Audience Measurement
TSA (Total Survey Area)
A geographic definition encompassing the primary metropolitan area plus surrounding suburban and rural counties where the station's signal is received.
What is TSA (Total Survey Area)?
TSA is the outer-ring geography for audience measurement. Where the Metro Survey Area (MSA) covers only the core city and its immediate commuter zone, TSA extends outward to every county where the station has measurable listenership. For a regional FM station broadcasting from a major market, TSA listenership can exceed MSA listenership by a factor of two or three.
TSA ratings matter enormously to regional advertisers — the tractor dealer, the vacation resort, the outdoor outfitter — whose customer base lives in the surrounding counties and small towns, not downtown. A station that underperforms in MSA but dominates TSA can still be the right buy for the right advertiser, and knowing the geography matters more than the raw headline rating.
Why it matters
Highly important for regional advertisers whose potential customer base extends significantly beyond the immediate city center.
Related terms
- AQH Rating— AQH Persons expressed as a mathematical percentage of the total measured demographic population in a specific geographic market.
- Audience Composition— The demographic, psychographic, or socioeconomic breakdown of a station's listener base, usually expressed in percentages.
- Audience Turnover— The calculated ratio of a station's cumulative audience (Cume) compared to its Average Quarter-Hour (AQH) audience.
- Average Audience— The estimated number of people listening to a radio station or viewing a television program during any given minute of the broadcast.