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At many News/Talk AMs, "It's a Solid Gold Weekend!"

H

Holland Cooke

"It's a Solid Gold Weekend!"

Sounds retro, eh? Why not! Many of today’s News/Talk AM stations were once Top 40 stations, back in the vinyl era. These stations may not play music any more. But smart ones have swapped weekend oldies for weekend GOLD...the real kind.

At many News/Talk stations, only morning drive is a bigger money-maker than weekends, thanks to how-to shows. Some of these shows are paid programming, brokered hours in-which the presenter doesn’t even keep commercial inventory.

And advertiser-friendly weekend Talk programming does NOT -- repeat, NOT -- have to be audience tear gas.

Some specialty shows are audience favorites, and that can only help weekday listening. On the other hand, I’ve seen stations with shoddy weekend programming do poorly on Mondays in day-by-day Arbitron numbers. Some weekend shows are well-produced, others sound horrendous. Many otherwise-respectable stations sound like hell on the weekend, as though they’re on auto-pilot. I actually read an Arbitron diary comment that said, "On the weekend, it sounds like they think nobody is listening."

If you'll be attending the NAB Radio Show in Dallas, look in your registration bag for my special report on weekend News/Talk programming. You will read strategy, tactics, production tips, Sales wrinkles...AND my specific recommendations, shows I consider Talk radio's weekend "A" list.

If you won't be in Dallas, download your free copy @ http://www.HollandCooke.com/weekendgold.pdf

Holland Cooke
News/Talk Specialist
McVay Media
www.HollandCooke.com
 
NJ101.5 is a talk station which plays Oldies every weekend.
They also play lots of spots every weekend.
Their weekend playlist clearly targets the same demographic segments as their weekday talk programming.
Best of all, no preachers. No bowl cleanse infomericals. No financial services infomercials passed off as talk shows.
It seems a complimentary weekend format is something more talk stations should consider.
No, weekend talk programming does not have to be "audience tear gas" (great line), but it often is. Mainly because it's easier to take the money and run whatever advice talk/infomercial somebody with an open checkbook wants to do. Can't blame stations completely. The audience for talk stations dries up on weekends. Now the chicken and eqq question: Does poor audience numbers mean poor programming or does poor programming mean poor audience numbers?
 
RE "the chicken and eqq question"

fred flintstone said:
Does poor audience numbers mean poor programming or does poor programming mean poor audience numbers?
Click to expand...

The latter.

And here's the problem with reversing the former: Once you chase-away weekend audience with those insultingly-fake-sounding "talk show" infomercials about colon cleansing products, it's REAL hard to get 'em back, should the station later decide to program weekends more-diligently.
 
SPAM???Re: At many News/Talk AMs, "It's a Solid Gold Weekend!"

WOW Nice commercial. Did you have to pay for this advertisment?

Holland Cooke said:
"It's a Solid Gold Weekend!"

Sounds retro, eh? Why not! Many of today’s News/Talk AM stations were once Top 40 stations, back in the vinyl era. These stations may not play music any more. But smart ones have swapped weekend oldies for weekend GOLD...the real kind.

At many News/Talk stations, only morning drive is a bigger money-maker than weekends, thanks to how-to shows. Some of these shows are paid programming, brokered hours in-which the presenter doesn’t even keep commercial inventory.

And advertiser-friendly weekend Talk programming does NOT -- repeat, NOT -- have to be audience tear gas.

Some specialty shows are audience favorites, and that can only help weekday listening. On the other hand, I’ve seen stations with shoddy weekend programming do poorly on Mondays in day-by-day Arbitron numbers. Some weekend shows are well-produced, others sound horrendous. Many otherwise-respectable stations sound like hell on the weekend, as though they’re on auto-pilot. I actually read an Arbitron diary comment that said, "On the weekend, it sounds like they think nobody is listening."

If you'll be attending the NAB Radio Show in Dallas, look in your registration bag for my special report on weekend News/Talk programming. You will read strategy, tactics, production tips, Sales wrinkles...AND my specific recommendations, shows I consider Talk radio's weekend "A" list.

If you won't be in Dallas, download your free copy @ http://www.HollandCooke.com/weekendgold.pdf

Holland Cooke
News/Talk Specialist
McVay Media
www.HollandCooke.com
Click to expand...
 
It's great to have you on this board, HC, because it allows me to take your ideas down to your face.

