Report: Radio Has 30M Superfans

According to DMR/Interactive's audience segmentation analysis, Amplifiers and Ambassadors, or passionate Super Fans, who regularly share and amplify their favorite radio stations with friends and co-workers, are estimated by to be about 30 million listeners nationwide.

Superfans represent just 10-15% of a station's audience, but consume a disproportionate amount of radio and are tremendously loyal to their favorite station. In addition, the new listeners that emerge are not only in the station's core demo, but are 70% more likely to remain engaged with the station due to the unique power of word-of-mouth.

"The opportunity for radio is to engage and harness this tremendous asset to drive increased listening and ROI for advertisers," according to DMR/Interactive President/COO Andrew Curran. "Audience Amplification is a powerful way to consistently grow a station's audience at little or no direct cost and it provides a competitive advantage for radio against other platforms. With limited internal resources, stations cannot afford to treat listeners the same and inefficiently allocate resources."

Getting to know these Super Fans and Amplifiers, DMR/Interactive notes, starts with unifying a station's existing data sources including email, texting, winners, points programs, social media and listener advisory panels and identifying the best listeners by name as part of an overall audience engagement strategy. The result consistently drives increased listening by strengthening the station's relationship with these Super Fans and further enables the station to provide their best advertisers with premium access to enhanced audience segments.