According to Nielsen, 367,447 adults tune in to their favorite Augusta, Georgia, radio stations every week. This is significantly more consumers than are reached by all other advertising-supported media, including local TV, local cable, streaming video, social media, online audio, and local newspapers.

Augusta radio's unchallenged reach is why many CSRA business owners depend on the medium to capture the largest possible share of the $11.4 billion dollars consumers are expected to spend at retail this year.

Other local small business owners, however, may be surprised to learn that by most marketing metrics, radio remains the best way to advertise in Augusta.

Here are four more facts about AM/FM radio that may surprise many local marketers.

The combined weekly reach of the CSRA's broadcast television stations has slipped to 66.2% of all adults, according to Nielsen. These stations include WJBF, WRDW, WCES, WAGT, and WFXG.  

The combined Augusta, Georgia TV audience now falls behind cable programming at 76.6% and streaming platforms at 66.3%. To put this virtual dead heat into perspective, none of the three video media is a match for Augusta radio which reaches more than 84.4% of local adults every week.

But although the reach of broadcast TV, cable, and streaming are neck-and-neck, the share of time consumers spend with each of these media is dramatically different.

During the past seven days. according to Nielsen, only 67.1% of local consumers tuned in to Augusta, Georgia television stations like WJBF, WRDW, WCES, WAGT, and WFXG.  TV's diminishing reach among adults 18 and older has been eclipsed by the audience size for social media, cable, and Augusta radio. Furthermore, streaming video services such as Netflix, Hulu, Prime, and Disney+ are quickly reaching parity with over-the-air options.

The erosion of local TV station audiences is stunning when comparing prime-time ratings from the past.  In 1980, the highest-ranked TV show was Cheers with a 21.3 rating. The 30th-ranked show was The Wonder Years with a 14.2 rating.

Twenty years later, Survivor was the number one show with a 17.4 rating and Family Law was the 30th ranked show with an 8.8 rating.

Finally, in 2019, Sunday Night Football was the number one ranked show with a 10.9 rating. Survivor tied with Dancing With The Stars in 30th place with a 5.5 rating.

It is stunning to think that the number one TV show in 2019 had a 24% lower rating than the 30th-ranked show in 1980.

Every week, 425,000 Central Savannah River Area (CSRA) consumers watch something on TV.

Not too many years ago, when an Augusta, Georgia area consumer sat down to watch TV, the program options were limited to what was on WJBF, WRDW, WCES, WAGT, WFXG, or, maybe, what was on a handful of cable channels.  That was then. This is now.

Today, according to Nielsen, each time a TV is turned on in an Augusta living room, the viewer has more than 817,000 options not only from broadcast stations and cable systems, but also from streaming video platforms like Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Peacock, YouTube, Amazon, Tubi, Crackle, and FreeVee.

Of course, Augusta consumers don't even need to sit down in front of their big-screen LCD, anymore. Most of the 817,000 available programs can also be viewed on their computers, tablets, gaming devices, and smartphones. But as far as viewers are concerned, though, it's all just television.

It wasn't too long ago when advertising on Augusta, Georgia television stations was considered the gold standard for marketing by local business owners. But over the past few years, the number of viewers reached by WJBF, WRDW, WCES, WAGT, and WFXG has plummeted. In all only 67% of adult consumers now tune-in to at least one of these channels during the week, according to Nielsen.

The consumption of video content isn't diminishing among CSRA consumers. What has changed, though, is how they are watching it.

In November, according to Nielsen, the share of time watching broadcast television has fallen behind other video options including cable programing and internet-delivered choices such as Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, and hundreds of other streaming networks.

It used to be so simple. When a small business owner wanted to advertise on Augusta television, there were only a few options including, WJBF, WRDW, WCES, WAGT, and WFXG. But slowly, the number of options expanded to include cable channels provided by Xfinity, DISH, DirecTV, and WOW!.

Heading in 2022, local advertisers have even more options as internet-connected devices deliver hundreds of more programming choices to CSRA consumers. Collectively, this type of content is called OTT (Over-The-Top-Television) or CTV (Connected-Television). For the purpose of this discussion, OTT & CTV will be referred to singularly as streaming video.

Streaming video can be viewed on any device that can connect to the internet. This includes computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones. Programing can also be accessed using a smart-TV, Roku Stick, Amazon Fire Stick, or a game console. In all, according to Nielsen, 95.2% of Augusta area households own a device capable of receiving streaming video. 

