management resources for community media

This handbook sets out audience research methodology, including quantitative audience measurement; measurement of audience opinions and reactions; qualitative research; data analysis; and more. Community radio is not specifically considered, but the methodologies are nevertheless useful.

Written by Graham Mytton, head of audience research for the BBC World Service and published by UNESCO and UNICEF

Download the Handbook on Radio and Television Audience Research (PDF)

Below is a selection of fourteen statements about community radio. Each of them puts a different emphasis on the characteristics described in the previous post What is community media?, and many introduce other characteristics.
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Bruce Girard

There is no single definition of community media and there are almost as many models as there are stations. Each community radio station is a hybrid, a unique communication process shaped by a few over-arching characteristics and by the distinct culture, history, and reality of the community it serves. Nevertheless, there are some characteristics that all community radio stations have in common. Among these are that they are community-based, independent, not-for-profit, pro-community, and participatory.
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Community broadcasting is distinct from public broadcasting in that the latter is a window through which people can look and learn about their surroundings while the former is a mirror that reflects a community’s own knowledge and experience back at it and invites the community to know itself, to dialogue, to find solutions to its problems, and to develop agendas for action.

Community Radio Sustainability Project
Financial sustainability presents the greatest challenge to the success of independent radio stations operating in developing countries and is inextricably linked to a news outlet’s ability to preserve its editorial freedom. In these developing countries there is a critical need for gathering and sharing information about the small steps media can take to build their capacity for sustainability.

This guide is intended as the first in a series of guidebooks to equip station managers and staff with management and programming resources for their station. Each guide will include examples and case studies of how the topic has been addressed by stations in Sub-Saharan African countries, including relevant environmental factors and key outcomes.

Guidebook to Sustainability

This page offers a brief description of various methods of audience research : “Seven Day Diary”, samples, random sampling, different audience measures, etc. Audience research is crucial to the sustainability of community radio stations. In short, audience research is a mechanism through which stations obtain feed back from audience that:

increases community participation in the stations,
informs better programming
enhances the development agenda of the station
feeds into successful marketing strategies.

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