Are Kuhner's Ratings Really That Good?

[Shellanswerman]

Elsewhere on the Boston board, the claim is made the Jeff Kuhner's ratings are sky high. WRKO-AM's overall rating is exactly where it was when WTKK-FM went away, and in the last rating period, the cume was down from earlier this year. Has EVERYTHING ELSE on WRKO tanked, while only Kuher's have been up?

 

[dumber than a box of hair]

Elsewhere on the Boston board, the claim is made the Jeff Kuhner's ratings are sky high. WRKO-AM's overall rating is exactly where it was when WTKK-FM went away, and in the last rating period, the cume was down from earlier this year. Has EVERYTHING ELSE on WRKO tanked, while only Kuher's have been up?

That's the problem with "overall" ratings: you don't get the picture for an individual show.

Kuhner is #1 in men 55+ (the typical demo for that format) in both the August and September monthlies. Worthless demo to most advertisers, true, but those numbers are far better than those of his predecessors.

 

[TSBench]

That's the problem with "overall" ratings: you don't get the picture for an individual show.

Kuhner is #1 in men 55+ (the typical demo for that format) in both the August and September monthlies. Worthless demo to most advertisers, true, but those numbers are far better than those of his predecessors.

Not exactly useless, and time is on the side of the older-skewing stations. The main problem isn't that the older demos are bad advertising targets, it's that few have figured out how to pitch them. They better figure it out soon, unless their prime customer is a 23 year old busboy working 29 hours a week at Chili's.

Five years from now, I think I'd rather be a salesman at WBZ or WRKO than Jam'n.

Regards,
TSB

 

[vmorrison2]

I looked at Kuhners 18 to 34 year and 25 to 54 demos in adults, men and woman and I can assure you they are dreadful. Frank FM in New Hampshire and WERS has more Boston metro listeners than he has. You only have to listen to who his sponsors are to see how difficult it is to sell his show. How many major market stations with decent ratings run PSA's between 8a and-9a? RKO does. Years ago, I sold an AM station that had big 35 + numbers and a huge TSL. The agencies wouldn't return a phone call.

Kuhner has cornered the market on angry white men over 55 who want a steady of diet of Obama is a foreign born Socialist who wants to destroy the country.

I also heard from a friend who works at Guest Street that Kuhner's salary is about 70K a year. Since Kuhner is not bringing in any major advertisers and the cost per spot on RKO is pretty cheep I doubt he will be seeing a big raise or bonus anytime soon.

 

[TSBench]

..........I looked at Kuhners 18 to 34 year and 25 to 54 demos in adults, men and woman and I can assure you they are dreadful.........

The devil you say! Any station that is strongest 55+ is going to suck, and then suck more, the younger the age cell gets, That's kinda how it works (unless you're Air America, where the demos sucked everywhere). I can't think of one non-sports issue-oriented talk station that is strong in all the cells 18+, and trying to program one to that end is a fool's errand.

I haven't seen a rating book in years, but I would think that Magic probably has the broadest appeal, and that's mostly in women.

But the day of the younger demos being golden is coming to an end. The math just doesn't work anymore, and the technological landscape is going to become increasingly unfriendly . Of course, the older-skewing stations are going to have to get sharper in pitching the older demos, but until the advertisers figure out the marketing and advertising strategies the stations aren't entirely the masters of their own fates.

.......Years ago, I sold an AM station that had big 35 + numbers and a huge TSL. The agencies wouldn't return a phone call......

Me, too. I guess they may have been busy returning mine.

Regards,
TSB

 

[vmorrison2]

...

Me, too. I guess they may have been busy returning mine.

Regards,
TSB[/QUOTE]

Maybe I should have said we only had 55+ numbers. The Ad agencies correctly or incorrectly believe that after a certain age peoples buying decisions have been cemented and you can't get them to change their buying patterns.

You can make money with an older demo. I made a very nice living selling that station with the older demos. But the AE"s that sold the FM sister station made twice as much as I did.

I enjoy ME TV and Cozi TV which is owned buy NBC. You would think that that Cable network has access to the best research. Just look at who their sponsors are. 90% are PI's.

 

[nowradioguy]

Not exactly useless, and time is on the side of the older-skewing stations. The main problem isn't that the older demos are bad advertising targets, it's that few have figured out how to pitch them. They better figure it out soon, unless their prime customer is a 23 year old busboy working 29 hours a week at Chili's.

