There are three styles of radio programming these are:
- Broadcast Radio
- In Store Audio
- Internet Radio
Broadcast Radio
There are 2 different types of broadcast radio, public and commercial radio but they both create a variety of playlists to meet the audience's needs.
Public radio must have a variety of stations so one station concentrates on one genre so that everyone's interests are covered as public radio is funded by the public. Public radio tend to play more songs during an hour than a commerical radio station as public radio's don't have advertisements in their shows. On average, public radio plays about 17 songs per hour. Public radio also must meet their guildlines for example: BBC is (Entertain, Educate and Inform). As for commercial radio like xfm, capital, smooth etc, capital FM plays the most recent chart hit songs and they tend to play pop, RnB, Hip-hop etc, just the general types of genres that 14-35 year olds would appreciate as that is the stations target audience. The thing about commercial radio is that they have alot of advertisement and station ID's but they play less songs than public radio.
On Thursday 14th March 2013, we visited the BBC Radio studio in MediaCity at the Quay House.
BBC radio Manchester's target audience is 55+ , we also found out that the ratio of speech to audio is 60% speech, 40% radio. This shows that the older the target audience, the more speech to audio. This might conclude that older people prefer speech so they dont feel as lonely if they are alone. The BBC radio carrys out a market research so they know what songs listeners wont turn over. BBC tend to play their station ID after every link.
Instore Audio
All business establishments have some kind audio playing instore, from promotions, theme tunes and a playlist to suit the shop. For example, SuperDry plays Dance music as it is aimed at young people (15-25), but if you go into a high end fashion store, they would be likely to play more relaxing house music like Deep House, something that you would normally hear on a fashion show cat walk. Major supermarkets tend to have their own radio station that broadcasts throughout all their stores to advertise the offers they have on and they tend to play chart music as its the most popular genre.
Internet Radio
You can listen to internet radio from anywhere around the world with some sort of internet connection. The good thing about internet radio is that they dont really use advertisment in their shows and you can find any kind of genre you want to listen to. Some internet radio shows consist of just music and no speech and also just speech, no music. Unlike broadcast radio, instore audio, internet radio doesnt tend brand their station. Some people may like Hip-Hop music but broadcast radio always censors the music so people tend to resort to internet radio for hip hop as play the explicit version of the song.
