With listenership figures down, Ireland's radio stations are having to take bigger risks to catch the public's ear, writes Emmet Oliver.
How can so many people read so few figures and arrive at so many different conclusions? That is the question in the wake of this week's release of the JNLR radio listenership figures. Through a slew of giddy press releases the various station bosses claimed major victories against their rivals, while their rivals claimed the opposite.
Despite the mountain of press releases and millions spent on marketing this year, the hapless listener appears unmoved by it all. The general level of radio listenership has been falling in recent years and it recovered only 1 per cent in this week's results.
Dan Healy, chief executive at NewsTalk, is one of the few radio bosses hoping the public are slightly jaded by the screaming headlines and copycat antics of the stations.
"We hope people are looking for something different," says Healy. "That is what we believe the market needs right now."
Something "different" in this case is one Eamon Dunphy. Due to hit the airwaves on September 6th, Dunphy's new morning show is hoping to turn the apparently rising tide of disenfranchisement to its advantage.
The promotional adverts on NewsTalk already give listeners a flavour of what is to come. Lots of noisy, slightly blue comedy sketches in the Navan man vein, an endless ridiculing of various "muppets", presumably the now-obligatory interview with Roy Keane and hopefully in between all that, some stimulating conversation.
The decision by NewsTalk to drop the more business-focused David McWilliams for Dunphy is an interesting one. To some it smacks of desperation, but to others it is a courageous move designed to finally put NewsTalk on the map.
"When Dunphy was on The Last Word it was about the only time someone in commercial radio was able to even come close to matching RTÉ's ratings," explains one advertising source.
The lifeblood of commercial stations is advertising, and the key times of the day are morning and evening. That is why NewsTalk is prepared to pay Dunphy more than €600,000 a year to put the station on the ratings map in morning prime time. Conventional wisdom has it that listeners in the morning are cranky, harassed, impatient and hungry for news, traffic and weather, not for long, meandering interviews.
On The Last Word, Dunphy received a lot of critical acclaim for his longer, gentler interviews, where previously staid public figures could reveal a little bit more about themselves. This won listeners, even though others got excited by Dunphy's occasional ambushing of people such as Niall Crowley of the Equality Authority and various Government ministers.
The question is, are listeners interested in that kind of radio in the morning, or will Dunphy have to change his approach and become more news-driven, with shorter, more punchy interviews and, consequently, less time for controversy?
With Morning Ireland remaining the country's most listened-to programme (472,000 listeners), the chances of NewsTalk building a huge news and current affairs audience in the same time slot might seem remote. But Dan Healy says that Dunphy's show will be trying to steal listeners from all over the place (Ian Dempsey and Ryan Tubridy, maybe?), not to mention reaching people who are no longer listening to radio at all.
For its part, RTÉ may not be too worried about Dunphy right now. The bigger problem is declining ratings for its flagship station RTÉ Radio One. While the headlines might not look good for RTÉ, one must be mindful of reading too much into the figures.
For example, RTÉ still produces the top 10 radio programmes in the country. In addition to the continuing reign of Morning Ireland, Five Seven Live hit an all-time high (224,000 listeners) this week, with plenty of plaudits for host Rachel English.
But dip below the surface figures, and RTÉ does have problems. Its audience is ageing rapidly and there is a question over its ability to replace these listeners in time. Its position in Dublin has also been weakened significantly in recent years.
Its biggest problem is probably the constant erosion of its market share by local stations. These stations, some of them owned by major British media companies, now control 56 per cent of radio listenership, whereas RTÉ One has 27 per cent, 2FM 24 per cent and Lyric FM 3 per cent.
The radio business has been riven by rumours for months about a high profile female star leaving RTÉ Radio One and taking up residence with NewsTalk. There has also been talk of moving Gerry Ryan on to RTÉ Radio One, bringing with him his advertiser-friendly young audience. But RTÉ's managing director of radio, Adrian Moynes, and head of RTÉ Radio One, Eithne Hand, have so far eschewed radical changes to the RTÉ schedule.
Outside the talk-driven stations such as RTÉ and NewsTalk, things are changing fast too. Today FM, as RTÉ's only national competitor, managed to remain almost static this time around, with Ian Dempsey and Ray D'Arcy in particular holding their ground.
In contrast, Matt Cooper suffered badly in the latest figures (down from 162,000 to 138,000) and another major slippage could be critical. However, the station yesterday strongly denied Cooper was facing the axe or that he would be replaced by David McWilliams, formerly of NewsTalk.
"I believe the figures for The Last Word have now bottomed out. It was always a two-year project, so let's see what the next set of figures say," says Today FM managing director Willie O'Reilly.
Spin FM, the only specialist station aimed at Dublin's younger generation, was a big winner this week. Its cutting-edge music and more relaxed talk policy is apparently finding an audience, with listenership up 3 per cent to 7 per cent this week.
Q102, formerly Lite FM, also managed to show a steady performance this week with 11 per cent listenership. Its decision to ditch the name Lite FM may indicate that all this stuff about brands is not so important after all.