What would you do?

[Cobra14]

Let’s play a scenario.

Going back In time when the antenna caught on fire on Tiger mountain.

When your station is on its backup site on Cougar Mountain, during that time your ratings go up significantly for the duration your on that site. Like a lot. Whatever building penetration, 167 valley coverage or whatever the reason your ratings go up.

Antenna on Tiger gets fixed or replaced or whatever and you switch back to it. Your ratings sag and drop down like way down below what they were while you were on the back up site. For whatever reason. For multiple months.

Do you make a permanent move back to Cougar? Would a manager green light that or the FCC?

What are your thoughts?

 

[fordranger797]

A few things that are important to consider here:

1. When a station is operating from its backup facility on Cougar Mountain, it’s likely operating at a fraction of the power it would normally put out from its primary site on top of Tiger Mountain. It’s not really a situation where you’ll see power output levels at or near stations like 93.3 or 95.7, both of which are at the very top of the maximum ERP. When I previously worked for a radio station that had to rely on its backup site, the coverage was far inferior to what we had from the regular site.

2. It would be very hard, if not impossible, to get permission to change the parameters of a broadcast license to allow the entire facility to move to Cougar Mountain. I wondered for a long time why more stations didn’t take advantage of what, in my opinion, is a superior site. People with more experience than me informed me that there are many issues at play that make this impossible. Kelly can explain better.

3. Broadcasting from the auxiliary site probably isn’t going to do anything to help your ratings. It’s more likely to negatively impact your ratings with a poor signal in some locations that were previously well covered. I’d argue that most listeners who tuned into their favourite radio station after the antenna fire noticed that the station came in worse. I’d bet that most station managers wanted to get their primary sites up and running as soon as possible to avoid signal issues.

 

[Kelly A]

Let’s play a scenario.

Going back In time when the antenna caught on fire on Tiger mountain.

When your station is on its backup site on Cougar Mountain, during that time your ratings go up significantly for the duration your on that site. Like a lot. Whatever building penetration, 167 valley coverage or whatever the reason your ratings go up.

Referring to your example of the WTM antenna catastrophic failure; I don't recall that there were any impactful losses or increase of in-demo ratings share for any of those stations while on their backup site. Which, when you think about it, is the desired result should the use of a backup site for a longer time than just main-site maintenance period, be required.

 

[bobdavcav]

Cobra, I would find the scenario you present hard to imagine. In my mind, both Cougar and Tiger have issues, though where those issues present themselves is a bit different. The biggest issue with Cougar is downtown Everett. While Tiger signals have more issues in downtown Seattle, they both seem to have some issues around and south of the stadiums. Apparently Tiger also has issues on 405 south of Bellevue, but I'm not familiar enough with those issues. Unless you were in one of the above mentioned areas, I wouldn't think you would notice much of a difference. I personally didn't notice any difference with any of the signals, then again I wasn't in any of the mentioned areas that often, and when I was, I wasn't listening to the effected stations. I do remember going up to Snoqualmie Pass one day with the car radio set on KZOK. Although I wasn't paying too close attention on the way up, when we got off the freeway, the station seemed to be coming in fine. I'm not sure if the station was operating from the backup site on Cougar or a temporary antenna on Tiger at the time, but this would have only been a few months after the fire.

 

[fordranger797]

Cobra, I would find the scenario you present hard to imagine. In my mind, both Cougar and Tiger have issues, though where those issues present themselves is a bit different. The biggest issue with Cougar is downtown Everett. While Tiger signals have more issues in downtown Seattle, they both seem to have some issues around and south of the stadiums. Apparently Tiger also has issues on 405 south of Bellevue, but I'm not familiar enough with those issues. Unless you were in one of the above mentioned areas, I wouldn't think you would notice much of a difference. I personally didn't notice any difference with any of the signals, then again I wasn't in any of the mentioned areas that often, and when I was, I wasn't listening to the effected stations. I do remember going up to Snoqualmie Pass one day with the car radio set on KZOK. Although I wasn't paying too close attention on the way up, when we got off the freeway, the station seemed to be coming in fine. I'm not sure if the station was operating from the backup site on Cougar or a temporary antenna on Tiger at the time, but this would have only been a few months after the fire.

I recall that KZOK sounded pretty rough around Olympia when they were on the backup site. Cougar is a very good site, but you need to be sending out a higher level of power to avoid signal issues on some of the more outlying areas of the market.

It is true, Tiger Mountain has some shadowing issues right around I-405 where cougar mountain creates a shadow. Both sites have pluses and minuses, but the big advantage for cougar is accessibility from an engineering standpoint.

 

[Kelly A]

I recall that KZOK sounded pretty rough around Olympia when they were on the backup site.

Olympia is outside the market anyway. That, and there's no money to be made from there.

 

[davideduardo]

Olympia is outside the market anyway. That, and there's no money to be made from there.

Thurston County is in the Seattle MSA. But it is only about 4.5% of the market population.

 

[fordranger797]

I wouldn't sleep on Thurston County entirely, as there are people who commute there for various state jobs. If anything, this example shows that a backup site isn't perfect, and therefore, the company operating it probably doesn't want to use it any longer than they have to. They're happy if most listeners don't notice a difference.

 

[Kelly A]

I wouldn't sleep on Thurston County entirely, as there are people who commute there for various state jobs. If anything, this example shows that a backup site isn't perfect, and therefore, the company operating it probably doesn't want to use it any longer than they have to. They're happy if most listeners don't notice a difference.

