ARN’s revenue has dropped in a “challenging” ad market.
The network’s radio revenue was down 6% to $208.4 million for 2019, compared to $222.3 million the year prior.
Total revenue for the HT&E-owned business was down 5% to $223.3 million, despite “digital and other” being up 13% to $14.9 million.
As with other radio businesses, ARN had a tougher second half to 2019, which was back 9.8%, compared to the first half which was down 2.4%.
Despite noting the “challenging” ad market, ARN described it as cyclical.
CEO and managing director Ciaran Davis highlighted the network’s podcasting and extension of contracts for key talent, such as Kyle and Jackie O, as positives for the year ahead.
“In a difficult market we have the highest audience reach in the history of ARN with 5.3 million listeners every week, and our commercial offering is winning share,” Davis says.
“This result reflects the success of our investment in talent and locking in the early extension of key long-term contracts across breakfast slots in Sydney and Melbourne provides assurance for our advertisers and great content for our listeners.”
ARN has also extended its partnership with music and podcast platform iHeartRadio to 2036.
“This licence, extended to 2036 on an exclusive basis, gives us an incredible competitive edge that simply cannot be replicated, and augments our investment in data and technology to grow our share of the digital audio advertising markets,” Davis says.
“The future of podcasting is particularly exciting, and we are well placed in this growing market as a result of launching iHeart Podcast Australia, now offering the most comprehensive podcast content offerings for listeners and advertisers that is currently delivering 30 million download impressions a month.”
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