It's very possible it's both. If you look at Rush's ratings around the country, there seems to be a pattern, and it's not good.
Based on that article, my suspicion is that the only day part that is doing well with people under 50 is mornings.
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Limbaugh losing ground in key demos on WBEN
- Thread starter Rob Piotrowski
- Start date
It's very possible it's both. If you look at Rush's ratings around the country, there seems to be a pattern, and it's not good.
Based on that article, my suspicion is that the only day part that is doing well with people under 50 is mornings.
How old is Sandy Beach now? Is his content/schtick stale?
In your second paragraph, did you mean to say, " A day will come (and I've said this before) when formats are more about lifestyles and musical genres than demographics."? Here's a fun game to play and it's probably the wrong forum but here goes anyway: What will be the first major News/Talk outlet to change format and when?
No. Genres are starting to disappear.
WLS-AM in Chicago has been buying up play by play rights to several Chicago sports teams such as the White Sox and the Bulls. I'm expecting they will go from news/talk to sports very soon. The problem a lot of these heritage news/talkers have is there aren't a lot of formats that have any potential on AM.
The types of callers you hear on the air aren't always indicative of the percentage of those demos in the audience. Limbaugh could have nothing but women on the air if he wanted, but we know they are pretty far from 100% of his audience.
This is the second take: I thought you were talking about demographics. My other thought was "more about lifestyles than musical genres and demographics". My intention at this point is not to correct you but just to complete explaining my thinking process. My wife hates it when I do that.
I was, and as I said, formats that are built strictly around a musical genre will fade away. Maybe I need to explain it better: You can see it in country. One reason for the success of that format is it's not built around a single narrow regional genre anymore, but musical variety. The word "country" is more about the lifestyle than the genre. So you can have music that sounds like southern rock getting played on a country station, and nobody blinks, except the person who doesn't think it's country. Which technically or musically it's not. So as I said, formats will be about attracting lifestyles and demographics, rather than people who like a specific musical genre. And the music industry is heading the same way, blurring the lines across genre barriers, and they use shows like The Grammy Awards and the CMA Awards to show how that can be done.
His routine is consistent with what he's done for years as a WBEN talk show host: Pro gun, yet pro choice; anti-union-right to work and a right-of-center republican. Beach is doing what WBEN is known for. Whether his act is stale or not depends on the listeners' perspectives. He's not Shredd & Regan or Schopp & Parker. Age? Probably around 72, which fits with WBEN's 65+ white suburban republican listener base.
Of the dozen 25 to 40 year old guys that I know, not one listens to WBEN, Beach, Rush or Bauerle. They do however listen to Shredd & Regan on the way to work, and WGR, which is the only AM station they listen to, even though 1270 and 1520 do sports. The funny thing is, these guys frequently gbitch about the sports talk shows ("this guy's an a**hole, he doesn't know what he's talking about") but they continue to listen, frequently and for long periods of time. It's the allure of sports talk, which is the only format worth doing if a company wants to attract younger males to the AM band. It helps immeasurably that WGR has the Bills and the Sabres. Without those major franchise teams, they wouldn't be able to own the 25-54 male demo as they do.
OK, here I go again in this "summing up" thing that I feel I must do: In the past, some have made the point that people will be more likely to listen to a song, no matter how new or old, because they like the song, despite the person's age, a demographic argument which is where I thought you were going with this. Instead, you're saying that the genre' is independent of the lifestyle, a totally different concept to which in lieu of "the fifth", I take the "Emily Latella".
I find it fascinating that Big A states that News Talk programmers never
expected their current crisis. They are truly blind and incompetent then.
They milked the format as long as they could and never cared about the
future or adding new listeners. It's too late now.
Corporate programming has alienated many potential listeners.
It's not 1995 anymore. All kinds of content is available everywhere.
I know many people who rarely use Radio, except NPR...
expected their current crisis. They are truly blind and incompetent then.
They milked the format as long as they could and never cared about the
future or adding new listeners. It's too late now.
Corporate programming has alienated many potential listeners.
It's not 1995 anymore. All kinds of content is available everywhere.