But that's the point; stations based in Seattle likely don't have sales folks selling in Thurston County. Subsequently, if you get zero, or close to zero dollars from a community, it's not any benefit to cover that area in the rare chance you have to operate from a backup site. There's ultimately a cost to covering that non-financially contributing community, which you will likely will never even recover.

 

[davideduardo]

But that's the point; stations based in Seattle likely don't have sales folks selling in Thurston County. Subsequently, if you get zero, or close to zero dollars from a community, it's not any benefit to cover that area in the rare chance you have to operate from a backup site. There's ultimately a cost to covering that non-financially contributing community, which you will likely will never even recover.

On the other hand, it contributes to the number of persons in AQH share/rating, which help to raise rates.

 

[Kelly A]

On the other hand, it contributes to the number of persons in AQH share/rating, which help to raise rates.

It does, but there are also local stations in Thurston County which are all battling it out over a sliver of potential revenue pie within that county.

Getting back to the original premise.. For the few times a station needs to rely on a backup site to cover it's primary market, likely the cost involved with covering (in this example)<4.5% of the area on rare occasions, doesn't pencil out financially. As I mentioned prior, there are no indications that during the WTM multi-station antenna failure, did operating from Cougar Mt. create ratings or financial hardship on stations involved. I think over time it's been proven that the assumption that listeners and advertisers will somehow permanently flee listening/supporting a radio station while operating on a backup site with differences in coverage, is a bogus assumption.

 

[Cobra14]

Thanks for the answers. Well stated. My question was sort of a “what if” scenario, like if the ratings went up substantially when on the backup and then dropped back down when reverting back to the main. If you could track a direct correlation with the aux resulting in better ratings, would you switch to it full time? Like let’s say a whole bunch of people listening could get the aux better because they worked or lived in an area that had better reception from the aux, like that area just west of cougar or south of Renton where tiger sucks and cougar is solid.

 

[Kelly A]

Thanks for the answers. Well stated. My question was sort of a “what if” scenario, like if the ratings went up substantially when on the backup and then dropped back down when reverting back to the main. If you could track a direct correlation with the aux resulting in better ratings, would you switch to it full time? Like let’s say a whole bunch of people listening could get the aux better because they worked or lived in an area that had better reception from the aux, like that area just west of cougar or south of Renton where tiger sucks and cougar is solid.

Too many variables and unknowns to say. For example; a station choosing to move from WTM to Cougar will spend North of $500K in capex equipment, depending on whether they would be joining a multi-user antenna system, or station-specific antenna. And don't forget the lawyers fees and permit costs to get permits from King County to construct a full time/full power site at Cougar. Then there will be rent in the neighborhood of $15K per month after that. So, let's assume the station(s) thought moving would net a million dollar return in the first three years? Based on what? A slight individual ratings increase within a geographic area alone doesn't directly translate to dollars in the door, so in my mind, I can't imagine any broadcaster spending that kind of coin on a partial coverage loss.
To put an exclamation point on the topic; one needs to look only at KUOW and KEXP: Neither station is on Cougar or WTM, have pretty significant coverage holes, yet do very well ratings-wise, in their chosen demo's.

 

[bobdavcav]

Kelly, I was basically going to say the same thing, but you stated it so much better. I will add that if you look at the top stations 6+, there's no difference in stations on Cougar Vs. West Tiger. I've come to believe that there's a certain power level that if you go beyond, you're not going to see a huge increase in your ratings. For Seattle, I'd argue that that's around 8 KW from Cougar. Anything less and even in areas like Edmonds, you get significant hiss in the stereo signal on lower quality radios, but as in the case of 104.5, it's still very much listenable.

 

[fordranger797]

Kelly, I was basically going to say the same thing, but you stated it so much better. I will add that if you look at the top stations 6+, there's no difference in stations on Cougar Vs. West Tiger. I've come to believe that there's a certain power level that if you go beyond, you're not going to see a huge increase in your ratings. For Seattle, I'd argue that that's around 8 KW from Cougar. Anything less and even in areas like Edmonds, you get significant hiss in the stereo signal on lower quality radios, but as in the case of 104.5, it's still very much listenable.

There's an old saying I've heard from engineers in the past: someone who appreciates the content will tune in regardless of the signal quality. Obviously, you're going to run into problems if you sound awful around the market, but 104.5's signal strength is acceptable. I'd be happy if my auxiliary site was the equivalent of 104.5 on Cougar Mountain, but I'd still be making a full effort to get my main transmitter running though.

 

[Kelly A]

There's an old saying I've heard from engineers in the past: someone who appreciates the content will tune in regardless of the signal quality.

Exactly. Especially with streaming options now, content, not OTA signal, is King. A station could have the best coverage on the planet, but if the content isn't popular, it becomes just a waste of utility power.

 

[JackindaBox]

104.5 is K-LOVE which plays Christian Contemporary music…

 

[fordranger797]

104.5 is K-LOVE which plays Christian Contemporary music…

I think in this particular discussion, we’re using 104.5 as an example given that the signal quality and reach is about equivalent to most of the auxiliary sites on cougar.

 

[xmtrland]

104.5 is not a good example of the auxiliary sites at Cougar. Most aux sites on cougar run 50KW ERP. And as budget and time allows some have replaced the older tube backup with a new Solid state rig that can run HD from the Cougar aux site.

 

[Kelly A]

104.5 is not a good example of the auxiliary sites at Cougar. Most aux sites on cougar run 50KW ERP. And as budget and time allows some have replaced the older tube backup with a new Solid state rig that can run HD from the Cougar aux site.

You new here Steve? 104.5 is a typical example around these parts of FM, and KIXI, for AM.