Rural Programming Initiative
Final Report, KVNF

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1. You set some programming-related goals for your station when we began this project.
Please describe which ones you have accomplished; which ones you are still working on and where you are in that process; which ones you have abandoned and why you abandoned them.

Our goals were to increase Time Spent Listening and to increase the percentage of regular listeners who listen most to KVNF--from 24 to 28% in the first year and from 28 to 35% in the last year. We surpassed that goal and in the final survey we have 46% of regular listeners who listen most to KVNF.

2. Has there been a financial impact-either directly or indirectly-as a result of your participation in this project? (For example, has membership increased or decreased; have you used the research to get new underwriters or raise your rates; have you used the research in seeking and getting grants). Please tell us the percentage increase or decrease in financial support since the summer of 2001 that can be tied to programming and/or the use of the research.

There have been both direct and indirect financial benefits from this project. The
direct benefits have been the increase in UnderWriting rates during our morning and afternoon music shows. We had been pricing them at $8 per spot as opposed to $15 per spot for drive time. The survey showed that the audience level was actually the same for both times so we raised the music rates to $12 per hour.

The indirect benefit shows up in our overall membership support which is up about 20% which we feel is at least partly due to the realignment of programming as a result of the survey.

3. Please summarize what you have learned about programming and listening at your station as a result of your participation in this project.

We learned that we do not have a traditional 'drive time' profile, and that the listening audience stays as large or even grows from 9:00 AM to Noon and from 1:00 PM to 4:00 PM. We also learned that our Noon Local Affairs program kills our morning audience. There is a similar drop off at 6:00 PM (the beginning of our alternative news hour) but that seems more consistent with national trends.

4. Can you generalize from anything you have learned about programming and listening at your station that would be useful for other rural public radio stations?

If you are rural don't assume that your drive time will show the same spike as at urban stations.
Stay away from one hour shift in formats.