Top 20 webcasters' audience up 79% year-over-year, shows Triton Webcast Metrics

Web radio leaders Pandora and Clear Channel continued their growth in April,according to Triton Digital's newly-released April Webcast Metrics.

Their increases helped push the overall AAS (Average Active Sessions, essentially equivalent to AQH) of the Top 20 webcasters to nearly 1.7 million in the Domestic Mon-Sun 6a-12m daypart. That's a gain of 79% year-over-year. Almost all of that growth is thanks to Pandora and Clear Channel, both of which have grown more than 100% year-over-year (Pandora AAS up more than 675,000, Clear Channel up nearly 90,000).

 

Pandora grew 4% month-to-month (an increase of more than 48,000), reaching an AAS of nearly 1.2 million. The webcaster is up 131% year-over-year and up 18% since January 2012.

 

The #2-ranked Clear Channel reached an AAS of 171,803 in April, up 2% month-to-month. It has grown 108% year-over-year. 

 

The largest month-to-month percentage growth came from #4-ranked Slacker, with an increase of 19% over March to reach an AAS of 47,480. That's more or less a recovery to where Slacker stood in January. The webcaster is up 59% year-over-year.

 

Other relatively strong growth came from Hubbard (up 10% to reach a new record-high AAS of 5,219) and Univision (up 6%). Most other broadcasters were flat or declined slightly (including the #3-ranked CBS Radio, down 1%).

 

(The chart above shows the growth of Pandora, CBS, Clear Channel, the top 5 terrestrial radio groups and Slacker from September 2009 through April 2012. Note that Pandora's AAS numbers from December 2010 through mid-August 2011 were affected by the omission of tracking code in some of its mobile apps. Click to view in full size.)