Five years from now, I think I'd rather be a salesman at WBZ or WRKO than Jam'n.

Regards,
TSB

I'd really like to go along with this, viz, that time is on the side of the older-skewing stations. If that is the case, as you suspect, then why did WODS and WTKK get blown up?

 

[TSBench]

I'd really like to go along with this, viz, that time is on the side of the older-skewing stations. If that is the case, as you suspect, then why did WODS and WTKK get blown up?

Don't know why those stations were blown up. Owners work in strange ways.

By 2017. more than half the US population will be over the age of 50 (and growing), and will control 70% of all discretionary income.
As Willie Sutton famously replied when asked why he robbed banks, "because that's where the money is."

The biggest problem, as I see it, is not that stations can't sell the older demos, or clients sell into them, but that neither understand them because they regard everybody outside the money demo as monolithic (which is obviously wrong and apparent to anyone who thinks about it for 2 minutes.} So the clients stay ignorant, and unimaginative salespeople buy into the myths and poor spot sales become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Regards,
TSB

 

[nowradioguy]

Don't know why those stations were blown up. Owners work in strange ways.

By 2017. more than half the US population will be over the age of 50 (and growing), and will control 70% of all discretionary income.
As Willie Sutton famously replied when asked why he robbed banks, "because that's where the money is."

The biggest problem, as I see it, is not that stations can't sell the older demos, or clients sell into them, but that neither understand them because they regard everybody outside the money demo as monolithic (which is obviously wrong and apparent to anyone who thinks about it for 2 minutes.} So the clients stay ignorant, and unimaginative salespeople buy into the myths and poor spot sales become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Regards,
TSB

I believe you're correct. It's an unfortunate intersection of ignorant clients and unimaginative salespeople who regard those of us in the 55+ demo as too set in our ways to be open to ads on the radio. And given the merciless way they pull programming (FM Talk) or formats ("oldies", not "classic hits"!) we like right out from under us, we might as well be non-existent

 

[CTListener]

I believe you're correct. It's an unfortunate intersection of ignorant clients and unimaginative salespeople who regard those of us in the 55+ demo as too set in our ways to be open to ads on the radio. And given the merciless way they pull programming (FM Talk) or formats ("oldies", not "classic hits"!) we like right out from under us, we might as well be non-existent

Do you rush off to Taco Bell every time they put a new ingredient in a taco? Spend hours entering code numbers from Coke bottle caps into a website in hopes of winning "swag"? Download Katy Perry or Pitbull ringtones? Or do you consider all that stuff stupid and pointless? That's the kind of "new" and "exciting" stuff Corporate America is pushing to the most gullible demo -- 18 to 34. That's where the money is: Convince the people who are most likely to spend money on (or charge) fad items to spend on something new as frequently as possible just to keep up with their peers. It's easy-peasy, compared to having to make a convincing case for a new product of substance to the 55+ crowd, who are more likely to demand something that will last. We may become a super-majority demographically, but the money -- especially with easy credit -- will always be easier to pry away from the young and gullible. Madison Avenue has been selling crap to kids and young adults for decades and there's no good business reason for that crass, cynical attitude to change.

 

[Shellanswerman]

I recall reading a story on page one of the Marketing section of the Wall Street Journal a few years about Unilever's plans to market a brand of cologne to teenage boys, a product now called Axe(tm). They had marketed a product like this in Europe, but there was a perceived antipathy by American teenage boys to any kind of perfume. It took a few years, but millions of kids wouldn't think of going to a rave without dousing themselves in this stuff.

 

[TSBench]

Do you rush off to Taco Bell every time they put a new ingredient in a taco? Spend hours entering code numbers from Coke bottle caps into a website in hopes of winning "swag"? Download Katy Perry or Pitbull ringtones? Or do you consider all that stuff stupid and pointless? That's the kind of "new" and "exciting" stuff Corporate America is pushing to the most gullible demo -- 18 to 34. That's where the money is: Convince the people who are most likely to spend money on (or charge) fad items to spend on something new as frequently as possible just to keep up with their peers. It's easy-peasy, compared to having to make a convincing case for a new product of substance to the 55+ crowd, who are more likely to demand something that will last. We may become a super-majority demographically, but the money -- especially with easy credit -- will always be easier to pry away from the young and gullible. Madison Avenue has been selling crap to kids and young adults for decades and there's no good business reason for that crass, cynical attitude to change.

