More people are working at home because of the pandemic. A September 2020 Gallup survey found 33% of adults said they were always working from home, 25% sometimes and 42% never. Almost two-thirds of those working at home would prefer to continue, even if their employers re-opened their businesses for all employees and the pandemic ended.
Recent 2020 surveys of three diverse U.S. markets from The Media Audit reveal adults 18–44 are consistently the largest age group working from home some of the time, exceeding 50% in Des Moines (57.6%) and Denver (56.9%), and almost half (47.1%) in Fort Myers-Naples, FL.
“The data from these three markets indicates approximately 80% of these work-at-home adults 18–44 listen to radio during an average day,” said Nick Miller, VP, The Media Audit. “Two-thirds or more are listening to radio at least 60 minutes daily.”
Further analysis of the data turns up valuable insights for radio stations and their advertisers. Approximately 50% of these work-from-home adults 18–44 have household incomes of $75,000 or more: Denver 61.3%, Des Moines 47.7% and Fort Myers-Naples 53.3%.
The data provides another compelling insight about adults 18–44 who work at home some of the time and their radio-listening habits. In all three markets, more than 70% listen to radio during an average weekday from 5am-7pm, which generally matches the standard workday for many people.
“Not only do large majorities of these adults working at home listen to radio during the 14-hour period measured in the surveys but also approximately the same percentages listen during all three dayparts, 5am–10am, 10am–3pm and 3pm–7pm,” said Miller. “The largest percentages listen from 10am–3pm, the middle of the workday for most of them.”
Reaching young, higher-income adults working from home is not easy, as they shouldn’t be watching TV, reading the paper or even spending much time on social media – their bosses expect them to be working. Radio, however, is the perfect companion to their at-home work environment and one many advertisers can use to target this unique audience throughout the day,” said Miller.