The Tavis Smiley thread was going in this direction so I thought it would be best to separate out this thread as I find it quite interesting on its own.
It was nearly seven years ago (can't believe it has been that long!) that in a programming and asset reallocation, iheart decided to remove Rush Limbaugh from his longtime slot of 9:00 am to noon on KFI and replace him with hosts that had less staunch conservative viewpoints. Rush was really the only arch-conservative left on the station as Dr. Laura had been removed several years earlier, and KFI's other most popular hosts John and Ken in the afternoons and Bill Handel in the mornings were not nearly so conservative anyway. Rush's ratings had been slipping on KFI and it was felt this would be a win-win situation.
KFI could still be presented as a "more stimulating" talk station without the "baggage" of total conservative hosts. It was felt that this represented the views of the LA population in general and would serve the blowtorch signal on KFI well, allowing them to market to a much broader SoCal audience.
As for KEIB, they could put Rush and a collection of other conservative hosts together which would take the relatively small but loyal conservative audience and give them a station of their own. It would generate shares through large TSL, as many of these conservatives tune Rush in during the morning hours and leave the radio on all day afterwards. In order to unruffle Rush's feathers for the "demotion" to the weaker signal, they gave him his own call letters, EIB standing for Rush's self-proclaimed "Excellence in Broadcasting Network".
From my point of view, although I have little empirical evidence to support my thesis, I think this has actually worked out well for both stations and for iheart as an owner. Even after the failure of Air America, KTLK on 1150 was still airing bad syndicated liberal hosts and getting almost no ratings for it, so putting conservative talk on made for an older and perhaps less desirable selling demo for KEIB 1150, but at least they were a reliable audience that could be sold. And I could use a little help on this point, but I think iheart was syndicating some of the other hosts and could use 1150 to get LA clearance? In any case, the move to conservative talk was a net benefit for the 1150 signal. As for KFI, like David said, I don't think they have ever really been able to duplicate the ratings success that Rush and Dr. Laura brought to them in the 90s and early 2000's during the middays, and that carryover affect has also affected other programs. But I also do not doubt that, as planned, they have picked up talk listeners who do NOT want to hear conservative talk all day. So I think KFI is overall a bit down from its heyday, KEIB is a bit up from libtalk, and overall the decision iheart made was the correct one because the ratings and revenue success of the KFI/KEIB combo now is greater than the KFI/KTLK combo of yesteryear. (I do realize these two stations are not sold together, there are several other stations that iheart sells together, but I am only focused on the reallocation of programming and assets between KFI and KEIB as a stand-alone analysis - that is how the original decision was made.)
Any empirical evidence to support or refute the thesis, or even competing theses would be appreciated.
It was nearly seven years ago (can't believe it has been that long!) that in a programming and asset reallocation, iheart decided to remove Rush Limbaugh from his longtime slot of 9:00 am to noon on KFI and replace him with hosts that had less staunch conservative viewpoints. Rush was really the only arch-conservative left on the station as Dr. Laura had been removed several years earlier, and KFI's other most popular hosts John and Ken in the afternoons and Bill Handel in the mornings were not nearly so conservative anyway. Rush's ratings had been slipping on KFI and it was felt this would be a win-win situation.
KFI could still be presented as a "more stimulating" talk station without the "baggage" of total conservative hosts. It was felt that this represented the views of the LA population in general and would serve the blowtorch signal on KFI well, allowing them to market to a much broader SoCal audience.
As for KEIB, they could put Rush and a collection of other conservative hosts together which would take the relatively small but loyal conservative audience and give them a station of their own. It would generate shares through large TSL, as many of these conservatives tune Rush in during the morning hours and leave the radio on all day afterwards. In order to unruffle Rush's feathers for the "demotion" to the weaker signal, they gave him his own call letters, EIB standing for Rush's self-proclaimed "Excellence in Broadcasting Network".
From my point of view, although I have little empirical evidence to support my thesis, I think this has actually worked out well for both stations and for iheart as an owner. Even after the failure of Air America, KTLK on 1150 was still airing bad syndicated liberal hosts and getting almost no ratings for it, so putting conservative talk on made for an older and perhaps less desirable selling demo for KEIB 1150, but at least they were a reliable audience that could be sold. And I could use a little help on this point, but I think iheart was syndicating some of the other hosts and could use 1150 to get LA clearance? In any case, the move to conservative talk was a net benefit for the 1150 signal. As for KFI, like David said, I don't think they have ever really been able to duplicate the ratings success that Rush and Dr. Laura brought to them in the 90s and early 2000's during the middays, and that carryover affect has also affected other programs. But I also do not doubt that, as planned, they have picked up talk listeners who do NOT want to hear conservative talk all day. So I think KFI is overall a bit down from its heyday, KEIB is a bit up from libtalk, and overall the decision iheart made was the correct one because the ratings and revenue success of the KFI/KEIB combo now is greater than the KFI/KTLK combo of yesteryear. (I do realize these two stations are not sold together, there are several other stations that iheart sells together, but I am only focused on the reallocation of programming and assets between KFI and KEIB as a stand-alone analysis - that is how the original decision was made.)
Any empirical evidence to support or refute the thesis, or even competing theses would be appreciated.
