It’s not often that a public radio network holds top spot in the Dutch listening figures, but that’s what the figures for Nov/Dec 2004, released today by research bureau Intomart GFK, show. However, there hasn’t been a huge shift in listenership between stations, and these figures are distorted because of some special programming over the Christmas period. Radio 2 broadcast the Top 2000 between Christmas and New Year, giving it a huge increase in share, mainly at the expense of usual market leader Radio 538. Radio Veronica also broadcast a special - the Top 1000 of all time - which boosted its market share at the expense of Radio 10 Gold. It wasn’t a good two months for Radio 10’s owners Talpa, who also saw sister station Noordzee FM lose a significant number of listeners. Former market leader Sky Radio saw its share boosted to just 0.2% behind Radio 538, but the station - which broadcasts continuous music without presenters - traditionally does well over the Christmas period. Because the listening figures are published monthly but cover listening over two months, the next set of figures will also be influenced by the Christmas specials, but the figures published in March for the first two months of 2005 will give a truer picture of normal listenership. We expect Radio 538 to comfortably regain top spot, and the gap between Radio Veronica and Radio 10 Gold to widen again. These are the latest audience share figures (Oct/Nov in brackets):
1. Radio 2 (public) 12.5% (10.0)
2. Radio 538 (commercial) 10.8% (12.1)
3. Sky Radio (commercial) 10.6% (10.2)
4. Radio 1 (public) 8.3% (8.6)
5. Radio 3 FM (public) 6.3% (6.4)
6. Radio 10 Gold (commercial) 4.7% (5.1)
7. Radio Veronica (commercial) 4.5% (3.9)
8. Noordzee FM (commercial) 4.1% (4.6)
9. Yorin FM (commercial) 3.3% (3.6)
10. RTL FM (commercial) 2.8% (unchanged)
11. Classic FM 2.5% (commercial) (2.3)
12. Radio 4 (public) 1.9% (unchanged)
13. Arrow Rock Radio (commercial) 1.8% (1.6)
14. 747 AM (public) 0.8% (0.9)
15. Arrow 90.7 FM (commercial) 0.6% (unchanged)
16. ID&T Radio (commercial) 0.5% (unchanged)
17. BNR Nieuws Radio (commercial) 0.3% (unchanged)
Regional public broadcasters 14.1% (14.5)
Regional commercial stations 2.6% (3.1
Other stations 6.8% (7.2)