Well, the lower age demos are getting less populous and it will take decades to reverse that trend, even if we started a baby boom next week. Maintaining a constant share of a shrinking age demo eventually gets you CPM squeezed with the major advertisers. Plus, besides being prey to the latest and greatest from Taco Bell (Kee-rist, I find it distressing that anyone actually eats there) they are also the ones who are susceptible to figuring out they can program their own 'greatest hits', commercial-free station on their MP3 player or cell phone.
As mentioned, in 4 years half the popultion will be over 50 and will control 70% (4 TRILLION dollars) of the country's disposable income. The Boston Consulting Group has already started a consultancy for teaching companies how to pitch 50+, P&G has started a brain-storming marketing team to figure out how to sell packaged goods to the oldsters, and Jeff Bezos, everyone's idea of a pretty smart salesman, is setting up a special section of Amazon for 55+ consumers and stocking the shelves with an initial 1/4 million items.
The myths about the older demos are slowly being debunked. But, as you say, there will always be a market for kids and young adults (who can be pitched almost solely on price, since they're the most price-conscious demos), but ignoring the growing older demos will leave a lot of money on the table, or in the wallet of innovative merchants like Jeff Bezos.

Regards,
TSB

 

[WNTIRadio]

Okay, the myth is that 55+ is not easily influenced by advertising, not that they don't buy things. My mom buys a lot of stuff, but she is pretty set in her ways.

The question is, has the, or will the, 55+ generation change their buying patterns and be more influenced by advertising. Agencies and locals aren't going to place ads to a large, but ineffective, audience.

We do see that 55+ supports public radio due to the disposable income they generally have, and the direct connection to the product. There is some underwriting, but most of it on large public radio stations and NPR is image based, not results based. It's also preaching to the choir for many of the products/services.

Amazon isn't really a good barometer of how the 55+ react to advertising. QVC did the same thing 20 years ago.

 

[TSBench]

........Okay, the myth is that 55+ is not easily influenced by advertising, not that they don't buy things. My mom buys a lot of stuff, but she is pretty set in her ways.......

The myth is brand loyalty. The BCG studies show that, today, this is blown out of all proportion to the point of unrecognizability. Your mom may be set in her ways (as applies to everyone in some respects) but my family always drove Buicks from the time WW2 ended until the late 1980s. When my mother died at the age of 90, her bought-new Lexis was in her garage. You pitch the 50+ crowd on quality and convenience, the younger demos on price and 'coolness.' Ad agencies almost always look for the path of least resistance, which is usually price.

............... The question is, has the, or will the, 55+ generation change their buying patterns and be more influenced by advertising. Agencies and locals aren't going to place ads to a large, but ineffective, audience.............

Every survey ever taken shows that absolutely NOBODY will admit to being influenced by advertising, evidently trying to impress the survey taker with how they're too effing smart to be hoodwinked by those hucksters on Madison Avenue. Of course, this is BS. The problem isn't that the older demos can't be successfully pitched, it's that precious few companies have figured out how.

The absolute classic example of this can be seen in a couple of television advertising campaigns. The dumbest advertising campaign in history, bar none, one that makes New Coke look like pet rocks, belongs to Oldsmobile. Olds' core buyer was 50+, and they were seeing market share in those demos being eroded by their 'brand loyalists' switching to the high-end Japanese and German rides. Rather than slug it out with the foreign badges, they decided to shoot for the younger crowd, and came up with "It's Not Your Father's Oldsmobile", thereby in one stroke, alienating their core buyer by denigrating him while trying to sell expensive Detroit iron to kids and young families up to their eyeballs in mortgage payments and college tuition savings plans and who couldn't be pried out of their Corollas and Hondas with a crowbar. I believe Oldsmobiles are now found in museums.

