Wow talk about time flying ... it has been 13 weeks since the start of the Fall 2015 PPM Ratings in Toronto (and in the other PPM markets of Montreal, Edmonton, Calgary and Vancouver) that ends at midnight tonight. What a wild ride for talk radio. An election campaign, a Blue Jays run for the World Series, out with the old and in with the new Prime Minister, a terrorist attack in Paris that stunned the world and getting ready for 25,000 Syrian refugees by Jan. 1st and then some back tracking to only bring in 10,000 by New Years Day and the rest of the 15,000 by the end of February. (Well that means the Syrian Refugee story continues into the Winter 2016 PPM ratings).

All this and more creating a Great Day For Talk Radio as John Oakley says over at 640. Good or bad news, a lot of people wanted to talk about it. I predict that come December 10th when the PPM ratings are released, the talk stations, the sports talk stations and 680 News will all see a bump in their ratings.

What will be interesting for radio junkies like me and most of you on this board is what station benefited the most from the news events and people's desire to weigh in with their opinions.

680News will get more of a bump for the Paris terrorist attacks than they will for the election campaign. Paris was generating breaking news for days after the attack because of the raids.The boost in ratings may be tempered by people who have abandoned radio to get their breaking news on social media like Twitter. But for those tuning into radio, a spike in listeners over almost a week of non stop action in Paris could have a positive impact on 680's ratings.  

That said, we'll find out if the decision by Newstalk 1010 to promote breaking news more than promoting their bread and butter talk show hosts helped pull listeners away from 680's breaking news coverage of what was going on in Paris.

But in terms of talk, the trifecta for  Newstalk 1010 was the election campaign and who won, terrorist attacks in Paris and Syrian Refugees coming to Canada at the end of the year. These were hot, hot, hot button issues tailor made for talk radio stations.

640 is not where most people think of going to for breaking news. But that station should also get a boost in ratings because its fans probably listened more than usual because of all the breaking news that people wanted to react to.

Even the Blue Jays made for great talk radio on Newstalk 1010 and AM640.

However, it will be interesting to see which of the two sports talk stations will post a win in the ratings. I'm not a big baseball fan but when in the car during the games I listened to 590 The FAN. The games should offer a boost to their ratings. But when it comes to sports talk, it will be interesting where Toronto turned to talk about the games... the Fan 590 or 1050 TSN. I suspect 1050 will get a boost but the FAN may be the big winner because of the ratings during the live games broadcast. 

We'll find out on December 10th.

Next week results of the Fall 2015 ratings in the Numeris diary markets are released December 3rd. The diary market ratings ended November 1st so they include the election campaign, Justin Trudeau's win and the Blue Jays. So the small market talk stations also had good stuff to talk about that should help their ratings.

We'll find out Thursday, Dec. 3rd.

Any predictions on which stations will win the ratings war for election, Trudeau win, Blue Jays, Paris terrorist attacks and Syrian Refugees. Sort of like something for everyone to be able to brag about. That's so Canadian!

 

Last edited by kowchmedia (November 29, 2015 10:18 am)