It’s time to forget radio and focus your promo on 4 digital services

Artists and labels may be wasting their precious promotional dollars and time if they’re still chasing airplay on hundreds of individual radio stations rather than focusing on 4 digital services, according to new data from Morgan Stanley.

The numbers don’t lie.

US adults over 65 spend spend 57% of their listening time on broadcast radio, but listeners aged 18-29 spend just 14% of their time there.

Digital is increasingly grabbling listening time that once was radio’s and below you can see how that digital divide increases dramatically in younger audiences.

In that digital space, the influence of smaller and legacy outlets is also on the decline as increasingly digital listening is occurring on just four platforms

Unless your target audience is over 65, effort spent marketing on just four digital services – SiriusXM, Spotify, Amazon Music, and Apple Music – rather than hundreds of radio outlets offers a far greater potential to build and maintain an audience.

Bruce Houghton is Founder and Editor of Hypebot and MusicThinkTank and serves as a Senior Advisor to Bandsintown which acquired both publications in 2019. He is the Founder and President of the Skyline Artists Agency and a professor for the Berklee College Of Music.