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AM Radio

M

MarioMania

What is the status of AM Radio in the US??

I know most of the stuff on the AM band is useless..besides news/talk & sports

Music would not come back to AM, Well not music like on CHR Station's

The last great station on AM was the Big 610 KFRC
 
MarioMania said:
What is the status of AM Radio in the US??

I know most of the stuff on the AM band is useless..besides news/talk & sports

Music would not come back to AM, Well not music like on CHR Station's

The last great station on AM was the Big 610 KFRC
Click to expand...

This probably belongs on the Coast-to-Coast board instead of the Community Radio board, but here goes...

Outside of the Class A 50 kW blowtorches and maybe 2 or 3 other stations per market, AM is all but toast. The technical issues (getting rid of IBOC and the NRSC mask, among others) are fixable if the FCC wants to do it (Watch out for those flying pigs!), but if there's not enough audience willing to listen even after a station is made to sound good, why bother?

85% of the radio audience is listening to FM. Even news/talk and sports formats are migrating to FM now. You have to go where the listeners are and where the money is. For the most part they ain't on AM. For every WBBM or KFI, there are 10 (more?) smaller stations that don't cover their market and are in danger of failing. Again, there are exceptions, but they are, what, 20-25% of those AMs on the air today.
 
Yes, this is probably the wrong forum for the question, but we can deal with it. Most of the responses address metropolitan markets, multi-station markets. Yes, for an AM to survive there it needs a niche.

COMMUNITY RADIO usually addresses small markets or identifiable unique neighborhoods or communities inside a larger metro market. If you can identify or isolate a community where people there seem themselves as a "community", a "tribe" if you please, then technology is not as big an issue. AM radio may serve the need exceedingly well.

If you are in a market like Chicago, and you have an AM station that can never work its way up past 18th or 15th in the ratings, your days may be numbered unless you can find some group of people within your coverage area that have something that bonds them together: They are all of one ethnic group, or they are all fans of the same baseballl team, or they have a religious preference in common (and few people with that same religious preference live outside the coverage area of the station) then maybe you can be "community radio" hiding under the skirts of the metro market which will basically ignore your station.

Maybe some cream will rise to the top and a group of AM owners can organize and do a sell-job on the FCC that a definition of community oriented broadcasting could be established, and AM stations that fit the definition could be given some favorable climate in which to operate. To be successful, the definition and the rules would probably have to limit these community stations from churning up the waters where the traditional radio stations trawl their nets for audience and revenue.
 
AM radio can work. Look for a format and run with it. I head a group that runs a sports format in a 120+ Market. Can it work? You bet. Is it easy. NO WAY.

We run 6 1/2 hours of local programming a day. We sell like our life depends on it. (Because it does.) and currently, Clear Channel's AM is the only AM who beats us in the market. Because we HAVE to succeed. The #2 news talker in town dropped their legacy morning show 6 months ago. This is true I swear. They dropped them at 9:15 after their show on Friday. We, who had already been courting them, had a verbal by 11:15 and then signed by Monday. A week to get prepared and 10 days later they were OTA with us. 60 days later, the competition was running Mancow and PSA's. We had doubled our revenue. Now they've flipped their daypart AGAIN. They're running long form TRN News. We're up 350% in billing. They're advertising for a new morning show. Other dayparts are better for us too. Good lead in's help.

Our talent loves it here.
Our new advertisers love it here.
and the latest book shows our audience (who was mostly THEIR audience) loves it here too. (Did I mention we love translators?)

Is FM better? You bet your Bippy!. Does AM Work?.. No doubt. That's why we promote ourselves as


Sportsradio your Town. XX.XFM And XXX.XFM in the city. KXXX-AM across the region and around the world on XXXX.Com.

With the utmost deference to WWL. :)


If you really get it then FIGHT IT. No one should care more about your town than You. As we say... "We are locally owned and locally run". .As we advertise... "Our competition is in a hurry to RUSH your money out of town.." We are locally owned and locally operated..

If you want something easy to do, become a currency trader. If you love radio, find an angle and get to work.

It's not a golden goose, But there is an opportunity

Clouseau
 
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