N/T Radio: Bridge Ratings Cites News "Fatigue"

Dave Van Dyke

Bridge Ratings has been annually monitoring the consumption patterns of News/Talk radio and, according to President/CEO Dave Van Dyke, this is the first year they are able to publish part of the latest trending for the News/Talk format.

In his blog, Van Dyke addresses 'The State of Talk Radio'.

In recent months and years, questions have been raised by industry experts as to the general ratings malaise of the News/Talk format's consumption trends and the possible faltering interest of by today's radio listener. While there are exceptions to this, audience shares for the format have been slipping lately.

Although News/Talk/Informationremains one of the most popular broadcast radio formats among Americans, second only to country music, one thing that stands out about this latest study is listener fatigue with News/Talk radio. More specifically, Talk radio topics and the frequency with which they air.

While there is a perceived softening of the News/Talk radio format, it continues to do well as evidenced by these 6+ audience share trend stats from Nielsen:

While remaining strong overall, audience shares are off. Van Dyke asks, "Is this a function of seasonality or other environmental drivers?"

The lower shares of listening for Talk radio may also be attributed to its aging audience. Many industry analysts are aware of this and as in the past as with most other radio formats, News/Talk is finding itself in the position of considering how to move the demographic appeal of the format younger, even as that younger target is finding other sources for the news information they are interested in.

The very nature of news cycles in this new technology age is fueling fatigue simply because content is being sought after, found and consumed at a faster pace. The cycle of consumption is also accelerating.

One thing is very clear: as time (and access to information) has progressed over the last 15 years, news information has become oversaturated, particularly in the political news coverage arena.

As the trending chart reveals, political news coverage saturation spikes approximately every two years which is aligned with the political election seasons.

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