Release: Immediate Release
Date: 9th January 2020
PR 01/20
BA November 2019 Audience Assessment registers shifts in
Television and Radio Audience Shares
The Broadcasting Authority has released the audience assessment survey carried out in November 2019.
Forty daily questionnaires were compiled by the NSO giving a total sample of 1,240 respondents with the youngest being 12 year olds. Overall, this sample gives a margin of error of ±2.78%.
In November 2019 a change in audience share (with regards to airtime) was registered for both television and radio. Both ONE and ONE Radio ranked first in audience share which means that audiences follow those two stations more that the other broadcasting stations. For television audiences, TVM ranked second followed by Net TV; while for radio audiences Calypso Radio ranked second with 89.7 Bay placing third.
TELEVISION
As much as 65.1% of the population have watched TV during November. Compared to previous data, there was a significant increase of 10.5% of viewers over the previous assessment period of July (54.6%); and an increase of 1.4% of a similar period last year (October 2018 – 63.7%).
On average TV viewers have spent as much as 1.97hrs watching TV – this was 19’12” more than that registered at the previous assessment in July (1.65hrs) and 7’48” higher than that of October 2018 (1.84hrs).
Audience Reach – Popularity:
Overall, while 69.1% of all viewers followed local TV stations, as much as 30.9% watched a foreign station. The largest amount of viewers were attained by TVM (34.79%), ONE (20.12%), and Net TV (7.96%) respectively. These stations had audiences from all the demographical groups by gender, by age-groups and by district with the exception of Net TV which did not register any viewers between 12 and 20 years old.
Peak Audiences:
Peak audiences of the top three local TV stations were:
• TVM on Wednesdays with 21.78%
• ONE on Wednesdays with 11.59%;
• Net TV on Tuesdays with 5.19%.
Average Audiences:
Taking the total average over a whole week [Monday to Sunday and excluding foreign stations] ONE attracted the largest average amount of viewers [2.217%]; followed by TVM [2.205%] and Net TV [0.758%].
One had the highest average amongst all stations on Wednesdays [2.217%]; Saturdays [1.838%; and Mondays [1.457%]. TVM, on the other hand had the highest average amongst all stations on Sundays [2.135%]; Fridays [2.205%]; Thursdays [1.465%]; and Tuesdays [1.445%].
Audience Share – Airtime:
The total airtime available for viewers was distributed as follows:
Excluding Foreign stations, ONE ranked first with 26.9% of all the audiences, followed by TVM with 26.3%, and Net TV with 7.6%. Although TVM has attracted more viewers than ONE [TVM:34.79%; ONE: 20.12%]; the viewers of ONE have spent more time following their favourite programmes than those of TVM [ONE: 2.64hrs/viewer; TVM: 1.49hrs/viewer].
Over all the viewers, as much as 1.97hrs have been spent every day by viewers and this was 19’12”minutes more than that registered at the previous assessment in July 2019 [1.65hrs].
Favourite Programme Genres:
The most favourite programme genres named by respondents are: Local & Foreign News (19.4%); local Drama (13.8%); Discussion & Current Affairs (11.0%); Documentaries (10.5%); and Cultural/Educational programmes (8.8%).
Television service:
The most common type of reception service provided to television viewers is through a paid subscription – 92.1%. The next most common are IT based services [23.0%]; followed by Free-to-air service [3.9%]; and satellite service (2.1%). Of all the respondents who stated that they have a free-to-air service only 2.3% [≈10,000] have stated that they only have this kind of service.
RADIO
More than half of the population [54.5%] of the population have listened to Radio during November. Compared to previous data, there was an increase of 2.5% over the previous assessment period of July (52.%) and a minimal decrease of 0.5% over that of a similar period last year (October 2018 – 55%).
However, when respondents were asked how often do they listen to radio, 57.7% of the respondents have stated that they listen to radio every day, 14.7% have stated that they listen to radio at least once a week; 22.2% have stated that they do not generally listen to radio; while another 14.7% have stated that they never listen to radio. Only 1.0% have stated that they do not have a radio-set.
On average radio listeners have spent as much as 3.24hrs each. Compared to previous assessments, there was a decrease of 1’48” per listener over the previous assessment of July (3.27hrs) and an increase of 25’48” over that of a similar period last year (October 2018 – 2.81hrs).
Audience Reach – Popularity:
Over all the listeners, 89.7 Bay attracted the largest amount of radio listeners (20.78%); followed by ONE Radio (16.38%) and Radju Malta (12.84%).
Peak Audiences:
An indication of a radio station’s popularity is its highest amount of audiences obtained at any particular half-hour slot. ONE Radio had the highest peaks amongst all stations on Mondays [6.388%]; Wednesdays [5.119%]; Thursdays [7.801%]; and Sundays [5.304%]. 89.7Bay had the highest peak amongst all stations on Fridays [4.919%] and Saturdays [5.06%]; while Radju Malta had the highest peak of all stations on Tuesdays [3.794%].
Average Audiences:
Taking the average audiences attained by each station on each week-day, ONE Radio attained the highest total average amongst all stations for all the weekdays.
Taking the total average audiences over all the week days, ONE Radio attained the highest total average amongst all stations [1.915%] followed by Calypso Radio [1.016%]; 89.7 Bay [0.827%]; Radju Malta [0.758%]; and Radju Marija [0.728%].
Audience Share: Airtime
The total airtime available for radio listeners was distributed as follows:
ONE Radio had the largest amount of audience share [28.2%]; followed by Calypso Radio [15.0%]; and 89.7 Bay [12.2%].
On average, ONE Radio listeners followed their station for 5.59hrs; those of Calypso Radio did so for 4.72hrs; while those of 89.7 Bay followed their station for 1.90hrs. On average, all listeners have spent a total of 3.24hrs each.
Radio Favourite Programme Genre:
Respondents were asked what is their favourite radio programme. While 54.2% named a programme genre another 10.4% named a specific programme; while another 6.6% either said that they like all programmes on radio or “all” on a specific radio station.
Out of those who named a programme genre, the most quoted were Music programmes [58.7%]; another 8.6% named Discussion Programmes; 6.6% News; 6.3% Prayers & Religious programmes; and 1.42% Breakfast Shows.
As much as 10.4% of the respondents named a specific programme which they like to follow. The most named programmes were those classified as “Daytime” programmes [48.5%]; followed by “Morning Drive” programmes [44.6%]. Only 1.78% of the programmes named were for “Overnight” programmes.
DAB+ Radio:
13.1% of respondents have stated that they have a DAB+ radio-set – 54.6% of these have stated that they listen to their DAB+ radio-set for local stations only; another 30.2% stated that they listen to both local and foreign stations; while 8.3% stated that they follow foreign stations only. The rest [6.9%] have stated that they do not use their DAB+ radio-set.
The full version of the results of the survey can be downloaded from the Authority’s website.
Mario Axiak, M.B.A (Maastricht)
Head, Research & Communications
9th January 2020
Click here for Press Release 01/20
Click here for the full Assessment of November 2019
Click here for previous assessments