Is it really promoting the competition?

It seems that what's left of the CBS Radio empire has gone back to some level of cross-promotion among its cluster of stations. It has been going on in Chicago off and on over the past couple of years. The news station will run a spot for a music station, and occasionally cross promote sports broadcasts with the all-sports station in the cluster.

Yet, in New York, I saw the story that WFAN's Mike Francesa was "annoyed" to hear a promo air during this afternoon drive show for sister FM station WXRK's afternoon show, now hosted by Chris Booker.

Years ago, I felt the same way. There was always the "Why send any listener elsewhere at any time?" vibe felt throughout the station. I remember being stunned back in the 70's when a Chicago "beautiful music" station (oops - showing my age again) traded out with Newsradio 78. Each did a "When you want the news........." or "When you want to hear beautiful music...." type spot. I understood they were not competition, but was still opposed to it because it could send listeners in another direction. What if they can't find their way back? They could stop on another station before they get to yours on the return.

But just as my views on certain things have done a 180 over the years, I would have to say I have done that here. It has nothing to do with clusters doing what is now cross promotion. (The 70's incident I referred to was with different ownership, back in the day when one owner could only have a maximum of one AM and one FM in a single market.)

Now, it is radio competing against the alternatives which have come along. The playing field is way different. The idea is to keep people listening to the radio, moreso than one station vs. the next. I get it.

This is a way to try and combat my point that if radio had maintained a strong level of programming there wouldn't be this much "competition" for my ears.

So if one AM or FM station can point out a program that could be of interest and keep my attention on the radio, I see the purpose. It is no longer "which station?" but a matter of if I, or others, would be willing to turn on the "regular" radio.

Personally, I was born and bred on radio. Back to my days in grammar school of having a 20 foot transmitter kit in my bedroom and putting the microphone up against my turntable speakers to host "my" radio show every weekend. Coming home at lunch to listen to a few songs. The whole story, while knowing at the time I wanted to work in the industry.

But I fast forward 40 years. As I write this, it is mid-afternoon of a typical weekday to my ears.
I woke up this morning to a classic rock FM station, and listened for 15 minutes while I shaved, showered, and got dressed to start my day. I get the weather and a couple of headlines and a set of 3 or 4 songs every morning.

Since then, I listened to satellite radio for 45 minutes on my way in (Howard Stern, if you need to know what), and I have since listened to over 6 hours of an internet music channel online at my desk. When I went out for lunch and to run an errand, I heard about 45 minutes of tunes on my MP3 player.

Stern is gone from over-the-air and successfully taken his show to a better venue. He is the majority of the reason I pay for satellite radio. The songs I heard over the hours online and, of course, on my MP3 player, are mostly songs I don't hear anymore (if at all) on the radio, but did when they first came out.

Years ago those 7 hours of my day would have easily been spent on a couple of radio stations with no questions asked, and back the next day for more. No more. Yet, if radio had maintained the true local personality and more thorough playlists, along with shorter and more reasonable commercial breaks, I wouldn't have thought of spending money on satellite and an MP3 player and music I want to hear on it.

As a result, I understand completely that if I'm listening to WFAN for sports talk, maybe I'd want to hear Chris Booker and his knowledge on K-Rock (or whatever they are calling it with this week's format) when I'm done listening to sports talk. It would keep me away from the "competition", which is no longer AM and FM radio.

more Radio Recordings on the way

Thanks to those of you who noticed that we are re-structuring our RadioRecordings airchecks series. I'm pleased to say that we are on target for our Feb. 1st "re-launch", so please do check back next week!!

We have a few more from Chicago, Los Angeles, and St. Louis in particular that I think you will find interesting.

More bad publicity for the radio industry

Just as the radio industry needs all the strength and help it can get in order to survive in this economy come two stories which will not only impact the lives of a lot of people around the country, but will also have (another) negative impact on radio advertising and revenue.

Now comes word that The Radio Advertising Bureau (RAB) announces it is laying off ten percent of its staff, with a hiring and salary freeze as well.

So let me get this straight. Does this mean that the radio stations, which need all of the favorable publicity and image they can get in front of potential advertisers, can no longer afford to keep their collective publicity machine alive? Some message this sends to ad agencies and local advertisers. The organization responsible for materials and publicity about what makes radio a potentially good source for advertising is having financial problems. This makes a tough job even tougher, at the worst possible time. Ouch.

Meanwhile, the word is that on Tuesday, while the nation is focused on Inauguration Day, that "Clearance Channel" (as I call it) will announce significant employee and air talent reductions across the country. Considering they already use voice tracking in markets as large as Detroit and Chicago, I'm afraid to think of how much worse things will turn within the next week.

I suppose when you have one executive running 5 stations in the same market, each station only gets 1/5 of the effort. But the wrong people suffer on this. And that includes the listeners.

another station format change

The Los Angeles station known for years as "Indie 103.1" has bailed, but at least some of the air staff had the opportunity to say goodbye on the air. This station has been plagued by signal problems for years, going back to its "Mars 103" days of what I called the "weird rock" format in the late 80's.

Yet, station management is supposedly blaming the PPM audience measurement as a reason for its demise. As if that station ever made an impact in the market. It had a small but steady core of listeners, with little variation. At best, long term advertisers had a reinforcement outlet. For my money, this is the type of "hip" station that people would purposely overstate under the diary system and PPM is more of a reality.

At any rate, the word is the station will go Spanish within the month.

first radio format change of 2009.........

Well, we made it almost 2 weeks into 2009 before a major market radio format change. Not bad.

Even though it happened in Atlanta, it is merely a jazz station (107.5 FM) being pulled for a new format that has yet to be unveiled. Jazz stations have vanished within the past year and a half in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Miami, and Memphis, that I know of. Some analysts say it is to cut expenses since perhaps the new format will allow for fewer or no air personalities. I contend that the audience for jazz was never sizable enough to sustain anything above a minor audience rating, and even the smaller, local, and niche advertisers have cut back to the point of no immediate return.

just how beautiful?

For those wondering why radio stations are struggling so much these days and losing out to services and technology that consumers are willing to PAY for instead of turing on the radio, here is one more example.

Granted, this could be poor journalism too. This story is about a station changing its format to "beautiful music" but it doesn't give one example or clue as to any songs or artists the station is now playing.

Personally, I associate "beautiful music" with the elevator music FM's in the 70's and early 80's in large markets. Those have been gone for 20 years or longer. If there was a demand, believe me those stations would still be around and in the radio format wheel today.

I'm not going guess what this station is now playing. And there is no reason to tune away from whatever else I'm listening to just to find out.

http://www.bizjournals.com/albany/stories/2008/12/29/daily3.html?ana=from_rss


The joke going around the office is that the writer of this story will be hired as News Director at this "beautiful music" station.