Market Overview

On the following pages you will find a description of the radio landscape in some 15 European countries offering a brief look into how different markets are developing and what opportunities radio offers across Europe.

In addition to these general market profiles, a restricted access area for egta members offers a more detailed overview of national advertising markets, major market players, legislative background, pricing policies etc. Though not exhaustive the extensive overview of figures is unique in Europe and represents the data used by radio professionals in the respective country.


Italy

The Italian radio market

RAI, the Italian public broadcaster, owns three national radio channels that together reach approx. 22 percent of the audience share and account for 22 percent of the total radio adspend. Major private networks are RTL 102.5, Radio Dimensione Suono, Radio 105 Network and Radio Deejay, accounting together for over 37 percent of the audience share and nearly 41 percent of the adspend.

In the year 2009 radio investments decreased only by 7.8%. In the last two months of 2009 radio had a large growth: +20.7% in November and + 26.7% in December, moreover at the beginning of 2010, in January, radio investments grew by 5.3% and in February by 14.8% (Source Nielsen – net figures). Television is at the top of the list of advertising spend per media with 54.1 percent of investments.

Magazines-periodicals account for 10.9 percent of the adspend, newspapers for 18.8 percent, the internet 7.2 percent and radio 5.0 percent (Source Nielsen, net figures, classic media – Total year 2009).

Audience measurement

Italy will continue with the panel audience measurement. Early 2009 Italy introduced the panel methodology, but it was supported by CATI measurement, that used to be the main methodology. For 2010 there is still going to be panel+cati but all the national radios will use the panel measurement. Local networks will go on using CATI methodology.

New legislation/Digital radio

Italy embraced radio digital way: Agcom (The Italian Telecommunication Authority) signed the regulation that disciplines the Italian digital radio start up. Digital radio started in November 2009 and did not replace the FM-analogical radio, working side by side on VHF and L band. The digital radio entrance will offer new opportunities to Italian broadcasters and users.

Restriced accessMembers Only Section (Restricted Access)
This section contains more specific information on the market; including overviews of the market players, adspend, media mix, household equipment, pricing policies, seasonality indexes, legislation concerning advertising placement, as well as audience measurement technical factors.