I know many people who rarely use Radio, except NPR...
I do to, considering I knew a number of large and major market programmers in the 90's who ALL lamented the need to get younger demos involved in the format or the s**t is going to hit the fan in 10+ years.
Many I talked to said it, only a few ever did anything about it...and NONE stuck to---or were allowed to stick to---a plan to achieve those goals. They all decided instead to add more Limbaugh's, many knowing it was a long-range suicide mission for the format. But try explaining that to a Wall St. banker who's only concerned about next quarter, not 10+ years from now.
No, just lazy, shortsighted or overruled.
I didn't think so 5 years ago. I do now.
Almost nobody is scanning the AM dial looking to discover some new format. That says a LOT about the future of AM radio, because lord knows no company would dare spend even one cent promoting an AM format change.
I don't know about that. Nobody anticipates an earthquake or hurricane either, but they happen. No one anticipates getting cancer or crashing their car. Are they all blind and incompetent? No. Stuff happens. You just deal with it.
If you don't like radio, don't listen. No one forces you. But at the same time, if you don't listen, why post at a place called Radio Discussions?
As I recall, in the 90's we had the Hot Talk concept... with KLSX in LA being the largest example, and the New Jersey and Orlando outlets being talked about as the future of talk.
KLSX died without Stern. The New Jersey and Orlando stations, on analysis, were mostly different because they did not carry Limbaugh and were pretty much all local.
Then CBS tried to rebirth the concept with the Opie and Anthony style of sex in the church radio.
None of this worked for long, and even the Jersey and Disney World stations flattened out, despite being the poster children for a newer, less political and conservative radio.
Oh, and in the meantime we tried Air America. Millions of Americans tuned out.
But it wasn't for a lack of effort.
The problem is that nobody under 55 or 60 grew up scanning the AM dial. Most under-50's think of AM only if one of the local teams is only found on an AM station.
Add in the fact that less than 10% of the AMs in the top 100 markets cover even 80% of the market with a usable signal day and night, and a lot of people consider AM to be hard to hear, low quality and noisy.
So a lot of the issues have to do with the AM life cycle, except maybe for sports, being at its end. So a lot of the problems with talk have nothing to do with management or programmers or even the talent... it's the decline of AM which has left even the better stations with less "band traffic" and available cume.
KLSX after 10AM was a mess of Walt Sabo-style kooky. Ken Ober? Susan Olson? Kato Kaelin? C'mon, hardly a reasonable attempt at anything legit.
They also didn't wrap themselves in the flag 'round the clock and were far more relatable to normal people in broader demos.
Just a continuation of the piss-poor T&A weak Stern wannabe efforts of the early 90's---like what was tried in New Orleans and at WOWF in Detroit. Pathetic and definitely NOT a legit NEWSTALK-FOR-YOUNGER-PEOPLE attempt.
You wanted younger newstalk demos? Try having hosts who are younger, more energetic, more edgy, are not exclusively political AND are passionate about whatever they're talking about---whether it's abortion or idiots who don't signal before they make a turn. That's right, hosts who talk about real-life stuff in real life ways, but in an energetic, entertaining way. No Limbaugh's need apply.
Because they were lame and boring.
So you disavow them because they didn't continue to go through the roof? C'mon. They did fine.
Holy geeez. Where do I begin?
Air America never had millions to begin with, unlike the Limbaugh clones who were systematically funneled onto all of the heritage sticks with giant generational audiences and great signals.
AA was relegated to mostly inferior signals and/or rimsots. You know, the kind of stations that even conservatives (including Limbaugh) cannot make waves with.
No, just a lack of talent, direction and game-plan. They put boring non-radio people on crappy signals. Of course they failed. Of course. It had nothing to do with a rejection of something NON-conservative.
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Great. Like who?
Here's the thing about those two stations: You don't have success for as long as they have without people coming in and trying to hire the talent away. Lots of people have, and none have been able to duplicate that success elsewhere. After a while, you recognize that the format works THERE because it works THERE, and it's not going to be duplicated anywhere else, even if you use the same people. You make it sound like no one has tried, and the fact is that some have.
