Big A, what do you think is iHeart's objective here? This won't get ratings because it doesn't cover most of Atlanta with a 60 dbu signal. The counties covered by the signal have a low Hispanic composition. Do you think the objective is to gauge response before adding a simulcast with 105.7? Do you think it's to get a higher spot rate by telling advertisers they're getting the entire Latino spectrum?
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96.7 El Patron, why??
- Thread starter ShawtyBlack_ATL
- Start date
Not one of these has ever succeeded in a major market . It’s pretty much going to be a place holder with voice tracked talents
All good possibilities. They did a similar launch with Rumba97.7 in Boston earlier this year:
iHeart Boston Launches Rumba 97.7
• At the stroke of noon on Tuesday, after 24 hours of stunting, iHeartMedia Boston officially flipped WKAF/Brockton, MA from Throwback 97.7 The Beat to Latin Top 40 as Rumba 97.7, "#1 Para Reggaeton y Variedad en Boston." Engineered specifically for the Boston market, Rumba 97.7 "will deliver...
ramp247.com
They seem to be building a national platform, which is what they've done in other formats. The Boston station is getting good numbers too! The Phoenix station is a weak AM, but that's where Rico and Adrian are based. All four of these hosts are also on the Phoenix station, although Luis says he was born in Atlanta.
I said in an earlier post that it's expensive to run one station in a market with a specialized audience. But if you group several stations in multiple markets, you spread out the cost, and it's a more efficient business model. That's what iHeart has done in most of their other formats. Perhaps that's the idea here.
Once again, you said "hire good people." They've had a chance to audition all four of these people in house, and know what they can do. You don't prejudge people because they don't live in your area. That's not the way to build and encourage employees.
I think they see potential in non-traditional formats. We can all see that the alternative format is dying. CHR has stalled. Traditional audiences are using other mediums to hear music. So that leaves a huge hole for reaching Hispanic and Black audiences, who have shown they still have loyalty to radio. It's great that iHeart is willing to experiment.
They're doing the same thing on 105.3 The Beat. The morning show is syndicated, mid-days is VT from Texas, and overnights is VT from San Francisco. Ashlee is on five stations. This is the iHeart model. They likely would have done the same thing is the choice had been soft AC.
They seem to recognize that, since they said in the press release that the music mix was "engineered specifically for the Boston market." Rumba and Patron are different formats. But Gina appears to be based in Boston, and is also heard on the two Patron stations.
Those are not locally made format decisions. Formats in groups are determined in concert with the national senior management, national sales and, in this case, the Spanish language programming team which is very competent.
I may be mistaken, but I believe Z105.7 is the closest to Rumba. iHeart first had massive success with the Rumba brand in Orlando about 20 years ago and it still is to this day.
Atlanta is one market where iHeart has experienced multiple times with different Spanish formats which they haven’t really done in many top markets other than (recently) Boston, Miami, and Atlanta. There was a short lived experiment in Chicago that didn’t fare well. In Atlanta there was the original (Regional Mexican) 105.3 El Patron, (Spanish CHR) Viva 105.7, the “merged” Viva and El Patron at 105.3 (Spanish AC), 105.3 La Z, Z105.3, and now Z105.7, the latter 3 being a version of Spanish AC or CHR. They likely have played around in Atlanta the most due to the fact it hasn’t been an efttently successful cluster with other formats, and in the mid 2000s, Viva and El Patron both ranked very high. Not sure why the ratings fell off to the half a point or so Z105.7 is getting now. iHM made a big push for especially regional Mexican in the mid-2000s in a lot of markets, I remember the La Preciosa format in Greensboro, NC that didn’t last very long.
Curious to see how all of this pans out. I highly doubt this will be the last change iHeart makes to the Atlanta cluster in regards to Spanish formats. I do think regional Mexican on 96.7 this time is more for sales and marketing purposes than reaching an audience given the coverage area. At least they realized 105.3 is an Urban signal and not one for Regional Mexican or Spanish AC/CHR.
I Think you are looking more into what really happened in Atl. Simple another station started to show signs of life and beat them with a different format, so they felt the need to have a secondary station to take away a few listeners. I heart has no real plan to roll out regional mexican stations. Enrique santos just doesn't work in Atl.
Does she have to use words, idioms, pronunciations specific to Mexican Spanish when tracking for Patron, and switch to Dominican or Puerto Rican Spanish when tracking her Rumba shifts? Or is there a standard "neutral" radio Spanish acceptable to Spanish-dominant listeners of all nationalities?
