The 2021 Finney Media Why Listen?® Survey heard from almost 11,000 respondents with over one million data points, from three different formats: CCM stations, Music/Teaching (Hybrid) stations, All-Teaching stations and programs.
One of the challenges we face and opportunities we have, unlike a church which is focused on one particular denomination, is that our radio stations and programs are multi-denominational. They are heard by people from many denominations. In our nationwide survey, we asked about denomination affiliation. Among respondents from CCM stations, here are the Top Five Denominations:
How can this data help you?
The first four denominations comprise almost 80%. Of the remaining 20%, 9% are Catholic. The remaining 11% come from other assorted Christian denominations with different ways of worship and different words they use in their worship and ways they communicate with each other.
For us to reach them and perhaps many who haven’t even given us a pre-set yet, we’ll need to focus on using words and concepts that many or most understand.
A story to help illustrate. Heard this on the radio: A prominent national Christian broadcaster on his program – “we need to exhort fellow believers.” I asked friends from a Christian radio station to tell me the meaning of the word exhort. One thought it meant to exercise. A friend pointed out that refers to exert. Another thought that exhort is what you do when you know something damaging about someone and you expect payment to keep it quiet – to extort. These were smart broadcasters focused on a Biblical mission, but they didn’t know that exhort means to “strongly encourage or urge”. And if the national broadcaster had said “urge” instead of “exhort”, the message would have been clearer.
If we’re going to be clear in our communication, we’ll need to consider what our multi-denominational listener – people of all nations and denominations – understand. Clarity and understanding of the Truth is at stake.
Coming in February: The Top Five Marital Statuses represented among CCM respondents in the 2021 Why Listen? Survey. You already know not all are married for the first time. We’ll break down how different the respondents are in relation to marriage/life situations.