The brilliant campaign, in my mind, is for the new Cadillac ATS, which is as close to a production line performance vehicle as you'll find from an American manufacturer. Cadillac had the second oldest customer base in the industry, with only, IIRC, Lincoln being older. Their new television ads feature a couple of 30-something car nuts holding on to their seats and yelling awestruck as the car rockets across the Morrocan desert or Pantagonian plain. This marketing does what smart marketing is supposed to...selling an appealing lifestyle, which can be yours for 50 grand. Cadillac is giving the 30-50ish crowd that has a few bucks an alternative to that Lexis, Mercedes, or Beemer, but remembering their core consumer by letting them know that you can continue to stick with Caddie and still be one of the Kool Kids.

......... We do see that 55+ supports public radio due to the disposable income they generally have, and the direct connection to the product. There is some underwriting, but most of it on large public radio stations and NPR is image based, not results based. It's also preaching to the choir for many of the products/services........

Those 55+ NPR/PBS contributors are listening and watching in nice homes, with upscale furniture, top-of-the-line appliances, stereos, and televisions, with expensive automobiles parked out front. Somebody sold them that stuff, and they didn't have it when they were 35. Radio advertising is most effective when it is local. It is up to the marketeers at the manufactures, distributors, and importers to craft the image and create the demand. A lot of folks sell that stuff. They idea of local ads is to convince the consumer that they should buy it at their location.



.........Amazon isn't really a good barometer of how the 55+ react to advertising. QVC did the same thing 20 years ago......

I wasn't referring to advertising when I cited Amazon. I was using it as an example of somebody who understands there is a valuable, underserved market.

QVC and the home shopping channels had customers with income demos almost as bad as their taste. They sold overpriced merchandise that was often crap that had died in normal retail channels. Their genius was that they sold it on 'price' while actually charging higher prices than could be found elsewhere. They also created entire new industries. I knew one guy who, during the home shopping heyday, was impressed by the long lines at the Post Office made up of a seemingly endless line of folks in overalls and 'designer sweats' returning stuff to HSN and QVC. He got a Mail Boxes USA franchise, advertised on the local cable channel, and paid his rent for a couple of years on home shopping returns.

Amazon knows where the money is, sees a market, and rushes to fill it. It also sells current, available in the usual retail channels, merchandise of decent enough quality to include legit customer reviews you can read before you push the button. IIRC, the usual endorsement on QVC was some gushing woman, who had just paid $1200 bucks (just 4 easy payments) for a previous generation computer available on Buy.com for $375, telling the hostess how great her manicure looked. Chances our she wasn't driving to her PO box in an Infiniti. And did you ever notice that it was the same group of people who bought stuff over and over. They lived off repeaters. Hell, watch one of the 'hoarding' cable shows and see how much of that clutter was courtesy of QVC.

My point isn't that everyone over 50 or 55 is sitting at home eating caviar while reading Cat Fancier magazine. It is that it is the one demo that is in for long haul growth, has money, is no more brand loyal than anyone else, and is susceptible to good advertising. The idea is to create good advertising, and have people that know how to sell it.

Regards,
TSB

 

[CTListener]

.
The brilliant campaign, in my mind, is for the new Cadillac ATS, which is as close to a production line performance vehicle as you'll find from an American manufacturer. Cadillac had the second oldest customer base in the industry, with only, IIRC, Lincoln being older. Their new television ads feature a couple of 30-something car nuts holding on to their seats and yelling awestruck as the car rockets across the Morrocan desert or Pantagonian plain. This marketing does what smart marketing is supposed to...selling an appealing lifestyle, which can be yours for 50 grand. Cadillac is giving the 30-50ish crowd that has a few bucks an alternative to that Lexis, Mercedes, or Beemer, but remembering their core consumer by letting them know that you can continue to stick with Caddie and still be one of the Kool Kids.

Caddy has had cred with younger consumers ever since Escalades started appearing in rap videos, and on the street with those pounding hip-hop beats thumping out from behind the tinted glass.

As for brand loyalty, hasn't it been shown that NASCAR fans will blindly support any product whose name/logo appears on their favorite driver's car? ("If Tide is good enough for Jeff Gordon's clothes, that's what I'm gonna use!") Or is that a myth as well?

 

[Oldbones]

...... Olds' core buyer was 50+, and they were seeing market share in those demos being eroded by their 'brand loyalists' switching to the high-end Japanese and German rides. Rather than slug it out with the foreign badges, they decided to shoot for the younger crowd, and came up with "It's Not Your Father's Oldsmobile", thereby in one stroke, alienating their core buyer by denigrating him while trying to sell expensive Detroit iron to kids and young families up to their eyeballs in mortgage payments and college tuition savings plans and who couldn't be pried out of their Corollas and Hondas with a crowbar. I believe Oldsmobiles are now found in museums.

