Number of listeners: the difference between monday-friday and the weekend

Female81

Female81

New Member
In the weekends, I notice the number of people listening to my station is about 40 % of the number of listeners at monday till friday.

I know a lot of people especially listen to the radio at work. But are there ways to make the format of a (non stop) radio station more attractive in the weekend? At the moment, the music format in the weekends is similar to the office hours, except a special dance show (friday 7pm-saturday 2am) to kick the weekend off.

Regular format: late 80s-early 00s, general pop music, mostly quite 'feel good'. A couple of dance tracks by hour.

Because my station is strictly non stop, jingles and music have to do the trick.
 
Female81 said:
In the weekends, I notice the number of people listening to my station is about 40 % of the number of listeners at monday till friday.

I know a lot of people especially listen to the radio at work. But are there ways to make the format of a (non stop) radio station more attractive in the weekend? At the moment, the music format in the weekends is similar to the office hours, except a special dance show (friday 7pm-saturday 2am) to kick the weekend off.
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I would suggest increasing the dance content (though I admit I am biased towards that format) - TBH you would be aiming at people who are slightly older (late 30s to 40s especially young parents who can't go out clubbing) - mind you if I lived in NL I'd be out every weekend and I am 41 (but thankfully single and without kids) and apparently many people who go to trance events are yet older!

if you do not want to play out long DJ mixes (as there are so many stations doing just that) I'd go for the early 90s european rave classics (UK old skool, belgian techno etc...)
 
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I've changed the format recently, because there seemed to be a demand for mixing the danceable tunes with more 'serious' pop music. Some relaxed tunes between the more powerful stuff.

-Before, the format was 4 x dance (at least 120 bpm) by hour, + a couple of danceable pop- or urban tracks (100-120 bpm); seven days a week.
-At the moment, it's 2 x dance by hour + a couple of danceable pop/urban tracks. Also seven days a week.

And the 'weekend issue' already existed before, when there was more dance played. :)

So, it's hard to figure out what I'm doing wrong.
 
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I would say listening to the radio is way more habit-based than attraction-based. So it's not a matter of attractiveness or tension or whatever, it is matter of habitual behavior. And that is really difficult to change...
 
Also mysterious: the experiment with a dance show on saturday night (7pm till 2 am), last month. In fact, I had already ordered the voice overs before opening this topic, and reading General Lighting's comment.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UB-wMP3yiy4

There was already a dance show broadcasted at friday night, at the same time slot; nice ratings, no problems. The new saturday night show was similar. And within 20 minutes after the start, the ratings dropped about 50 % - every week. Something I don't notice at friday. And also not before at saturday night, after 7pm, with the regular schedule.

I don't get it; saturday night seems to be a more logical timeslot to broadcast a dance show than friday night - when USA people still are at the office (time zone difference).
 
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can your provider show where the bulk of the listeners actually are and in what countries (that would help you adjust for different timezones)?

I fear economic depression in most parts of the world means listeners are increasingly more discouraged - their desktop computer might be censored from internet streaming (and in workplaces some very "blunt instrument" censorware is often used) using a non work issue mobile phone at work is often also watched for and discouraged by bosses, and those "business friendly" phones issued by employers would have streaming blocked to save costs.(perhaps many ISPs in some countries have switched increasingly to usage based charging). other folk have to work at weekends as well as the week. I admit myself I find it hard to listen to upbeat music as much as I love it in recent times during the week (and do not always manage to update the mixes on my stations as quickly as I could nor find the energy to do live shows) as I have been very busy lately with my day job.

I've noticed on Party Vibe as well although our ambient and psytrance streams remain very popular, as are reggae, there has been a drop in listeners on other genres, also those who did live shows (myself included) find it harder due to longer working hours (and two of my friends becoming parents recently).

Maybe in downbeat times people prefer downbeat music (I've noticed this at the housing co-op I sometimes help out at) but that would not explain the psytrance remaining popular. However at the weekend those who can do go out, and in areas like mine where there is zero tolerance on dance events (due to drugs) they still often have house parties.

Another factor may be that people are becoming less tech aware and are increasingly using the ISP supplied router which does not have as strong a wi-fi signal ( to keep Ofcom, Agentschap Telecom, ARCEP etc happy) so if they are working on some hobby project in a workshop or in the kitchen they might not be able to get a wifi signal to listen to internet radio. Also folk are becoming less tech aware and do not even realise the router wifi channel should be changed or there will be intereference from your neighbours devices. I noticed even on a Dutch youth forum I sometimes read that the young people are a bit more "dumbed down" and less enthusastic about anything compared to even 10-15 years previously.

I do think the effect of wider world issues and less access to internet (whether through direct censorship, rising prices or less efficient devices) must have some effect...
 
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This is where my listeners come from. The big, orange 'other' part mostly consists of various European countries, according to a more detailed stats page. I guess about 2/3 of the total amount of listeners is from Europe.

Basically, my schedule is targeted at Europe (biorhythmwise). Although I keep the time zone difference with the USA and Canada in mind; when it comes to scheduling relatively harsh tracks and such things.

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I think a lot of factors are involved here - DE features strongly as they have a strong culture of listening to "cable radio" (they had (analogue) radio stations via the telephone wire since the 1930s!) and tech/electronics hobbies (similar to NL). There is also less of a gender gap when it comes to tech-related hobbies than the UK or some Southern European nations (I notice this as well amongst young women from Eastern Europe and many who are of Asian ancestry)

you are similar in many ways to my younger sister (same age as yourself) - she has a day job in marketing and web design but is heavily involved in the local music scene, sings and plays guitar (her favourite music is country and western/folk which we grew up with, although our parents being from Malaysia! - this may be why I've got to quite like listening to piratenhits ;) )

Whether or not you intended it, your station appears to be targeted at a certain kind of intelligent, confident European young woman (aged around 18-45) who understands English as either a first or second language, works in a skilled/professional job, is socially liberal in her views but has concerns about some modern pop music and its content (especially attitudes to girls/women and other aggressive lyrics).

However these young women are now increasingly likely to be mothers and may spend weekends with children - if they only own one device capable of listening to an internet station such as a laptop, the children may be using it, supervised by their mother? they may even be embarrassed about their kids learning about what their mum got up to in the 80s/90s ;)

Also there has recently been particularly good weather across Europe, so may have spent their weekend attending festivals with friends and family, riding their bikes etc (one of my favourite songs from NL is in the Drents dialect and is about these friends who went on a "short" bike ride around Groningen just around autumn, this took them 80km including across the border to Germany and back !)

Perhaps now the weather has changed, things will improve? winter is often a time for starting "indoor" hobby projects where folk are more likely to want to listen to music in the background, and be close to a good net connection?

I was thinking today that the young women at the housing co-operative would particularly enjoy listening to your station (and also reading your website). I will send them the link, but I know that only 2 out of the 5 there would be able to get a good wifi signal, not all of them have smartphones, and it might be some time before I can get there and install a better router ...
 
These metrics all matter on the demographics of the radio listeners. Advertising radio is still a large advertising technique, when looking at the listeners difference from Monday to Friday and the weekend. They must do research on how many people are listening at what time. Advertisers would tell you it varies from the demographics of the listeners.

It's great that you are looking at your metrics and taking notice on who is listening at what times. Keep up the great work!
 
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