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5. Media: Ad Rates, Audience & Circulation
Estimating Radio & TV Advertising Rates

Television Advertising | Radio Advertising

The Library provides print and electronic access to several key sources in determining the cost of advertising rates for broadcast and print media, including SRDS Media Solutions and trade publications like Mediaweek (via Proquest) and Broadcasting & Cable (via Business Source Elite). These are rough guidelines for determining ad rates for regional and national markets for academic purposes only – what you’d actually pay is based on many other factors.

 

Television Advertising

Regional Markets

For television ad rates, take the SQAD cost-per-point (in US$) for market and multiply it by the Nielsen rating for the program that airs at the same time. That will equal the cost of the ad.

First, use SRDS Media Solutions: TV & Cable Source to look at the regional market that you're researching. The Market Profile, linked in the left column, contains the daypart and the corresponding SQAD cost-per-point amount for the market.
NOTE: The dayparts are defined as: Prime Access (6 - 7 PM), Prime (7 - 10 PM), Late News (10 - 10:30 PM) and Late Fringe (10:30 PM - 12 AM)

To find the Nielsen rating for the show during which the ad will air, check the weekly Broadcasting and Cable (from EBSCOhost) issue for the numbers. If you can’t read the ratings (they are blurry and small), use the print copy.

Another alternative to finding Nielsen ratings would be to use Mediaweek. The magazine previously profiled a major market each week. The Market Profile gave total ad spending by media, basic demographics, Arbitron radio "ownership" (average quarter hour shares, revenue and percent of total market). It also had Nielsen Ratings for the networks (not cable) for evening and late news. It omitted prime-time ratings. For example, Milwaukee was last profile in September 2005. MediaWeek is available in print (current), online (ABI/Inform has PDFs). If you search online, search for the city as the title.

National Market

Use Advertising Age’s annual fall prime-time pricing survey. This give the full price of a 30-second spot.

What if you don’t want a 30-second spot? Multiply the cost of the ad by .50 for a 10-second spot, .60 to .80 for a 15-second spot or 2.0 for a 60-second spot.

 

Radio Advertising

For radio ad rates, take the SQAD cost-per-point (in US$) for market and multiply it by the Arbitron rating for the station. That will equal the cost of the ad.

First, use SRDS Media Solutions: Radio Advertising Source to look at the regional market that you're researching. The SQAD Spot Radio Cost-Per-Point Estimates, linked in the left column, contains the daypart and the corresponding SQAD cost-per-point amount for the market.
NOTE: The dayparts are defined as: AM (6 - 10 AM), Day (10 - 3 PM), PM (3 - 7 PM) and Evening (7 PM - 12 AM)

To find the Arbitron rating for the radio station, check out Radio and Records and click on Ratings in the top navigational bar. After searching for the market name, you will be given Arbitron ratings for the previous five quarters.