A bumper radio survey for Nova Entertainment's Smooth FM has seen the four-year-old station beat Kiis as the top FM Sydney charts.
In survey four of the GfK radio ratings, Smooth FM recorded 9.1% audience share in total demographic, a bump of 1.4 percentage points from last survey, which saw the station on 7.7% share. The lift puts it in front of previous FM leader Kiis 106.5 which held steady on 8.1% audience share.
The station also grew across all day parts including a huge 1.3 percentage point lift in its drive time slot, featuring Byron Webb, which hit 8.4% audience share.
It marks the third time the station has come in number one overall in FM listenership, after taking the lead in August last year for two consecutive surveys. At the time, Nova Entertainment group programme director Paul Jackson said the strategy for the station had always been “slow and steady”.
“We said it’s going to incrementally increase and that's what it's done,” Jackson said at the time. “This is a station build with brilliant talent”
“They relate to an audience, and they carved out a niche in the marketplace, which happened to be the biggest niche of them all.”
It also comes as Nova looks to bolster the brand, with the launch of the Smooth Creative Challenge, aimed at getting marketers, creatives and media agencies to trial its assets beyond just radio broadcasting.
Overall 2GB topped total audience and Sydney breakfast with 11.6% and 14.1% audience share respectively.
In Sydney FM breakfast Kiis took out the crown with 10.4% audience share, after a jump of 0.5 percentage points. Kiis also topped drive with 10.2% audience, after a slight boost of 0.1 percentage points. It is followed by Nova 96.9, fractionally behind on 10.1% audience share, after a huge boost of 1.4 percentage points.
2DayFM also had a positive survey with its breakfast duo Rove and Sam seeing a boost of 0.6 percentage points, reaching 3.9% audience share.
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