Rural Programming Initiative
Summary #1, KHSU

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What did you learn about listening to your station and your Listeners from the first round of research?
The research confirmed our belief that KHSU is a relatively strong station in a very fragmented market. Twenty different stations (17 commercial, 3 non-commercial) were identified by more than 1% of survey respondents as the one they listened to most; of those twenty stations, KHSU's percentage was the highest, at 6.0%. That said, of KHSU's regular listeners, 61% listen more to some other station, a larger percentage than any other station in our cohort. Our core audience is only 27% of the weekly cume, the smallest percentage of any station in our cohort.

Survey respondents mentioned "news" and "music" equally often when asked why they listened to KHSU; 58% of the respondents in each case. This survey supported other KHSU audience research by indicating that our audience tunes in and out frequently, resulting in relatively low time spent listening.

Based on the research and other information you have, what are your programming strengths and weaknesses?
During weekdays, our news and information programming draws substantially larger audiences, and longer time spent listening, than our music programming. Our strongest daypart consists of our afternoon news and information programs, The World and All Things Considered.

Our weakest daypart, by most ways of measuring audience service, is a two-hour block of locally-hosted folk and international music on weekday afternoons; this immediately precedes our strongest daypart.

Though the small sample size raises questions about reliability of the data, KHSU appears to have a greater share of weekend listeners than weekday listeners. Since the Sunday schedule was substantially revised shortly before this survey was conducted, it will be interesting to see if this trend continues in subsequent surveys.

What is the process you are using to decide on programming changes?
Our next survey as part of this project will take place in February. The station manager and program director get input on a regular basis from the station's Community Advisory Group on programming strategy. We also log and tabulate feedback from our listener comment phone line and station e-mail. Other information about listener preference is gathered by in-person surveys conducted at community events (such as fairs).

Any programming decision with significant direct financial impact (such as acquiring a new national program with fees attached) is made jointly by the program director and station manager. Scheduling decisions for specific programs and programmers are made by the program director. We try to achieve a consensus of the station management team (including development personnel) and the Community Advisory Group around any major change in programming, such as moving or eliminating a weekday format strip.

What program changes have you made?
Since the July 2001 survey, the only significant change was the elimination of Pacifica Network News when our affiliation agreement expired in September 2001. A group of five independently-produced regional or national public affairs programs replaced PNN on an interim basis, which continues at this writing (January 2002). Further changes will probably not take place until the February 2002 survey results have been reviewed.