During the Morning Show Boot Camp every year, Jacobs Media presents its findings from its latest Air Talent Question. It is looking for additional responses for the 2024 addition of the study.
The study is exclusive to those who work on the air or produce a program for commercial radio stations in the United States, or those who were on the air after the COVID-19 pandemic but are now out of the business due to being terminated, laid off, or being part of budget cuts.
“It’s a very extensive study. It covers a lot of ground in terms of what they’re going through attitudinally. Topics like AI, how they’re using it, are they worried about it, that that type of thing. Why they do what they do, how they feel about radio in 2024, all that stuff,” Fred Jacobs said.
“I probably do — with all the research that we do, different studies and all that kind of thing — upwards of 50 presentations a year. Maybe half of those are in person at conferences and stuff like that. This is the presentation where you can hear a pin drop in the room. None of these people are on their phones or returning emails. They are sitting there, staring at the screen looking at their lives and their careers.
“This is a great way of getting a deeper understanding into what’s going on with (air talents and producers), what motivates them, how have their attitudes toward the industry changed,” he continued.
The 2024 survey will be the sixth consecutive year the company has commissioned the survey. Jacobs told Barrett Media that in the first two years, “we easily broke a thousand respondents, so it was really robust.” However, now they “struggle to get 500.” Some of that drop in respondents could coincide with large layoffs at major radio companies since the COVID-19 pandemic. Getting additional feedback for the survey in 2024 would provide opportunities to address that lost data and also to measure the attitudes of those working directly on the air in the industry.
Not only is the data important for on-air talents and producers, but Fred Jacobs believes it is also an important study for radio ownership groups to understand.
“We want companies to look forward to this because — even though this is a study of air talent, for air talent — what it’s also valuable for is for companies to understand what’s the mindset of their on-air people. Collectively, how are they thinking about stuff?,” Jacobs added.
Those interested in participating in the survey can do so by clicking here.
Jacobs Media is accepting responses until Tuesday, July 23rd for its annual air talent questionnaire.
