Radio has more than survived; it has prospered by changing the nature of its relationship with the audiences. The easiest way to understand this is to see pretelevision radio as television as today – nationally oriented, broadcasting an array of recognizable entertainment program formats, populated by well known stars and personalities, and consumed primarily in the home, typically with people sitting around the set.
In an age week, more than 225 million people, 94% of all Americans 12 and over, will listen to the radio. The majority of Americans, 60 % get their first news of the day from radio, and where the large majority of all listening once occurred in cars.
Radio audience, though, is not growing. In fact, it is declining.
FM, AM, and Nonecommercial Radio
The FM (frequency Modulation) signal is wider, allowing the broadcast not only of stereo but also of better fidelity to the original sound than the narrower AM (Amplitude Modulation) signal. As a result, people attracted to music , a radio staple, gravitate toward FM. People favoring news, sports and information tend to find themselves listening to FM dial.
Radio is Local
No longer to compete with television for the national audience in the 1950s, radio began to attract the local audience. Because it cost much more to run a local television station than a local radio station, advertising rates on radio tend to be much lower than the television. Local advertisers can afford radio more easily than they can television, which increases the local flavour of radio.
Radio is Fragmented
Radio stations are widely distributed throughout the United States. Virtually, every town – even those with only a few hundred residents – has at least one station. The number of station licensed in an area is a function of both population and proximity to others towns.
Radio is Specialized
When radio became the local medium, it could no longer program the expensive, star – filled genres og its golden age. The problem now was how to program a station with interesting content and dos o economically.. But stations soon learned that a highly specialized audience of particular interest to certain advertisers could be attracted with specific type of music.
Radio is Personal
With the advent of television, the relationship of radio and its audiences changed. Whereas families had gathered around the radio set to listen together, we now listen to the radio alone. We select personally pleasing formats, and we listen as an adjunct to other personally important activities.
