The ABC has clapped back at recent reports on triple j audience trends, declaring they are “misrepresenting key facts.”
The ABC has taken issue with recent reporting on the audience trends of triple j, saying they misrepresent “key facts” in the areas of demographics and reach.
The broadcasting corporation released a statement on Tuesday (December 20) declaring that “triple j is in fact reaching more people than ever before,” with a current broadcast audience of “just under 2.2m each week.”
ABC also claims that, if we were to combine both metro and regional audiences, the youth station’s weekly reach across Australia is actually at an average of 3.2 million, with regional audiences, in particular, experiencing “strong growth” over the last three years.
The statement continues, “in the 18-24 youth age bracket, reach alone across the five capital cities was almost 440,000 on average for 2022, above the 2021 average of 410,000.” It adds, “this figure doesn’t include significant young audiences outside of the five capital cities where triple j ratings have increased significantly over the last years.”
As per The Guardian in August, “the year’s fourth radio ratings survey confirmed that triple j has been shedding those listeners, with its audience share in that demographic dropping by an average of 2.5% across Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide between late April and late June.”
However, ABC begs to differ. The statement put forth by the network this week says the figures published about their 18-24 youth age bracket “does not include the tens of thousands of young people living in regional cities or the millions who engage with triple j across our social media accounts.”
Highlighting the social media impact on these audience stats, ABC shares, “triple j is the number one Australian radio station on Facebook (1.3m followers) Instagram (844,000 followers), Spotify (450,000 followers) and YouTube (1.59m subscribers). triple j has 99,500 followers on TikTok.”
The corporation also declares that in 2022, 33% of the station’s listeners in Australia’s five capital cities were “under or within the target demographic.” Using the 2022 Hottest 100 countdown as an example, it says the annual event “reached 50 per cent of Australians aged 16+ (an estimated 9.5m people).”
triple j has faced a number of criticisms this year, including callouts about their male-dominated and diversity-lacking top 50 ‘most played artists’ list, as well as The 1975’s Matty Healy taking a swipe at them for sharing news of the band’s forthcoming Aussie tour, telling the station via Twitter, “yous can fuck off.”
What do you guys think? Is triple j’s relevancy amongst Aussie youth on its way out, as proclaimed by many over the last few years? Judging by these stats, there are still plenty of youngsters tuning in. But with a growing backlash, what does the future hold for the long-running Aussie station? I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.