So how would YOU have handled that situation?

Interesting to note that Toyota seems to be doing the exact same thing with the Corrola (another old lady car)...targeting it's marketing towards Gen-Y'ers. As confounding as their ad campaigns are (I totally don't get the backwards truck ad), they seem to be effective...if they thought the future was in 55+, why would they be pushing bluetooth connectivity and I-gadget compatibility?

 

[TSBench]

......................As for brand loyalty, hasn't it been shown that NASCAR fans will blindly support any product whose name/logo appears on their favorite driver's car? ("If Tide is good enough for Jeff Gordon's clothes, that's what I'm gonna use!") Or is that a myth as well?......................

NASCAR fans seem to have their own demo. But this sounds more like loyalty to drivers...if it's good enough for Jeff Gordon, it's good enough for me. If Jeff changes sponsors to BOLD laundry detergent, you'd expect those influenced by his sponsors to shift their loyalty to BOLD. There's a reason companies fork over millions to turn racing drivers' flame suits and hoods into billboards.

You can argue that brand loyalty today is like brand loyalty in 1965. It ain't true.

Regards,
TSB

 

[TSBench]

.......Caddy has had cred with younger consumers ever since Escalades started appearing in rap videos, and on the street with those pounding hip-hop beats thumping out from behind the tinted glass.......

What's the joke about the Escalade....big enough to comfortably seat the driver and 5 fully armed passengers?

Those videos may have given Cadillac cred with youngsters, but they're not buying them. The average age of an Escalade buyer is still over 50, and the younger buyers tend to be the performers in the videos, celebrities, and young professional jocks, a very untypical market. The Lincoln Navigator seems to be the vehicle taking the biggest hit, and it was flavor-of-the-month for that demo just a couple of years ago.

The rap connection cred has had an effect; the Escalade has a black buyers profile TRIPLE the usual Cadillac share of the black car buying market in general, but even that seems to be at least middle aged. It's nice to have, but Caddie has to keep the older market to make serious money.

Regards,
TSB

 

[TSBench]

.........So how would YOU have handled that situation?.........

I would have cherry picked media and pitched tradition, comfort, and quality to the customer base and pitch the smaller mid-sized vehicles to the younger set using a 'value', quality at a price, strategy. I wouldn't have gone out of my way to piss off my loyalists. I might have spruced up the design of the lower end vehicles to give them a little pizzazz. Of course, if I positively knew the right answer, I would be typing this reply from my villa in Nice before heading off with the wife to the Monte Carlo casino for a relaxing night.

........... Interesting to note that Toyota seems to be doing the exact same thing with the Corrola (another old lady car)...targeting it's marketing towards Gen-Y'ers. As confounding as their ad campaigns are (I totally don't get the backwards truck ad), they seem to be effective...if they thought the future was in 55+, why would they be pushing bluetooth connectivity and I-gadget compatibility?......

The Corolla has been redesigned for greater appeal to the young. The Corolla is the largest selling car in the history of the auto industry, so it's not surprizing it appeals to folks who grew old looking at and driving them. Also, the Corolla is far and away the 2nd car of choice for older, two-car families. Toyota is walking a fine line here. They need to make the Corolla sexy, and cheap, enough to spark interest in the younger set without losing the older buyers. The revamped design doesn't seem radical enough to turn off the 50+ set, and I doubt you'll see Toyota running any 'this isn't grandma's Corolla' ads anytime soon.

Of course, the marketing and branding of the car is the responsibility of the manufacturer and lead advertising agency. Since Toyota dealerships are all over the landscape, and model for model the cars are essentially commodities, the purpose of local radio ads is to convince every buyer, young and old, why shopping at ABC dealership, instead of XYZ dealership in the next town, is the wise move.
In the case of the Toyota Corolla, this will sprinkle ads across all the demo cells if the salespeople do their job.

Regards,
TSB

 

[nowradioguy]

This thread on "the Kuhner man" has devolved into one on advertising demographics, simply because someone stated that Kuhner's appeal is to listeners 55+.

The posts on demographics and the various products mentioned therein should be moved to another thread.