Hardly. The Atlanta MSA is now approaching 12% Hispanic, and if we consider that to mean about 6 to 8 share points of total Spanish language potential, that's a major slice of the market. With Hispanics now nearing 20% of the total US population, ad campaigns need that segment badly.
Atlanta is a strange mix of Mexican origin residents and Caribbean heritage ones. In younger demos, Spanish language CHR based on reggaetón is universal, but in the more adult group the tastes are not similar.
And that is not a decision made locally.
As BigA said, it requires a separate sales organization and very different marketing.
The failure of then-Radio One with Spanish in Houston shows how the different culture, client base and marketing needs make it hard for most clusters to adapt to a Spanish language station amongst them.
TV production for international markets uses "International Spanish" which is a neutral accent with a non-localized vocabulary. But most of us can adapt to the rhythm, accent and word usage in different countries. I switch into very different vocabularies and accents and even speed of speech depending on who I am with. However, on air someone who is appealing to a Caribbean audience can't usually do a Mexican targeted format well unless their heritage includes both cultures.
There is no simple answer to this, and it depends on the background, cultural heritage and experience of each DJ or announcer.
That said, I don't think that anyone who is not Mexican can do Regional Mexican successfully... with perhaps a few exceptions for Central Americans who share some or much of the culture... and those are cases where they have lived among Mexicans in the US for many, many years like Renán Almendariz Coello "El Cucuy" who is from Honduras. And even among Mexicans, to do Regional it is best if the announcers do not come from Mexico City... a place with a different attitude and accent.
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Why do they have to be local? Radio in most of Latin America is national and the audiences are used to the best programming coming from a nation's largest cities.
Regional Mexican 102.3/107.1 is defeating 105.7 handily in the ratings, David.
The old 105.3 earned better numbers than the present day 105.7. The Spanish CHR format is arguably a failure.
The new 96.7 will reach only a small fraction of the MSA Hispanic residents of which you speak with a 60 dBu or better signal. Many won't be able to receive a 50 dBu signal even.
96.7 would be a better fit for Reggaeton or Spanish CHR. 105.7, with its strong signal over Gwinnett and Cobb, would be a better fit for Regional Mexican. iHM has the formats & signals backwards.
The old 105.3 earned better numbers than the present day 105.7. The Spanish CHR format is arguably a failure.
The new 96.7 will reach only a small fraction of the MSA Hispanic residents of which you speak with a 60 dBu or better signal. Many won't be able to receive a 50 dBu signal even.
96.7 would be a better fit for Reggaeton or Spanish CHR. 105.7, with its strong signal over Gwinnett and Cobb, would be a better fit for Regional Mexican. iHM has the formats & signals backwards.
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Reggaetón is Spanish CHR today... from Chile to Chicago.
Obviously, they know this. Let's see how this strategy matures, as this could just be a first step.
One of the biggest issues here is the placement of HDHA's and their weight in the total Hispanic sample. In these cases, it's not about "covering Hispanics" but reaching the HDHA areas.
Atlanta just qualified for HDHA treatment as it's over 10% Hispanic.
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A couple of iHeart market presidents ago, I wrote in my blog that iHeart should switch formats between 105.3 and 105.7, moving El Patron to 105.7 because it covers Gwinnett, where the Latino population was growing swiftly.
She emailed me in response, starting the email with, "I'm so glad you're not managing my portfolio," and proceeded to give me rationale why I was wrong. I wrote about it a second time and got a response that pretty much said, "Please! You're driving me crazy," and again gave me a litany of reasons why I was wrong.
Years later, I mentioned to then-iHeart Atlanta President Justin Shaftlander why I thought 105.7 was the better frequency for a Hispanic format. He got it, agreeing with me, but said the station was billing $5 million and there were too many Urban stations for a new one on 105.3 to succeed. Later, of course, iHeart made the moves, shifting Hispanic to 105.7 and introducing Urban on 105.3.
This is a reflection of a common problem where a "non-Hispanic white" who has trouble reading a Chipotle menu tries to interpret the Hispanic market.
Well remember, from 2005-2009 Clear Channel had El Patron on 105.3 AND Viva on 105.7. Viva was a Spanish AC. So really, something had to go on 105.3, and I guess the Regional Mexican format made more sense on that signal. There just aren’t a ton of ears for it in the 60dbu. 104.1 has almost the same coverage area as 105.3 except they’re a tiny bit closer in, so there’s obviously potential for great success on that signal with the right format and execution.
Keep in mind that in that period Atlanta did not have PPM and did not have sufficient Hispanic population to warrant ethnic procedures for Hispanics. A lot has changed since then.
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