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K-Love's TV Commercials Don't Say "Christian"

G

Gregg.

K-Love has an interesting, fast-paced 30 second spot on local NYC TV. I've seen it twice during Jeopardy on Channel 7. It opens with the logo, with a jingle singing "K-Love." We then see a 20-something woman raising her arm and singing along with the radio in her bathroom. An African-American family is dancing in the living room. A male 20-something worker in a warehouse store spins around, then a young man in a wheel chair in a living room spins around.

The spot ends with two early teens, one boy, one girl, making a heart shape with their hands into the camera. We then see a slide for K-Love 95.5 New York.

There is no mention of this being a Christian station or any religious message at all. If you listen carefully to the song being played, you do hear the word God at the beginning. But you'd have to pay close attention. It's almost like the K-Love folks are marketing this station as a Hot AC. It makes you feel good and have fun. But nothing overtly religious at all.
 
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I've also spotted quite a few K-Love billboards and even bumper stickers in the area.
I don't recall seeing many from other local stations, in recent years.
 
K-Love’s approach to Christian contemporary is slightly different than some of the more local/regional CCM stations. They carry no preaching/teaching programming or material, really. The music isn’t overly religious to where it might offend one sect of Christianity. It’s more spiritual than anything, and in some cases could be slightly modified in to secular love songs. Essentially they are trying to target as wide of an audience as they can. In contrast, The Joy FM in Florida and His Radio in the Carolinas/GA are definitely more targeted toward evangelical Christians, which makes sense in those areas as that’s the majority. But K-Love has to err on the side of caution being national.
 
No rules requiring them to say they're religious. It's obvious that if you spend time with the people making the music that they're not old school Episcopalians singing hymns in church. Some of the songs they play have also been hits in secular formats. The guy who's hosting their morning show was a top rated secular talent in Tampa and other paces. I've been to some "new age" churches that have full live bands on stage with a big light show and even pyro during key moments. There's a reason why this music is popular once people get to hear it. Perhaps with some marketing, it will gain more audience around NYC.
 
Gregg. said:
K-Love has an interesting, fast-paced 30 second spot on local NYC TV. I've seen it twice during Jeopardy on Channel 7. It opens with the logo, with a jingle singing "K-Love." We then see a 20-something woman raising her arm and singing along with the radio in her bathroom. An African-American family is dancing in the living room. A male 20-something worker in a warehouse store spins around, then a young man in a wheel chair in a living room spins around.

The spot ends with two early teens, one boy, one girl, making a heart shape with their hands into the camera. We then see a slide for K-Love 95.5 New York.

There is no mention of this being a Christian station or any religious message at all. If you listen carefully to the song being played, you do hear the word God at the beginning. But you'd have to pay close attention. It's almost like the K-Love folks are marketing this station as a Hot AC. It makes you feel good and have fun. But nothing overtly religious at all.
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Remember that some of the most successful "ministers" with the largest "congregations" were/are people like Robert Schuller and Joel Osteen who didn't really dwell on biblical teachings and rarely got "preachy". Instead, they promoted a very strong, nearly constant message of positivity and self-empowerment, and everyone being welcome. It sounds like the commercial you describe is doing something similar. And it worked for the guys I mentioned...Schuller packed his original church and adjacent drive-in space in Garden Grove, CA before building the Crystal Cathedral which was featured in his TV services seen around the world each Sunday. Osteen's "church" is a former NBA basketball arena, and I'm sure nearly everyone has seen photos of the castle he lives in and the private jet(s) he's flown around in.
 
Gregg. said:
K-Love has an interesting, fast-paced 30 second spot on local NYC TV. I've seen it twice during Jeopardy on Channel 7. It opens with the logo, with a jingle singing "K-Love." We then see a 20-something woman raising her arm and singing along with the radio in her bathroom. An African-American family is dancing in the living room. A male 20-something worker in a warehouse store spins around, then a young man in a wheel chair in a living room spins around.

The spot ends with two early teens, one boy, one girl, making a heart shape with their hands into the camera. We then see a slide for K-Love 95.5 New York.

There is no mention of this being a Christian station or any religious message at all. If you listen carefully to the song being played, you do hear the word God at the beginning. But you'd have to pay close attention. It's almost like the K-Love folks are marketing this station as a Hot AC. It makes you feel good and have fun. But nothing overtly religious at all.
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In general, K-LOVE and Air1 run like AC and Country stations as far as presentation. Shows are lighthearted, topical to the average AC and Country audience. It’s not overly religious. Has not been as long as I have been listening. It’s just regular radio with Christian music mostly. They do have 60 seconds an hour of teaching and the Verse of The Day.

