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Another Salary Question

While internet streaming doesn't have the licensing and capital hurdles that over-the-air broadcasting has, it does have its own expenses. And unlike AM or FM, where the costs to run the transmitter are fixed and don't change based on the number of listeners, the costs of internet broadcasting are variable. Each listener consumes bandwidth; if you're a music broadcaster, each listener also adds a cost for licensing.

An internet station with 1,000 or 2,000 or 5,000 or 10,000 simultaneous listeners -- like stations in this market will see over the air -- will rack up terabytes of transfer a month. If such a station is to be self-sustaining, it either needs a sales person or department, or public-radio style development efforts. National internet-only radio sales is pretty much non-existent at this point.

The barrier to entry for running a station with a few listeners is small, but to compete with on-air broadcasters in a specific market, the costs will not be trivial. More success is likely to be seen in a "long tail" approach: finding a niche and grabbing a few listeners in each market.
 
Ed Trefzger said:
While internet streaming doesn't have the licensing and capital hurdles that over-the-air broadcasting has, it does have its own expenses. And unlike AM or FM, where the costs to run the transmitter are fixed and don't change based on the number of listeners, the costs of internet broadcasting are variable. Each listener consumes bandwidth; if you're a music broadcaster, each listener also adds a cost for licensing.

An internet station with 1,000 or 2,000 or 5,000 or 10,000 simultaneous listeners -- like stations in this market will see over the air -- will rack up terabytes of transfer a month. If such a station is to be self-sustaining, it either needs a sales person or department, or public-radio style development efforts. National internet-only radio sales is pretty much non-existent at this point.

The barrier to entry for running a station with a few listeners is small, but to compete with on-air broadcasters in a specific market, the costs will not be trivial. More success is likely to be seen in a "long tail" approach: finding a niche and grabbing a few listeners in each market.
Click to expand...

Internet streaming can also be complicated. For example I can't tell you the number of times streaming just stops and I have to reboot again and again in order for it to start up. It could be the server here at work or so many people are streaming it's slowing down the process.
Also take into consideration that many of us, including myself, travel a lot and streaming the internet is not an option. So I guess people like me have to depend on the car radio. Unfortunately when you travel across Western New York and the Southern Tier, you would be surprised how many different stations carrying the same programs or formats.
 
AndrewLawson said:
An earlier thread was dedicated to the question of salaries of the highest paid performers, mostly morning shows, in Buffalo and Rochester radio.

With the recent layoffs in Buffalo radio, what are the average salaries of midday, afternoon and night jocks?

What is the pay scale for weekend and part time jocks? I presume they are paid at an hourly rate?
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Yes It's hourly for PT/weekends at 8.75 an hour.No holiday pay, no benefits.Also if the company wants to cut down their expenses, the PTimers are the first to go.Now,they are hiring less weekenders and PT choosing to automate rather than hiring,maybe it should work here the same as in the other major businesses.Why don't they cut the people on the top,instead of us poor people at the bottom.I would love to see Janet Snyder and Norton get knocked down a bit, so they can really feel what it's like to be at the bottom.
 
"WiFi radio need not require huge initial investments. Starting small and expanding in small steps would be highly feasible, unlike over-the-air service in which transmission enhancements require non-trivial capital investments and regulatory clearance."

People overestimate the amount of money it takes to get a broadcast license and build a broadcast radio station (existing stations with 24/7 licenses and decent coverage footprints can often be bought reasonably in reasonably sizable medium markets), and underestimate the amount of up-front cash it takes to build a talent roster and market your service to both listeners and advertisers as you start to cultivate an audience. The latter group of expenses--the talent and the marketing/promotion/sales effort--are going to be the same, and are going to be considerable, whether or not you're going conventional or WiFi. In fact, marketing cost might be much higher for WiFi because you have to help convince people to get the equipment and develop an installed receiver base on top of recruiting potential listeners. In conventional radio, the receiver base already exists and you can use your own signal on top of other marketing efforts to reinforce your promotional message and encourage more TSL.
 
Gently Down The Stream

The simple fact is that getting an Internet station up and streaming is quite inexpensive. The expenses mount as the number of listeners mount - more listeners require more bandwidth, better servers, and higher fees. Meanwhile, ad revenue (either audio or "banner" type video) should increase proportionally with the number of listeners, and ideally would more than offset the additional expenses.
 
Meanwhile, ad revenue (either audio or "banner" type video) should increase proportionally with the number of listeners, and ideally would more than offset the additional expenses.
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And one more thing.....wouldn't the number of listeners be much easier to count? It seems it could be measured, as opposed to estimated. Small stations especially should benefit, as the statistics of small groups are notoriously prone to error.
 
On-Line Listening Estimates

listener-in said:
And one more thing.....wouldn't the number of listeners be much easier to count? It seems it could be measured, as opposed to estimated. Small stations especially should benefit, as the statistics of small groups are notoriously prone to error.
Click to expand...

As Counselor Savage has posted, listening statistics are much more reliable. There are some gray areas. For example, most website statistics tell you how many unique IP addresses connected to your site, or your stream, and for how long. What you can't determine as easily is whether that IP address was a single listener, or a router that connected hundreds or even thousands of people to the Internet. It's very possible that on-line listening is being under-reported for that reason. That's one reason that many radio stations attempt to require players that log in and register each individual listener, either overtly or covertly.

Either way, it's likely more reliable than Arbitron "estimates" - especially, as you say, in small markets.
 
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