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Blaming the demise of News Talk because it's on the AM band is
a cop out. Many stations were given an FM simulcast. Almost every one
failed horribly. AM is a smaller part of the problem.
The major issue is the Right Wing crazy content.
Classic Rock and Classic Hits formats are on the same path.
If they won't change the programming, they better make it work
with nothing but older demos...
a cop out. Many stations were given an FM simulcast. Almost every one
failed horribly. AM is a smaller part of the problem.
The major issue is the Right Wing crazy content.
Classic Rock and Classic Hits formats are on the same path.
If they won't change the programming, they better make it work
with nothing but older demos...
Orlando and New Jersey, which are somewhat the model for a modernized talk format, are also Sabo creations. I was across the street from KLSX, also doing talk, at the time so I paid a lot of attention to the format. The recognition that younger FM demos did not want all Bosnia all the Time simply failed to recognize that the younger FM demos, for the most part, did not want talk at all.
They were FM. In central NJ, there was no AM that really covered anything to speak of, so it had to be FM. In Orlando, there was really only one AM with close to full metro coverage, and it was already a traditional talker. In both cases, the stations got on the air on FM decades ago when they could pick up folks at the fringe of the demographic barrier below which there is really no interest in talk and convert... and keep them. But both of those stations are aging just like the rest; WKXW has the vast bulk of its audience over 50. WTKS does better under 50, but not as well as a decade or so ago.
The problem is that those under 40 have no interest in any kind of long form talk, and that non-talk group is expanding each year as the population that grew up on the Internet and with new media ages.
Or, simply proof that there is no news/talk format for "younger people". The mistake was to consider Stern a talk show and to try to build a format out of what was a narrowly niched morning show.
Even if you find the hosts for this, you are left with trying to talk about "newsy" subjects to a demo that does not want that sort of content. There are many reasons, ranging from the attention span of young adults to the way news is consumed today to the lack of life experience by younger persons, but you can put on younger, hipper people but they won't get much of an audience.
LA, Portland, Seattle, Miami, LA... all had good to great signals and did as poorly as the lesser signals and the odd smaller market stations like WKIZ that joined the network.
At the time, AM was cuming in the millions every week in the top 10 markets, and was getting cume ratings as high as 35 or 40 in most of the rest of the top 100 markets. But nobody stopped when they pressed scan and heard an Air America station... they just tuned by or tuned out. It did not stick.
You can't blame the good signal stations for keeping their format. It was winning at the time. So Air America went to mostly second tier signals. But if any of the good signal stations had been a great success, we would have seen major changes in other markets. We didn't. (Yes, AA was badly run but it was on long enough to know that its particular flavor was even less appealing than conservative talk)
To the contrary, it showed that it was too late to use AM for any kind of younger talk except sports. It showed that a different focus did not work. And the fact that "real radio" and its later CBS variants could not pull 25-34's or even 25-44's into any kind of talk in great numbers.
I don't think I said that.
You don't change something that's a hit, and right now, those two formats are hits, and are attracting broad enough demos to work. Sure, a day will come when they go the same way as political talk, but until then, you stay with what works. If you know a better way to run a business, buy a station.
Exactly...same conclusion reached by WTKK-FM in Boston. This was the model of a station that attempted to combine a variety of political views with all local and no Rush or Hannity.
You are doing a "glass is half empty" analysis.
In the opposite scenario you realize that conventionally formatted talk radio, irrespective of format, does not work for under-50 listeners. The conservative formula still works for many stations, and they will continue to do it until it no longer makes money. We have tried "hot talk" and progressive talk and they are not options.
But for lots of stations, conservative content makes money. They will continue to program this content until that situation changes.
Glass half empty again. As BigA says, these are hit formats, making tons of money right now.
In 1919 when the Yankees bought Babe Ruth's contract from Boston, do you think they were sitting around in the management office saying, "but in a few years he won't be hitting those long balls any more"? Of course not. They were saying, "he's a crowd pleaser. Let's raise the ticket price and take advantage of his draw".
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