• by Joe Mandese , December 19, 2006

In a move that is part of a bigger trend suppressing the flow of public data about advertising sales results, the Radio Advertising Bureau Monday said it would discontinue reporting national and local radio advertising sales estimates on a monthly basis, and would begin reporting them quarterly effective with 2007. The change follows moves by the broadcast networks to discontinue reporting quarterly figures at all, and follows a post Sarbanes Oxley passage that has led to the suppression of other important advertising financial metrics by publicly traded companies, including estimated advertising billings by major ad agencies.

The RAB said it would continue to report monthly ad sales percentage changes via its www.RAB.com Web site, but that the dollar totals would only be released quarterly. The RAB said it is making the change in reporting frequency to "provide more disclosure of the actual data, allow for more meaningful analysis of emerging trends, and be in line with the majority of media revenue reporting practices and schedules."

However, it was unclear from the announcement how the new schedule would provide greater insights about radio advertising sales. Generally, most major media industry sectors do reporter quarterly, not monthly. While the major publicly held newspapers continue to release monthly advertising sales statistics, most other media either report quarterly, or not at all. Over the past several years, some of the industry's best ad sales disclosure data has been either suppressed or discontinued. The Broadcast Cable Financial Management Association, for example, stopped reporting monthly cable ad sales several years ago due to pressure from the Cabletelevision Advertising Bureau. The CAB also has discontinued regularly reporting cable advertising sales totals.

Earlier this year, the BCFM also discontinued reporting quarterly estimates for the Big 3 broadcast networks' advertising sales.

In lieu of some of the public advertising sales data, syndicated research suppliers including Nielsen Monitor-Plus, TNS Media Intelligence, and SQAD and its NetCosts service, are trying to fill the gap.

"We are in a fast-changing media environment and too often short-term variances in business month-to-month have not provided a proper perspective on where radio is headed," Jeff Haley, the recently installed new president-CEO of the RAB, stated in the bureau's announcement.

"Our purpose is to give the marketplace a solid foundation on which to analyze radio," he added. "Quarterly reporting will stabilize the perspective on radio revenue. Disclosure of the dollar amounts will align radio with the other media's reporting practices and demonstrate the industry's position as a formidable player in the wireless media arena."