As far as their sister network, ever since Air1 shifted to mostly Contemporary Worship, serious topics like suicide and depression that used to be discussed (Often with phoners with troubled listeners explaining how the music has helped them or otherwise) have mostly disappeared from that network. It was previously a common thing because a lot of the listeners when it had a rock-based format were struggling with things like depression and addiction. It was an outreach to men mostly. Nowdays they try to market that one as an “escape from stress and worry” so they leave most of the sensitive topics to K-LOVE. A lot of people that run into these networks are far from the stereotypical Church going soccer moms. People find it and listen to it in times of struggle.

These commercials for K-LOVE were crowd sourced. They asked listeners to submit video of themselves dancing around to be included in that commercial.
 
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As I mentioned, I have a few hours a week I work for a friend who listens to Air1. The morning show talked about the husband, wife and dog all in the living room watching TV and the smell of bad gas which the husband says must be the dog. The husband is mum as the wife takes the dog to the vet, has tests done, tries several changes to the dog's diet and eventually learns the dog is in fine health and has no digestive issues. It was then the wife realizes it wasn't the dog. Yep, this was Air1. As I have said all alog, they don't push Christianity because their listeners are already and don't need to be reminded.
 
b-turner said:
As I mentioned, I have a few hours a week I work for a friend who listens to Air1. The morning show talked about the husband, wife and dog all in the living room watching TV and the smell of bad gas which the husband says must be the dog. The husband is mum as the wife takes the dog to the vet, has tests done, tries several changes to the dog's diet and eventually learns the dog is in fine health and has no digestive issues. It was then the wife realizes it wasn't the dog. Yep, this was Air1. As I have said all alog, they don't push Christianity because their listeners are already and don't need to be reminded.
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Their morning show spent the better part of the last decade on Hot AC radio, so that would fit that narritive.
 
Gregg. said:
K-Love has an interesting, fast-paced 30 second spot on local NYC TV. I've seen it twice during Jeopardy on Channel 7. It opens with the logo, with a jingle singing "K-Love." We then see a 20-something woman raising her arm and singing along with the radio in her bathroom. An African-American family is dancing in the living room. A male 20-something worker in a warehouse store spins around, then a young man in a wheel chair in a living room spins around.

The spot ends with two early teens, one boy, one girl, making a heart shape with their hands into the camera. We then see a slide for K-Love 95.5 New York.

There is no mention of this being a Christian station or any religious message at all. If you listen carefully to the song being played, you do hear the word God at the beginning. But you'd have to pay close attention. It's almost like the K-Love folks are marketing this station as a Hot AC. It makes you feel good and have fun. But nothing overtly religious at all.
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Bingo and this is how Klove does so well.. they arent hugely overly religious

On a local level, Z88.3 Orlando is consistently in the top 3 in the ratings for this very reason... they dont get overly religious and market themselves as a family radio station
 
It doesn't surprise me if it looks almost like as if EMF bought a transmitter in downtown Hell itself. They practically did. You can't fool anyone as hardened as native NYC born, raised and still there folks with that anonymous, cheesy, suburban, religious home schooling mom music.

So I guess it's a lesson learned over time in and different markets is to play down the Jesus amplification and let the music do whatever it does. And perhaps subtle is the best way of keeping it.

They might also be making a nationwide campaign about it....
 
Bongwater said:
So I guess it's a lesson learned over time in and different markets is to play down the Jesus amplification and let the music do whatever it does. And perhaps subtle is the best way of keeping it.
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The old adage is you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. Back when Bonneville owned WRFM, they did something very similar with happy and bouncy beautiful music. It was one of the top stations in NYC. Bonneville is owned by the Church of Latter Day Saints, commonly known as the Mormon Church. At one time, they owned a country music station that wouldn't play drinking or cheating songs. Kind of hard to do, but they did.
 
Don't most broadcasters that play CCM music, such as Star 99.1 in NJ, have a rather upbeat presentation that resembles A/C stations?
 
Nashville also had a K-Love spot that ran during the news last night. Last CCM Spot that ran around here was when Salem created "The Fish". That was back when I was in high school.
 
Miss Tuned said:
I love the sung "New York" - how big does the market have to be for its local K-Love to get a custom sung jingle?
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Probably most of them have a custom jingle. They're predominantly O&Os and EMF has plenty of $$$ to spend on the jingles.
 
I listen to them pretty regularly. There is no doubt that they are Christians, and they DO talk about the Lord often enough to remove any doubt. Many of the songs pretty clearly mention the Lord in their lyrics. It's not like they are trying to "hide" Jesus in their presentation, they're just trying not to be overbearing to those who may find "preachy" programming off-putting. They do have a positive message, and they DO make it clear that the LORD is where the forgiveness, strength and joy we all need can be found. :)
 
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