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98.7 is flipping on Friday 1/10 6pm

Jeffrey said:
They certainly seem to be trying to appeal to an older Hispanic audience. Are we in an era where stations are going after older demographics or flipping to religious stations simply because youth is no longer listening to radio?
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It could also be because the younger Hispanics are listening to La Mega. It's one of the highest rated stations in NYC right now.

WSKQ is beating Z100 in 18-34, and tied with them for 18-49.

CTListener said:
The big question is whether it will bill enough to grind out a small profit.
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How is he selling it? He has no ratings track record. He has no sales staff. Who is selling these spots?
 
CTListener said:
How many non radio geeks do that?
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People set presets upon hearing a song they like without thought fairly often. They also hit the skip button to the next station and will listen to something they like until they hear something they don’t. It’s a passive medium, and a decent sized segment of the population isn’t paying much attention. I have a car with 12 FM presets, and I don’t need 12 presets very often, nor do I know anybody who does. FM gets enough dashboard real estate (for now, anyway) that few people have to be selective.

Might be fewer people doing that in New York, however, since public transportation has such high usage, and the dial is already crowded.
 
According to the hourly IDs and press release, 98.7 is supposed to be simulcasting on 1190 WLIB, however WLIB is completely off the air today -- not even a silent carrier like they were a few days before the flip.

And also the RDS info on 98.7 is still saying "TJ 98.7" and listing the format as "Top 40". No Radio Text, artists, or song titles are displayed, just like during TJ.
 
So Emmis is running this format in other Markets & Reading what Jeff Smulyan had to say about it, I’m not sure 🤔 if they are going to subscribe to ratings & give this a legitimate run or Is this another stop gap until Emmis actually sells the Station.
 
Always interest said:
So Emmis is running this format in other Markets & Reading what Jeff Smulyan had to say about it, I’m not sure 🤔 if they are going to subscribe to ratings & give this a legitimate run or Is this another stop gap until Emmis actually sells the Station.
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I was under the impression that Emmis had divested all its other stations except for WEPN and WLIB, which Jeff Smulyan was trying to sell but his asking price was unrealistic, and he couldn't get an offer anywhere near that number. Is that factually inaccurate? Is that a misinterpretation?
 
Weiserguy said:
Jeff Smulyan was trying to sell but his asking price was unrealistic, and he couldn't get an offer anywhere near that number. Is that factually inaccurate? Is that a misinterpretation?
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We have no factual knowledge about anything other than his asking price as of September 2023.

But yes, these are the last two stations, except for an AM (WFNI) in Indianapolis that's silent.
 
Weiserguy said:
I was under the impression that Emmis had divested all its other stations except for WEPN and WLIB, which Jeff Smulyan was trying to sell but his asking price was unrealistic, and he couldn't get an offer anywhere near that number. Is that factually inaccurate? Is that a misinterpretation?
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I’m not sure. If I was sure I wouldn’t be asking
TheBigA said:
As I recall, it took a few days for TJ to get straightened out.



They don't own stations in other markets.
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My mistake I read in Ramp’s article on this . “It was also pointed out that recent launches of similar formats have resulted in significant audience reactions in Miami, Orlando, Austin, Houston, Dallas, and Portland” . After that it Mentions Emmis only has two stations left.
 
Always interest said:
I’m not sure. If I was sure I wouldn’t be asking
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I was trying to answer your original question(s), and asking for a fact check from someone more plugged into the situation, like @BigA. I wouldn't expect you to know the answer, since you asked the question in the first place.
 
Always interest said:
So Emmis is running this format in other Markets & Reading what Jeff Smulyan had to say about it, I’m not sure 🤔 if they are going to subscribe to ratings & give this a legitimate run or Is this another stop gap until Emmis actually sells the Station.
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Every format is a stop gap until the station is sold or another opportunity comes along. The staff and the management just might not be aware of it.

Fresh out of college, the job I was offered didn’t start until August 1. I had almost three months with nothing going on and no money coming in. So, I took a temp job at a warehouse that had already announced it was closing by the end of the year. My first day, the office manager said, “Everybody's a temp. I just was a temp for 23 years.” That's business, and it's definitely the business of radio.
 
