Radio and Search Engines
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Let's revisit a topic that's discussed frequently at Audio Graphics - how radio stations rank in search engines.
The reason why we focus on search engine positioning is simple. If the radio industry is serious about all the chatter we hear it make on how "the future is online," the people pulling radio's strings should understand that search engine placement is an intricate part of this future. Unfortunately, judging from where terrestrial radio stations place in search engine rankings, they don't seem to understand.
There are two angles to take in this quest on finding how serious radio is about its online future. 1) How individual stations rank when doing a search for format-specific "radio." 2) How radio groups (or the industry at-large) rank when a business owner searches for ways to build an effective radio advertising campaign.
I just pulled numbers on where Audio Graphics' RadioRow ranks. It's a standard process that requires little time, yet it furnishes invaluable information on whether certain pages of this web site need a little help to boost search engine positions. I doubt if any radio station conducts similar research, or if any radio industry player does either. Here's why.
Say you're a business owner looking to spend a little money on radio, only you don't quite know the ins-and-outs of how to put together a radio campaign.
You would, in today's internet-based world, sit at the keyboard and do a search for "radio advertising," "how to do radio advertising," or "the benefits of radio advertising."
To save you time, we'll pull a quick check on what each search brings, concentrating on the top twenty returns for each.
"Radio Advertising" - Returns for the Radio Advertising Bureau are slotted in the #3 and #4 positions, only RAB doesn't give guidance to local business owners on radio advertising. RAB's main function is to give help to radio stations on how to package the selling of radio advertising. Need proof on this? Visit the RAB web site and see what's front and center, a big ad for "The Best of Radio." Click here, and see the words "Use this site to excite you and your clients about Radio." (Read more about how I view this wasted internet real estate here.)
The only radio group having anything resembling an online guide for producing radio commercials is Clear Channel, but what it has is convoluted and not very helpful. Check TotalRadius to see if you agree. Beside not being able to figure out what a "TotalRadius" is, this web site doesn't show in the search engine rankings.
Doing a search for "Radio Advertising" also delivers the Radio Ad Lab in the #9 position. It contains some lofty words on radio, a few on how to put a commercial together, and an example of a "panogram," which reportedly identifies reactions an audience has to an Allstate radio commercial. Just what a local business would be looking for, a comparative using a company that can afford a ten-thousand-dollar radio commercial production budget.
TargetSpot lands the #14 and #15 positions. Bid4Spot's in the #17 position. Then we see The Pacific Radio group in slot #20. It's the only radio group page showing, and it contains a form that wants personal information before this station group will respond.
Let's move on and do a search for "how to do radio advertising." There are no returns from any radio group within the top 20 listings. So we'll bounce over to the search term "the benefits of radio advertising." Whoa! Again, not one return from a bonafide radio industry group or station.
OK, enough trying to uncover information from a Google search on radio advertising from a business perspective. How about a listener's? To save a little time, let's concentrate on the top ten returns to see how many stations are listed when doing format-specific searches on Google. While there has been a lift in the number of individual stations listed over past years, it's a sad note to point out that none of the major radio groups have a "station list" page showing. Examples of these station listing pages are at Clear Channel, CBS, Cumulus, and Citadel.
If the future of radio is "online" (as we continue to hear from radio trade publications, reports on what's said at conventions, and words that flow from the CEOs' mouths of leading radio groups), there's nothing to indicate that radio is grasping the fact that nearly 25% of people looking for an online radio station use search engines. (This statistic is from a 2005 Audio Graphics survey of over 2,400 internet radio listeners.)
According to research, in this story from September 22, 2009, "ComScore said overall U.S. search market volume rose 15.5 percent from July and 19.2 percent from last year." Google is credited with 64.6% of these searches. Here is a listing of how many searches were performed in August 2009. Clearly, people use search engines.
To place the numbers above into a more meaningful message, and to bring this conversation back to where we started, consider that Audio Graphics' Radio Row - as of 10/4/09 - appears in a top ten position for format-specific searches 81.1% of the time, 72.4% in the top five slots:
- 24.6% in #1 slot
- 20.2% in #2 slot
- 2.9% in #3 slot
- 14.4% in #4 slot
- 10.4% in #5 slot
You can use this chart to check on the format searches. It reflects where RadioRow.com rests on Google, Yahoo!, and MSN as of this morning. See how your station ranks (or not). Click on any number to be taken to the search return.
| Keyword |
Google rank |
Yahoo! |
MSN bing |
| alternative radio stations |
5 |
2 |
4 |
| blues radio stations |
8 |
9 |
3 |
| classic hits radio stations |
1 |
1, 2 |
4 |
| classic rock radio stations |
22 |
5 |
6 |
| classical radio stations |
10 |
5 |
24 |
| contemporary radio stations |
2 |
1 |
13 |
| country radio stations |
6 |
5 |
4 |
| dance radio stations |
1 |
1 |
1 |
| hard rock radio stations |
1 |
1 |
1 |
| hip hop radio stations |
2 |
1 |
2 |
| indie artist radio stations |
6 |
3 |
15 |
| jazz radio stations |
6 |
4 |
4 |
| new age radio stations |
7 |
5 |
2 |
| oldies radio stations |
4 |
4 |
5 |
| public radio stations |
ns |
ns |
46 |
| rap radio stations |
1 |
1 |
1 |
| rock radio stations |
13 |
1, 2 |
7 |
| soft rock radio stations |
22 |
4 |
2 |
| soul radio stations |
1 |
2 |
2 |
| sports talk radio stations |
4 |
2 |
1 |
| talk radio stations |
4 |
1 |
2 |
| internet radio stations |
15 |
ns |
5 |
| radio stations |
34 |
ns |
2 |
While you may be thinking that your online audience is coming directly from your local audience, consider this. In all of the research I've conducted, fully 30% of an online station's audience comes from outside the United States. An educated guess is that another 40% of a station's online audience comes from outside its Area of Dominant Influence.
If you still think that being listed in the top positions of a search engine doesn't matter, maybe the radio industry's new credo about "the future is online" isn't something you're buying into, yet.
But if you're beginning to see the value of building that online presence, you should start paying attention to where your station rests in a format-specific search for "(format) radio stations." Not believing this is an important internet strategy is going to keep your ability low on growing an online audience.
It also gives an edge to all of those independent properties that have found the means to get their station web site listed in the top twenty spots. Anything less, and you simply don't exist to a vast majority of people who search for a radio station on the internet.
If a station doesn't exist in a search engine's return, how is it that any radio industry leader can expect the future of radio to be online?
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From: Fred Stiening
StreamingRadioGuide.com
The biggest mistake most stations make in their website is putting literally all of their content in flash and graphics, which search engines can't index.
My web site has lists of stations by format, and the default sort order is by # of visitors in the last 60 days. The most popular music formats are Classic Rock, Country and Oldies (possibly skewed by the older demographics of News/Talk listeners, who are 80% of the entire traffic here)
From: Matt
30% of an online station's audience comes from outside the United States and Clear Channel blocks out non U.S listeners not even Canadians can listen mini America. The radio industry will be much better when clear channel goes bankrupt soon and sells all thair radio stations.
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