget Sound Blathers | October 05, 2011 at 12:03 PM
I think that Right Wing radio succeeds here BECAUSE Seattle is blue. It allows an oasis for those who do not agree with the primary sentiment to express their opinion.
Posted by: Mike Barer | October 05, 2011 at 12:57 PM
Interesting point, Mike, although I most certainly wouldn't classify KIRO-FM as "right wing" radio. In looking at the radioinfo.com numbers, notice that KISW is on a downward trend, and KIRO-FM is on the way up. Let's see what happens over the next few months-we could see KIRO-FM sitting on top of the radio heap.
Posted by: Radio Queen | October 05, 2011 at 01:06 PM
maybe dave ross/luke burbank; dori monson; ron and don are just more interesting then the best the 'left' can put on the air?
Posted by: Puget Sound Blathers | October 05, 2011 at 01:53 PM
They are #1 6+ which doesn't mean very much. You have to look at the demo outbreaks and hour by hours to see the real winners.
Posted by: JimF | October 05, 2011 at 02:07 PM
True, but they can still boast "we're #1" to the general public who doesn't know any better. Of course, they can't fool the advertisers.
Posted by: Radio Queen | October 05, 2011 at 02:33 PM
How do we find out the "hour by hours?"
Posted by: lotus eater | October 05, 2011 at 02:35 PM
"We" (as in the general public) don't get to see these numbers. Only Arbitron clients get the detailed breakdowns. Even the media can only talk in very general terms about numbers. Here's a link to Arbitron's explanation.
Posted by: Radio Queen | October 05, 2011 at 02:55 PM
Years ago, back when I actually owned a muisc store, I waas approached by a radio salesman. From a station very few had ever heard of. Even now I cannot remember the call letters. Anyway, he showed me documentation that his radio station was the most productive place to spend my advertising dollar.
So whats the point......? The point is that the Arbitron book is put together in such a way that any radio station can make the claim that they are the best.
Posted by: Ryder | October 05, 2011 at 04:28 PM
The interesting part is the CUME (the number of listeners). Notice how KIRO's cume is considerably smaller than most of the top stations and some of the bottom ones. That says there is a small, but loyal, audience spending time listening.
Posted by: some guy | October 05, 2011 at 07:07 PM
Leftist talk radio fails because many liberals are able to develop a viewpoint without the aide of talking points from some blowhard on the radio.
I only speak for myself, but if I listen to 10 hours of talk radio on a given week, 20 minutes are spent on left-leaning shows, 30 are spent news/weather/traffic, and 9 hours are spent with the right-wing guys. (The remaining 10 minutes go to Cisco on the weekends. I just like the way he makes me feel about myself.)
Listening to someone drone on and on about stuff that I already agree with bores me. I'm confident enough with my opinions that I don't need constant reinforcement from some guy who just happens to have a microphone. I'd much rather spend that time listening to the opposite point of view and getting some insight into why they think the way they do. And let's be honest - the guys on the right are just better showmen than the ones on the left (with a few exceptions). They do it with a lot of attitude and a lot of hyperbole. It's just good radio.
I can't imagine I'm alone on this...
Posted by: Tony | October 05, 2011 at 10:01 PM
Does right wing talk radio succeed here? I don't think so. Judging from this post, no political talk radio, left or right really makes it any more. What radio listeners want is Amanda Knox sitings, and in-depth Nancy Grace public farting analyses.
Posted by: Phil Dirt | October 05, 2011 at 10:05 PM
I'm not saying that right-wing radio is ruling the airwaves these days, but it's definitely doing better than liberal radio. Off the top of my head, you have 4 prominent local conservative hosts (Monson, Carlson, Boze, Curley) versus 1.125 prominent liberal hosts (Dave Ross and Ken Schram - who just barely falls into the liberal category). There's Luke Burbank (too busy being ironic to have an ideology) and the guys that run those Ron-and-Donathons, but I wouldn't really put any of them in one colum or the other. Add in all of the syndicated hosts on the air in Seattle and I'll bet there's a 4 to 1 conservative/liberal ratio.
And look at the stations themselves. Sure, KTTH might not be killing it in the ratings right now, but they do at least give the impression of being an actual radio station. They may only produce one hour of local radio per day, but that's still 100% more than KPTK does. And KTTH has a great website with mynw.com.
Try going to kptk.com (I'll wait). It's a search engine powered by godaddy.com. And if you type "KPTK" into that search engine, it suggests a website with the heading "Wax, Shave or Ignore". You'll find their actual website at seattle.cbslocal.com, but even that is a generic CBS website that's shared with CW11. If you're able to maneuver around all the America's Next Top Model popup ads, you'll eventually get to the KPTK homepage (which incidentally appears to have been designed using Windows Paint with the intention of being accessed via Compuserve). The whole thing's a joke.
I think it's fair to say that the tabloid stories (and yes, Nancy Grace's flatulence) are what's hot right now, but you can't say that conservative radio doesn't beat left-wing radio - here or anywhere.
Posted by: Tony | October 05, 2011 at 11:55 PM
"And let's be honest - the guys on the right are just better showmen than the ones on the left"
I'd argue that conservative politics are more showy by nature. Conservativism is home port to bigots, zealots, gun nuts, survivalists, nihilists, Randian objectivists, american exceptionalists, xenophobes, laissez faire capitalists and all other manners of circus show freaks with selfish or experimental world views that aren't just fun to watch, but fun to listen to.
Liberal talk amounts to matter-of-fact news, human interest stories, the arts, boring shit.
Posted by: The Original Andrew | October 06, 2011 at 01:17 AM
KIRO is not UP because their competition is DOWN.
KIRO is UP because there competiton is GONE.
There was a time when KIRO had more competition: KING 1090, Live & Local; KVI, Live & Local much of the day; The Buzz, talk-radio on FM; 1300 AM; All-News on KNWX; Local News and syndicated talk on KRKO in Everett.
Today, almost nothing.
KIRO-FM is a well-programmed station with the biggest local personalities on Seattle radio.
Their real competition is NPR.
KOMO is nothing but a bunch of news-readers half-heartedly stumbling through repetitive wire-copy. Traffic reports keep them in the hunt.
KTTH has Rush Limbaugh and People Meter is proving that Rush always had a small band of loyal followers and nothing more.
KPTK is the most poorly automated station in the history of human-kind. At least every 20 minutes you'll hear dead-air or multiple audio or the wrong audio. But at least there's Lee "If it's yellow, let it mellow; if it's brown,flush it down" Callahan.
KIRO-FM is good.
But it help's that they're the only thing left.
Posted by: Itchy | October 06, 2011 at 03:59 AM
KJR-FM rates pretty good - about 5th-6th, but see that the cumulative listeners numbers are higher than most stations. In radio ratings, it seems very difficult to have a foolproof rating system and while Arbitron captures a pluratlity of the market - there is a noticeable suffering of fools. Noticed also that KVI is down near rock bottom way lower than KJR-FM, could there have been a mistake in their decision to go oldies ? Bryan Suits is probably musing - I told you so...
Posted by: KS | October 08, 2011 at 10:27 AM