Survey 3 has been released and while you’ve seen the raw data, read the analysis and taken a look at the spin, radioinfo has caught up with Gemma Fordham, Mike “Fitzy” Fitzpatrick, Paul Jackson and Duncan Campbell, for their initial thoughts on the results.
And according to Nova Entertainment‘s Paul Jackson, the biggest story comes from one of the smaller metro markets.
“I’ve been telling everyone the best story today is in Adelaide between Nova 919 and FIVEaa. Both have done brilliantly”, he says
Nova 919 was up 0.5 All People 10+, to give them outright lead.
“Nova has never been outright number one before in cume and share, ever. To do this up against a station like Mix 102.3 which has been around for years is absolutely incredible”.
ARN’s Duncan Campbell says they take responsibility for MIX 102.3’s once unattainable position in Adelaide slipping away.
“We made a key mistake in Adelaide…we are now correcting that. The Nova show is a good breakfast show, it’s slightly quirky but it’s good and it benefited from a very weak SCA show when it converted to Hit 107 and picked up some good audience. The breakfast show on Mix is still number one FM breakfast show for the 45th survey in a row and we will be back to number one before the end of the year.”
“With FIVEaa it’s been a long time coming but it kind of feels it’s getting back to where the station always was. But we’ll have a closer look at the numbers and see where the gains are coming from,” says Paul.
In Melbourne NOVA’s Chrissie, Sam and Browny were up for the third consecutive survey overtaking KIIS which Paul says augers well for the show’s future, “We have spent lots of time and effort in putting this show together based primarily on great characters and strong chemistry. I think it’s an outstanding entertaining show to listen to…we will probably continue to sit behind Fox and Triple M but we will continue to get closer to them. We have the runs on the board but it’s going to be challenging for top spot.”
Duncan says, “We obviously have a couple of issues, as happens…The big one is with KIIS in Melbourne but again we have confidence in our strategy there. It’s the breakfast show’s third survey, we brought back the Gotcha Calls which have had a positive result and Meshel has a strong opinion piece with Nitty Gritty. The show is getting better and the station overall sounds good”.
“So our strategy remains in tact in Melbourne but it’s a real battle for us”.
Triple M’s Mike “Fitzy” Fitzpatrick suggests the good news story for SCA in Survey 3 would be Melbourne “based on a one and two breakfast Triple M and Fox and a one and two FM, yeah.”
“I’d say yes too, that’s something we are pretty stoked with this survey,” says SCA’s Gemma Fordham.
“I see no worrying trends for Triple M,” says Fitzy. “Our music was adjusted in Brisbane six weeks ago so we’ll start to see the result of that come through in the next book. For us it’s about consistency, we don’t change a lot on Triple M, but you can always do things better…so our focus for our Content Directors is always try and better themselves”.
ARN must be wondering what they can do better with WSFM in Sydney, with Jonesy and Amanda dropping 1.1% to hold a 6.9% share.
“Obviously”, says Duncan “We didn’t expect that result with WSFM in breakfast, there’s no trend around that result but those numbers are certainly disappointing and we won’t shy away from that but again we don’t react to one book.”
SCA’s slow burning breakfast show in Sydney, Sam & Rove finally saw some movement up 0.3 to a 3.3 share.
“The biggest issue with Sydney is consistency,” says Gemma. “It’s a very unusual situation we are dealing with, it’s the third breakfast show for the station in two years. So we have lost a lot of trust from the audience understandably and we are also in a market where there are four heritage breakfast shows. So people are happy with what they are listening to and we just have to work even harder…”
Hamish and Andy have been working hard to maintain number one national drive team for the second book.
Hughesy and Kate had a 9.7% share nationally, Kate, Tim and Marty had 10.8% and Hamish and Andy 11.1%.
“The boys (Hamish and Andy) have just been delivering great content”, says Gemma.
“I’m finding more and more people are talking about the guys and they are doing those big story arcs that we all love and they are so bloody great at.”
But according to Paul Jackson, “In the grand scheme of it though, it’s not enough of a gap there for one to have leverage over another.
“Drive has three quality shows that kind of negate each other, because it’s going to be a draw every time. We won Adelaide and Perth, Hamish and Andy won Brisbane and Melbourne and Hughesy and Kate Sydney”.
Duncan’s thoughts are fairly simple, “they are all good drive shows, they are all really exceptional.”
Until next time…