The South African Advertising Research Foundation (SAARF) has released the latest RAMS, and on the whole, found that radio is a medium continues to deliver stable and consistent listenership. Looking at the period from January to June this year, “RAMS June 2012 does not show any statistically significant changes in listenership over the previous survey for any individual station”.
Time spent listening (TSL)
The latest RAMS release shows that people spend two minutes more per day listening to radio. South African adults (aged 15+) now listen to the radio for three hours, 33 minutes on average each day. Weekly time spent listening (TSL) is now 24h48, up from 24h36 in the previous survey.
Three provinces put their ears behind this growth: TSL in the Western Cape and Free State was up by nine minutes each, while Gauteng’s TSL rose by three minutes.
Radio’s reach has strengthened since the previous RAMS release. Seven-day listening rose from 88.0% in RAMS May 2012 to 88.8% currently, with growth coming from Durban and the 35+ demographic.
Average Monday to Friday listening remained stable at 68.5%.
While listening on the weekend remained stable in total, RAMS June 2012 shows a growth in Saturday listening from 7:30-9:30am, and on Sundays from 7:45-9:15am and from 7:00-8:15pm.
Saturday listening levels are at 65.3% (with gains in the Cape fringe), while Sunday listening levels are at 65.5% (with growth in the metros).
No individual radio station showed any statistically significant changes in audience level over RAMS May 2012.
The listenership figures of several stations however, when evaluated on a year-by-year basis, are now significantly different than they were in RAMS June 2011.
Community Radio
As with commercial radio, there was no movement over the previous RAMS release on an individual station level, although a number of stations did show significantly different listenership compared to a year ago.
Five new stations have posted their first RAMS figures (based on large urban data only):
- Mdantsane FM in the Eastern Cape has a provincial reach of 1.7% per week, with 78 000 listeners.
- 97.0 Knysna FM reaches 0.2% of the Western Cape’s adult population, with a weekly listenership of 6 000.
- Shine FM in KwaZulu-Natal has 2 000 listeners per week.
- Kopanang FM in the North West province reaches 0.2% of the province per week, with 4 000 listeners.
- In the Northern Cape, Kurara FM reaches 0.1% of the province per week.
Durban Youth Radio, which has been off air for some time, is now back on RAMS, with a weekly audience of 0.1% of KwaZulu-Natal’s adult population, and a listenership of 4 000.
