Radio ratings: Ali Clarke’s ABC breakfast boost
ABC Radio Adelaide’s long-running dominance of the key breakfast shift looks set to continue, with new announcer Ali Clarke achieving a big boost in the latest ratings survey.
The GfK survey period, which began shortly after Clarke replaced David Bevan in the shift, shows a 2 percentage point leap in ratings for ABC Radio Adelaide breakfast – a performance which led the station to an overall move up the ratings table.
Clarke lifted listener share from 14.2 per cent to 16 per cent, increasing the ABC’s lead over FIVEaa’s David Penberthy and Will Goodings who dropped from 13.6 to 12.4.
The survey marks a successful transition for the ABC from the successful pairing of Bevan and Matthew Abraham, who retired from radio earlier in the year.
In their last survey together after six dominant years in breakfast, the pair achieved 14.7 per cent listener share.
Extracted from GfK ratings survey six: July 16 to September 23, 2017.
Bevan’s move to the morning shift – a direct swap with Clarke, with the pair overlapping from 8.30 to 9 – has also paid off for the ABC, with a solid boost in ratings.
In fact, it was a successful survey across the board for the ABC’s local station, with every shift putting on listener share.
Drive announcer Julian Schiller increased his listener share by 1.4 percentage points, while evenings announcer Peter Goers and the syndicated Night Life program have recaptured the ABC’s lead in the 7pm to midnight shift.
Ali Clarke. Supplied image: ABC
As a result, ABC Radio Adelaide has rocketed up the ratings table – from fifth place in the previous survey to second.
By contrast, every commercial station – barring hit107 – lost share.
Mix102.3 remains the leading station, with 12.4 per cent of audience share, followed by ABC Radio Adelaide (11.6), Nova (11.0), FIVEaa (10.8) and Triple M (10.7).
Triple M fell back from a powerful performance in the previous survey, dropping from overall second place to fifth, despite remaining the leading station in the morning and afternoon shifts.
FIVEaa lost share across the board, apart from the Drive sports program, to fall from overall third to fourth.
However, the overall picture has tightened: the gap between the leading five stations is now under two percentage points.
Extracted from GfK ratings survey six: July 16 to September 23, 2017.
The demographic data shows the ABC’s improved performance came from the oldest group of listeners – the station gained a huge 6 percentage points in share of listeners aged over 65.
It also made modest gains among people aged between 55 and 64 years.
