Melbourne radio ratings: Smooth FM edges closer to Fox FM’s consistent drive lead
Nova Entertainment’s Smooth FM has edged closer to Fox FM’s drive ratings crown as it grew 0.4 points to a 9.8% audience share.
Meanwhile, Fox FM’s long-standing drive favourites Carrie Bickmore and Tommy Little, followed by David Hughes and Kate Langbroek still managed to win the drive-time slot with a 10.5% share. However, the popular drive show did lose 1.5 points from survey five’s much larger 12% share.
Smooth FM’s drive show host Byron Webb
In the drive battle, Smooth FM’s Byron Webb just managed to overtake Gold FM’s Gavin Miller who fell 0.5 rating points from 10.2% to 9.7%. Miller helped the station to a third place finish compared to last survey’s second place.
Coming in fourth was Nova’s Kate Ritchie, Tim Blackwell and Marty Sheargold who saw a slight improvement from a 7.9% share to 8.1%.
Triple M managed a large improvement from the last survey with its drive duo Mick Molloy and Jane Kennedy jumping 1.9 ratings points from 5.2% to a 7.1% share.
Following Triple M was Kiis FM, who struggled to grow its audience share as the radio station dropped 1.1 ratings points which gave hosts Will McMahon and Woody Whitelaw a 6.1% share.
For indie radio station Triple J, it managed to improve 0.5 points to a 6.5% audience share, making the station more popular than Kiis FM’s drive program.
For the AM stations, 3AW was relatively stagnant with a 9.9% overall audience share compared to last survey’s 9.8% share.
However, ABC Melbourne managed to jump 0.8 points to a share of 7.5%.
Meanwhile, Macquarie Sports Radio managed to make it into the whole points this survey, reaching an audience share of 1%.
Melbourne radio ratings survey 6 2018. Total audience share. Source: GfK
For the breakfast time slot, despite coming in first place for the FM stations, Fox FM took another hit as it fell 0.7 ratings points to a share of 9.6%. For the last survey Fifi Box, Brendan Fevola and Byron Cooke managed a 10.3% share.
For the second time, Smooth FM came in second place with an 8.2% share seeing growth from last survey’s 7.7% with the help of radio duo Jennifer Hanson and Mike Perso.
Following Smooth FM was Nova which saw a 0.1 point growth as its radio hosts Chrissie Swan, Sam Pang and Jonathan Brown managed a 7.8% share.
Triple M, however, had a much bigger growth of 0.7 points. The radio station obtained a breakfast audience share of 7.7% for the sixth radio ratings survey of the year.
Meanwhile, Gold FM lost traction again falling from a 7.4% share to 6.7%.
Despite its ratings drop, Gold FM still managed to beat Kiis’ 5.9% share.
However, 3AW once again, managed to top all of the FM breakfast audience shares with its huge 18.4% share, while ABC Melbourne saw a 10% share from its 1.5 point growth.
Macquarie Sports Radio, which rebranded from Talking Lifestyle, this survey managed very slight growth with a 0.2% share from last survey’s 0.1% share.
Melbourne radio ratings survey 6 2018. Source: GfK
Despite losing 0.5 ratings points, for the second survey in a row Smooth FM managed to win the title of the most listened to FM radio station with a 9.9% audience share.
Fox FM held its second place position even though the station dropped 0.6 points to a 9.4% overall audience share, narrowly beating Gold FM’s 9.3% share.
Even though Gold FM also fell 0.6 points, the station still clearly topped Nova’s 6.8% share.
Meanwhile Triple M saw a 6.5% share ahead of Kiss’ 5.4%.
Yet again, 3AW was the most listened to radio station overall while its fellow AM station ABC Melbourne grew by 1.1 ratings points to a 9.1% share.
However, Macquarie Sports Radio only managed a 0.4% audience share compared to last survey’s 0.3% share.
Abigail Dawson was Mumbrella's senior content journalist covering event content. She left Mumbrella to move into an agency role in 2020.
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