In all, says Nielsen, 297,500 Augusta area consumers watch streaming video content every week. Combined, these internet channels now reach more adults every week than local newspapers, podcasts, and digital audio services like Pandora, Spotify, Sirius/XM. Amazon Music, and iHeart Radio.

Surprisingly, streaming video now reaches almost as many CSRA adults as local TV and local cable.

Every week, according to Nielsen, 444,000 adult consumers in the Central Savannah River Area (CSRA) watch something on television. But, of course, the definition of what it means to watch TV has changed since the time when the number of available viewing options could be counted on the fingers of a single hand.

Today, Augusta, Georgia area consumers have a gargantuan number of viewing choices. This includes programs from stations like WJBF, WRDW, WCES, WAGT, and WFXG. Or maybe cable and satellite systems like Xfinity, DISH, DirecTV, and WOW!. There's also content delivered over the internet from Netflix, YouTube, Hulu, Disney+, and Amazon Prime.

No longer are Augusta consumers tied to the 21-inch Zenith in their living rooms. Instead, TV can be watched on giant LCDs, smartphones, and tablets from any room in the house, in the backseat of their cars, or practically anywhere else.

The best way to think about TV watching in the CSRA is in terms of three buckets:

1. Over-the-air...including all broadcast channels
2. Cable...including all premium and non-premium programming
3. Internet...including all streaming services. This is also known as OTT or CTV

Here's how many Augusta area adult viewers fall into each bucket. Remember, viewers are not limited to a single bucket.

Advertising on Augusta television and cable is becoming less attractive to Central Savannah River Area business owners as viewers rapidly defect to alternative video entertainment sources including, Netflix, YouTube, Hulu, Amazon and Disney+.

Collectively these streaming services are referred to as Over-The-Top Television (OTT) and Connected-TV (CTV). Viewers can only access this OTT and CTV content via smartphone, tablets, computers, smart-TVs, Amazon Fire Sticks, and Roku Sticks, Nielsen reports that 91% of Augusta area adults own at least one these devices. Furthermore, they are using them.

According to Nielsen projections, OTT and CTV networks now reach 43.4% of CSRA consumers every week.

Type "AUGUSTA REAL ESTATE AGENTS" into Google. In slightly over a half-second, the search will deliver 8,410,000 results. Similar searches for Martinez, Evans, Aiken, Greenwood, and Lexington produce a proportional number of returns.

Despite the economic hardships imposed by the Coronavirus crisis on Central Savannah River Area consumers, the demand for real estate is booming. 

The Wall Street Journal published a trend yesterday indicating that mortgage applications for purchase a home have achieved levels equal to last year.

According to redfin.com, home buying demand is 16.5% higher now than it was pre-COVID-19 on a seasonally adjusted basis.

Redfin attributes this explosive growth in real estate shoppers to two factors, including record-low mortgage rates. The other primary driver is a migration trend from expensive metropolitan areas as buyers hunt for more space at lower prices.

To capture a larger share of the robust market, local real estate agents need to stand apart from the millions of Google results.  Advertising on Augusta radio will help accomplish this.  Here's why.

Pay-TV is struggling to survive COVID-19.

Before the onset of the pandemic, Nielsen reported that 69% of Central Savannah River Area households received their television programs from cable systems, telephone companies, or satellite operators.  That number, however, is plummeting.

Pay-TV providers in the Augusta area include Xfinity, Dish, Spectrum, AT&T TV, WOW! and DirecTV.

"Cord-cutting, people dropping their cable and satellite TV subscriptions, pre-dates the onset of Covid-19. But the pandemic is exaggerating the trend, creating deeper issuers for programming that relies on those services for distribution," Eric Savitz wrote last week in Barron's.  This includes non-premium services like ESPN, TBS, TNT, USA, CNN, and Discovery.

"LightShed Partners analyst Richard Greenfield counts a loss of 1.96 million subscribers to cable, satellite TV, and virtual cable services combined in the first quarter," Savitz continued. "This is the worst combined quarterly drop ever, down 6% from a year ago."

Greenfield said in an interview with Barron’s that what is especially sobering is that most of the first quarter activity pre-dated the virus. The numbers are likely to get considerably worse in the second quarter.