I wonder will more talk stations (liberal and conservative), especially the low rated stations flip to sports and or sports betting format in the coming days, weeks, etc? I think what happened with KGO 810 will have a domino effect across the USA for the future of talk radio, especially with the ones that are not doing well in the ratings and so on .
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Future of talkradio stations
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Somewhat related to your question is this article about Ben Shapiro.
Talk radio alone isn't making enough money. However, when combined with podcasting, it seems to do better.
Any talk show host who doesn't do a podcast is leaving money on the table.
Conversely, any podcast host who isn't also doing radio is leaving money on the table.
Talk radio alone isn't making enough money. However, when combined with podcasting, it seems to do better.
Any talk show host who doesn't do a podcast is leaving money on the table.
Conversely, any podcast host who isn't also doing radio is leaving money on the table.
Apparently homophobia and out-and-out neo-nazi talk is in......ultra-homophobe and anti-trans crusader Matt Walsh will be syndicated by Westwood One.
Westwood One Adds Matt Walsh To Daily Wire’s Afternoon Conservative Talk Block - RadioInsight
Westwood One has announced that it will revise is afternoon Conservative Talk offerings in the new year. Expanding its partnership with Ben Shapiro's The Daily Wire, Westwood One will cut back Shaprio's show to 3-4pm Eastern and adding Matt Walsh to host the 4pm hour. Michael Knowles will remain...
radioinsight.com
There are few formats that are cheaper for a station to run than 24/7 syndicated conservative talk. On the flip side, 24/7 syndicated conservative talk tends to get very low ratings, because such a station usually has 1 or 2 competitors with local news or talk.
KGO was not that, it was mostly live talk.
KGO was not that, it was mostly live talk.
More likely: station owners will wait for many months (or more) to see how the whole sports betting economy evolves before flipping more stations. Only "dead stations" owned by big groups can take the long shot bet on this kind of programming.
The problem is, in particular regarding KGO, was that the sports gambling initiatives in California were all soundly voted down. So, the question is; will people take gambling statistical information and opinions from a radio show where gambling isn't allowed to Nevada, where it is?
It doesn't matter what people do with the information as long as BetMGM and the other groups continue to pay for the airtime.
Except the question is as to whether online sports books are willing to advertise on TV and radio stations specifically in areas where online sports betting isn't allowed, like the Bay Area. The programming is provided by a syndicated network, true, but that doesn't benefit local station's open inventory.
I get the impression that doesn't matter.
At the same time, the Sports Betting station in Las Vegas doesn't get great ratings. I think the station gets less than a 1 share.
And that's in Las Vegas, historically the casino and gambling capital of the USA.
KGO's ratings went down over the past couple months. But from what I understand, their revenues probably went up.
Doesn't matter. When it comes to sports-anything, ratings are not indicative of revenue coming in.
VPNs anyone?
And hence The Problem; Over the decades in order to get more listener ears in a format where talk show hosts and wannabes are a dime a bazillion, the hyperbole of right wing radio got ratcheted up. Because the more pointless anger you feed people, the more they want, the longer they stay for the MyPillow ads. It's a shorter leap from Rush Limbaugh to Alex Jones than it looks (and speaking of Alex Jones, how the hell is he still paying for airtime? I notice he's still got radio affiliates.)
With the internet and more of the younger, more angsty right-wing audience defecting to impossible to broadcast live extremist programming and podcasts on the dork web (Steve Bannon is even carried by some broadcast radio stations.), it's come to that inevitable point where terrestrial conservative talk radio can't possibly go any farther to the right without walking straight into an absolute minefield.
MOAR tax cuts for the rich are one thing. Getting people so worked up against the government or their trans neighbors that they go and violently attack them is entirely another. And with all these AR-15s out walking around with fully loaded people these days, all it takes is a few words to set them off. History has already demonstrated what repeated messaging intending to provoke violence can do January of last year.
But the problem is how does mainstream conservative talk radio take a step back towards common sense without 2/3rds of the remaining audience thinking these stations been taken over by people who are awake?
And I agree with TheBigA, you really do need both radio and a podcast to make it in talk these days. But a lot of podcasters are skeptical of radio, as many radio hosts are of podcasts. There's a gazillion brokered rent-a-stations. And a radio frequency and call letters still look spiffy on any professional resume.
But there's a number of people these days that just want instant viral fame on their own terms. They see what others are doing with podcasts, YouTube, etc. And they would rather cut out the middleman, the structured environment of broadcast radio and the FCC's hot language hangup for the benefit of complete, top-down creative control.
They are actually aware radio could be a faster way to access a broader audience and more $$$. But they don't want anyone telling them what to do or say. Even if it's their best foot forward to an actual career.
That's OK; They're not ready for it yet.
Understood. My point was more directed towards the opinion I've seen here on RD and elsewhere, where AM band enthusiasts talk about how KGO's owners messed up with flipping to Sports Bet talk, because the ratings dropped, and those dropped ratings reflect the KGO owners' 'mistake'.
Then there is the attitude that California not approving Sports Betting will sink KGO.
Yet, in Casino Country USA (Las Vegas), sports bet talk still brings in low ratings, despite the fact that betting is obviously legal in Las Vegas. Obviously, the ratings themselves really don't reflect whether a sports betting station makes money. And whether betting is legal in a jurisdiction won't reflect the success of a sports bet talk station.
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The place where they went "down" from was already so low that they were not getting any transactional business to begin with.
It's been mentioned before on this site, and what many poster's here don't understand; is ratings are not like a score in a sports game, with clear winners and losers. There are stations that get decent to good ratings but because of the advertising climate, still may not be seeing the same ratio of revenue from what's on the scoreboard. What really matters to stations is revenue, full stop. You get that revenue by being there for advertisers that want to reach a particular audience or demographic range. Sports is one of those audiences. Also, that's why many stations are owner-grouped within a market. The idea is a create enough demographic spread to cast a wider net for advertisers willing to buy ads on the group, not necessarily just via one station alone.
And ads are bought based on delivery. Lets say the #1 station has a 5 share and spots are $200. The #15 station may have a 1 share but charge $40 per spot. It is just as good a deal as the top station. And many smaller clients can only afford a small schedule on the big station and will find that more spots more often on the lower rated one gets better results.
Do you realize it has been two years now?
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