Stone Door Media Lab’s Jeff Green presented results from a Country radio research project, and gave attending programmers five specific “metrics that matter” in determining what songs have the most likelihood to become hits. They are: most added, early streams-per-spin, Shazams-per-spin, Pandora thumbs ups and top 10’s, and early airplay and rapid chart growth. Warner Music Nashville VP/Research & Analytics Victoria Nugent offered clarity on terms and definitions for consumption, streaming, downloads and other oft-used terms and metrics. WHKO/Dayton PD Nancy Wilson gave insight on practical usage of label-provided data, Shazaam and Pandora, and local research. “You can find a lot of this data for free," she said. "Go to Shazaam.com and type in your market or a song title. You can also go to Pandora.com.”

Moderator Bob Richards touched on the skepticism some may have about most added and streaming data. Green said that while he understands that spin programs can affect what is most added, the pattern over several years indicates most added songs over several weeks more often become hits. When Richards asked about the possibility of streaming data being manipulated by superfans or even paid-for streams, Green said, “The sample size is so large it would be hard to manipulate. It is is just too complicated to manipulate that level of streams." Download the slide deck from the CRS app or here.