Kent said:
People set presets upon hearing a song they like without thought fairly often. They also hit the skip button to the next station and will listen to something they like until they hear something they don’t. It’s a passive medium, and a decent sized segment of the population isn’t paying much attention. I have a car with 12 FM presets, and I don’t need 12 presets very often, nor do I know anybody who does. FM gets enough dashboard real estate (for now, anyway) that few people have to be selective.

Might be fewer people doing that in New York, however, since public transportation has such high usage, and the dial is already crowded.
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I was referring to "flipping around the dial," not setting presets. Just about everyone has presets on their car radios, but how many routinely do band scans? Don't most non-geeks just punch up another preset when they hear a song they don't like or a long stop-set, rather than explore the whole FM band? The only way this new format on 98.7 gains traction, IMO, is if Emmis commits to a large-scale advertising campaign -- TV and outdoor -- to get potential listeners to find, listen to, and save the station.
 
Always interest said:
My mistake I read in Ramp’s article on this . “It was also pointed out that recent launches of similar formats have resulted in significant audience reactions in Miami, Orlando, Austin, Houston, Dallas, and Portland” . After that it Mentions Emmis only has two stations left.
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A variant in Austin gets a 0.7. No significant station in Houston is doing it (and perhaps Huff can verify this). Dallas got zip in last two months. And I do not see one in Portland.

The reference may be to HD channels.
 
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CTListener said:
I was referring to "flipping around the dial," not setting presets. Just about everyone has presets on their car radios, but how many routinely do band scans? Don't most non-geeks just punch up another preset when they hear a song they don't like or a long stop-set, rather than explore the whole FM band?
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I don’t know how common it is, but I don’t think it's rare. Again, it might be a lower percentage in New York, but it probably still happens more than you'd think. You'd be surprised how many people don’t even know how to set a preset (my mother among them).

CTListener said:
The only way this new format on 98.7 gains traction, IMO, is if Emmis commits to a large-scale advertising campaign -- TV and outdoor -- to get potential listeners to find, listen to, and save the station.
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I tend to agree with you here. Whether it's a TV and outdoor campaign or something else, just existing probably isn’t enough. “If you build it, they will come” hasn’t been true in radio for at least the last 10 years.
 
Kent said:
I don’t know how common it is, but I don’t think it's rare. Again, it might be a lower percentage in New York, but it probably still happens more than you'd think. You'd be surprised how many people don’t even know how to set a preset (my mother among them).
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That is an interesting observation. Many years ago when I had a bunch of stations in Ecuador, we had a street crew (actually one guy part time) who went to taxi stands and bus terminals and offered prizes if we could set two buttons on the car radio to our "popular class" stations. We'd give things like gallons of motor oil, coupons for gas stations, etc. The city had 31 bus routes, each with a station at each end. And maybe 100 taxi stands... perhaps more. So every day, he could hit 25 to 50 taxis in an hour or two and as many as a dozen of the small, medium and large busses. We also got them to allow us to put decals in the vehicle windows.

A lot of the drivers did not know how to set the radio. We were "kind enough" to set for other favorite stations that were not direct competitors.
Kent said:
I tend to agree with you here. Whether it's a TV and outdoor campaign or something else, just existing probably isn’t enough. “If you build it, they will come” hasn’t been true in radio for at least the last 10 years.
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It's seldom true unless a station does something to fill a huge hole in a market. When I did the Mega "Rock Nacional" format for Emmis in Argentina, we soft launched and had no promotion ready. But we were the only Argentine rock station, and we had found that as many as a third of all adults would cume it. In the first book, after less than a month on the air, it was #1 with nearly a 19 share.

At that time, there was no widespread internet usage. There was no streaming, and no smartphones. It was 2000, mnot 2025.

We launched Mega at about 11 AM on a Tuesday. When we were too tired to do any more, we went to dinner (restaurants open at 9 PM generally) and grabbed a taxi. The driver was listening, less than 12 hours after the launch. We asked, and he said another driver had discovered the station and spread the word. The station "went viral" in a single day with just word of mouth.
 
Kent said:
Every format is a stop gap until the station is sold or another opportunity comes along. The staff and the management just might not be aware of it.

Fresh out of college, the job I was offered didn’t start until August 1. I had almost three months with nothing going on and no money coming in. So, I took a temp job at a warehouse that had already announced it was closing by the end of the year. My first day, the office manager said, “Everybody's a temp. I just was a temp for 23 years.” That's business, and it's definitely the business of radio.
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It’s really always been the business of radio
 
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