On Aug 6, 5:45*pm, (David Kaye) wrote:
"Brenda Ann" wrote:
While I may not have some of the expertise he claims to have, [....]

It's not a matter of "claims." *He's known in the industry and he has a
website detailing all his accomplishments over the years, complete with photos
and other documents. *

He cares about ratings, which are made of
whole cloth and based upon a model that is non-sequitur in the real world.

Huh? *Without ratings it's very hard to make income. *Sure, it's possible to
sell time on stations with no ratings, but it's extremely difficult. *Stations
such as KEST and KPIG(AM) do it, but they have a tough go of it. *KPIG(AM) is
advertising for salespeople every couple months because it's so hard to keep
salespeople who can't make any money selling time. *

Regardless of whether you think the ratings system is flawed or not, the PPMs
and the diaries of Arbitron are fairly close for the most part, and the
differences between Neilsen and Arbitron ratings aren't much different,
either. *Thus, I'd be inclined to think the ratings systems aren't as flawed
as people contend they are. *

We've all seen what the true meaning of polls is during the past four
election cycles. There's just no way you can legitimately, despite what some
would have you believe, base the opinions of 1,000,000 people on the dubious
reporting of a few hundred or so.

None of this matters in radio and TV ratings. *The ratings come in and the
stations sell based on those ratings. *The advertisers buy based on the
assumption that they are correct. *If they're so far off as to be bogus, the
advertisers would have left long ago and the ratings systems would have been
thrown out. *Companies do not spend money capriciously, especially they're
trying to bring in business. *

I agree Eduardo is pretty sharp, but let me try to explain Brenda's
point, or perhaps put my spin on it. There are two ways to market a
product. One is to do research, focus groups, etc. This produces a
product that the market probably wants to some degree, but also a
product for which the market is familiar. Now the way to make a
killing is to come up with a product that the customer doesn't know he
needs. You understand the product, not the market per se because the
market isn't built yet. Basically if you focus on surveys, you can
only provide something that the customer already knows about. You
probably won't screw up, but you won't make a killing either.

Eduardo has no passion for radio. He surveys the market and tries to
adjust stations to meet what his survey indicates is marketable.