Insights: PPM Markets Show Continued Recovery

Today’s Westwood One blog includes highlights from Nielsen’s just released high-level findings from the August Portable People Meter markets and the May-June-July diary surveys. For those expecting stability, there were surprising increases across the board.

• Audience recovery in the Portable People markets continues: Benchmarking against the March PPM survey, August average quarter-hour audiences increased again, now generating 90% of the prior audiences. In terms of weekly reach, AM/FM radio in the PPM markets has recaptured 96% of March cume listening. In diary markets, AM/FM radio has retained 97% of prior weekly cume.
• In medium and smaller diary markets, AM/FM radio is “pandemic proof”: AQH listening in the just-released May-June-July survey is virtually identical to the January-February-March period as AM/FM radio retains 100% of prior listening.
• Total U.S. AM/FM radio listening is now at 95% of March levels: Combined, total national AM/FM radio AQH is 95% of prior levels.
• Mornings represent virtually all of the AQH growth in August PPM: In the just-released August PPM data, most of the AQH growth occurred Monday-Friday 6AM-10AM and on weekends.
• Out-of-home PPM listening continues steady recovery and nearly matches prior levels: As of August, 69% of AM/FM radio time spent occurs away from home, nearly matching pre-COVID levels.
• PPM: Sports radio storms back while most format shares remain very stable:In August, the return of many sports and the looming reemergence of the NFL generated a +15% increase in all sports PPM shares (3.3 to 3.8).