Tag Archives: CKMF

Montreal radio ratings: “a solid book” for The Beat, but …

March 7, 2013 – 8:10 pm| Posted in Montreal, Radio
Station Winter 2011 Winter 2012 Fall 2012 Winter 2013
CJAD 25.9 24.8 25.2 25.0
CJFM (Virgin) 18.2 17.3 18.6 15.9
CKBE (Beat) 17.2 14.9 16.6 18.6
CHOM 10.3 11.9 13.7 13.5
CKGM (TSN) 2.6 4.4 2.3 2.6
CBME (CBC1) 7.5 8.2 7.2 7.0
CBM (CBC2) 2.9 2.7 2.4 2.5

BBM ratings, anglo 2+ audience

I don't normally pay that much attention to the quarterly BBM ratings of Montreal radio stations. Not because I don't care, but just because there's rarely anything in them that's newsworthy. A share point up here, a share point down there. Some stations do better in some time periods, others do better in others. There isn't usually much movement.

Lately, CJAD has been first overall among all audiences, while the three music stations have been fighting for audience in key demographics: men for CHOM, young women for Virgin and somewhat older women for The Beat. CBC falls significantly behind, and TSN Radio even further. Other stations don't even register. Things have been a bit more interesting on the French side with the rise of CHMP 98.5, which is now Quebec's most-listened-to radio station.

But today's numbers (PDF) showed a significant change for once: In overall audience (ages 2+), The Beat has leaped ahead of Virgin Radio for the first time, getting an 18.6% share versus 15.9%. That prompted The Beat to send out a press release calling itself "Montreal's #1 Music Station".

That was enough for a Gazette story on the matter.

But as the story shows, The Beat's claim to be ahead of Virgin comes with a caveat: Virgin still outperforms in key demographics (among them, adults 25-54, adults 18-34 and women 25-54) and in key time periods.

In Astral's press release, in which Virgin also calls itself "Montreal’s number one music station", it focuses on the key advertising demographic of adults 25-54, in which Virgin still leads.

We could play with demographics all day, but if we stick to adults 25-54, the results show a three-way tie among the music stations: Virgin 21.9%, The Beat 20.1% and CHOM 20.0%, with CJAD behind at 13.1%. This represents an upward trend for The Beat and CHOM, but is down from last year for Virgin.

See some analysis here from Astral, and here from La Presse.

Needless to say everyone's happy and everyone is number one. Here's how the numbers break down for each station:

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Regional CKOI stations turn to talk

August 20, 2012 – 5:43 pm| Posted in Radio

While everyone's focused on CHOI Radio X coming to Montreal, it's not the only music station in Quebec switching to a talk radio format today.

As announced in June, Cogeco converted three regional stations from the CKOI brand to news-talk brands based on the one used by CHMP 98.5FM in Montreal.

They join FM 93 in Quebec City (CJMF-FM) and FM 98 in Saguenay (CKRS-FM), the latter of which is an independently-owned station that carries some network programming.

The three new stations share much of the same programming. They include:

Each station continues to have its own local morning show, noon show and afternoon drive show on weekdays. They will also air sports programming including Canadiens and Alouettes games, except for the station in Gatineau which air Senators games.

Meanwhile, at other stations

CKOI in Montreal, which remains a music station, launched its new programming today. It adds Yan England to its morning show, Nadia Bilodeau to afternoons (starting Sept. 10) and revamps its noon show to focus more on humour.

Mitsou, who left NRJ in June and was rumoured to be heading to rival Rythme FM, confirmed she'll be starting there Nov. 20. She'll join the afternoon show, instead of the morning one, so she can spend mornings with her family. Marie-Soleil Michon will host the show until Mitsou starts. Also joining Rythme FM (CFGL-FM) are Lise Dion and, according to La Presse, Denis Fortin.

NRJ Montreal (CKMF-FM) adds Mike Gauthier with its fall schedule. He'll also join Rouge FM in Quebec City, which is also owned by Astral.

La Presse has a few other tidbits of programming changes at French-language radio stations in Montreal.

In Quebec City, legendary pranksters Les Justiciers Masqués are back on the radio, joining the afternoon show at the CKOI station there, which is owned by Leclerc Communication.

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Radio ratings: Good news for 98.5, The Beat and CHOM

June 26, 2012 – 12:00 pm| Posted in Radio

Quarterly radio ratings were released earlier this month. You can see the BBM compilation of top-line data here (PDF), but it doesn't say too much.

Astral and Cogeco both provide analysis for the benefit of advertisers, Astral in the form of a slideshow (PDF) and Groupe Force Radio (which represents Cogeco stations and independent former Corus stations in Quebec City and Saguenay) also does a slide presentation (PDF). The latter tends to be more detailed, but is also more biased, highlighting their stations' successes and their competitors' struggles.

Here, based on those reports, is some analysis of what's going on in commercial radio in Montreal. We'll start with the English side.

English radio

Afternoon ratings show a spike for Donna Saker's show on CKBE, rocketing it to No. 1. There's a similar spike in late mornings and at noon-hour.

Overall, there hasn't been much change in the ratings. A few points up, a few points down. But breaking it down a bit you see some significant gains for CKBE-FM 92.5 (The Beat) and a few highlights for CHOM-FM 97.7 as well.

The Beat, which rebranded last fall in an effort to attract a younger female audience but hadn't seen much movement in ratings until now, is starting to see the change (and accompanying marketing spending) pay off. It's second behind Virgin Radio among adults 18-49 and 25-54 (in both cases passing CHOM), first among adults 35-64 (passing CJAD) and has seen a gain of more than 50% in a year for men 25-54 (which is interesting because the station is targetting women).

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Astral ditches Energie for NRJ

July 6, 2009 – 5:43 pm| Posted in Montreal, Radio

NRJ

Astral Media, the folks who decided to bring Virgin Radio branding (and programming) to stations including Montreal's CJFM 95.9, has decided to do something similar with their French-language Énergie network, dumping that brand in favour of France-based NRJ Radio.

The press release (also on their website) reassures listeners about keeping local hosts and promoting local talent, but also talks about new programming that would come from this international network that operates in more than a dozen countries around the world.

There are just so many hours in the broadcast day, so expect some of the non-vedettes at Énergie (CKMF and what's left of regional stations) to lose their jobs as Astral finds more efficiencies bringing in cheap, syndicated foreign content instead of paying locals to act as DJs.

The changeover is scheduled for August 24.

UPDATE: More from Les Affaires.

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