Why Weekends Don't Work

Think Audience

Ever think about why your public radio weekends don't seem to attract an audience? Look at your churn.

Look at the Numbers

Check out your Morning Edition Numbers. If you have a daily cume of 36K and an AQH of 12K, your turnover ratio on that particular day is 3 to 1. The audience churns three times. 

If your cume on a Tuesday between 6a and 7p is 70k and your AQH is 10k, your turnover ratio is 7 to 1. The audience churns seven time

If your cume on a Saturday from 6a to 7p is 50k and your AQH is 5k, your turnover is 10 times.  

If you cume weeknights is 35k and the AQH is 1k, your turnover is 35 to one. 

Delivering an Audience

Given these numbers, how effective is to place a program initiative during the evening or late in the day on Saturday or Sunday? If you have ever wondered why so many programs fail, it is because you're not delivering an audience to that program. 

And...consider what audience churn means to fundraising. If your audience is constantly churning, there is no loyalty to the programming. Your ability to raise funds from listeners diminishes. That's why it is so hard to raise member dollars at night and most of Saturday and Sunday.

What's the Hang Up?

It's pretty simple. That crazy quilt of patchwork programming is causing all sorts of seams and barriers to listening. Each program says hello and goodbye with theme music wrapped around the edges. About the time a program starts to build an audience, it's over. You're starting fresh with each new element.  Also consider that radio listening doesn't start conveniently at the top of the hour. Listeners are loading in and out all the time. Without consistency, building audience becomes difficult.