Any station that makes more money breaking format with weekend "pay for play" shows than it does during the week with its regular talk lineup is in the wrong format. To use your logic, they should go pay-for-play
seven days a week. Just think how much more they could command for Tuesday at 7 a.m. versus Saturday
at 11 a.m.

Some stations manage to make their "how to" blocks on the weekend marginally entertaining. WDBO in Orlando is a good example with its "Ask the Experts" segments. At most stations, there's nobody around to hand-hold or "teach" the "talent" radio. So the "experts" drone on in a fog.

Yes, you could make "advertiser friendly" radio listener friendly, by having good producers, a strong PD, and maybe a co-host to sit in and help the handymen communicate. But if you're going to all that trouble, why
not just develop local weekend shows to give back the connection to the community that you lose with all that weekday Rush-Sean-Glenn-Neal-Laura I-Savage syndication?

Talk is the only format where it is considered completely acceptable to change format on the weekends.
A rival consultant has plenty to say about this, but I won't post a link, because I'm not going to give him a free commercial. But please continue, HC, to share with us your success stories from blowtorch WKZO in Kalamazoo and how conservative news-talk should sound like "Regis and Kelly."

The most "advertiser friendly" station is the one with the highest ratings.
 
RE "It's great to have you on this board, HC"

<< It's great to have you on this board, HC, because it allows me to take your ideas down to your face.>>

It's always impressive to hear statements-that-bold from an anonymous poster.
Feel free to include your resume with future retorts.

<< The most "advertiser friendly" station is the one with the highest ratings. >>

At least we know you're not a station owner.
Probably not someone who has to make a payroll anywhere.

I cooled on your highest-ratings theory in the mid-90s, when several owners -- mostly in medium markets, in various regions -- were using me to flip AMs from Nostalgia to News/Talk. They were exiting 4,5,6-AQH 12+ shares. And the sound bite I kept hearing was "nobody wants to buy it, and nobody wants to sell it."

My point is that a point is not a point.
Ask a station owner about "indexing."
Some formats index-higher/lower than their audience share.
Meaning that one share point delivers more/less than 1% of the market's radio revenue.

As a format, News/Talk, for instance, tends to index greater than its ratings.
Some non-music AMs deliver nearly-two-percent-of market revenue for every P12+ share point.
For two reasons:
1. QUALITY: Audience data on News/Talk is second-only to Classical, which has fewer listeners.
2. QUANTITY: News/Talk stations can run more spots than any sane music station would.

<< Any station that makes more money breaking format with weekend "pay for play" shows than it does during the week with its regular talk lineup is in the wrong format.>>

I SURE DO AGREE that lots of those pay-for-play shows are hurting ratings.
Any station that plays those Colon Blow half-hours can toast in ratings hell.

But there are plenty of poor shows done by station employees.
And some paid shows that are quite good.
The distinction is inside baseball.
Listeners don't sort that way.
If it's engaging they'll listen; if it's not, they won't.
Listeners know that programming is sponsored.
They don't care whether it's sponsored by the minute or the hour.
HOW A SHOW SOUNDS is what matters.

And as for "breaking the format on the weekened," there's PLENTY of precedent.
The most-listened-to FM Talk station in the USA plays music on the weekend.

<< Yes, you could make "advertiser friendly" radio listener friendly, by having good producers, a strong PD, and maybe a co-host to sit in and help the handymen communicate. But if you're going to all that trouble, why not just develop local weekend shows to give back the connection to the community that you lose with all that weekday Rush-Sean-Glenn-Neal-Laura I-Savage syndication? >>

You touch on several issues:

1. There is genuinely less DEMAND for the issue-oriented "I'm-right-you're-wrong" shows like Limbaugh/Savage/et al on the weekend. Admittedly, some of that is cause-effect. The availability of weekend-how-to-programming is greater than the availability of fresh issue-oriented shows.

2. There are fewer issues to orient on the weekend. There's more news during the week. Talking about, for intance, home improvement, on the weekend is more-relevant-to many listeners than two-day-old news events.

3. I'm thinkin' you're also not a GM or PD. Just TRY to find weekend talent! Post-consolidation, radio's farm team has gone to hell. Part of what's driving use of how-to shows on the weekend is that it's AVAILABLE. Heck, it's hard-enough to find good FULL-TIME help. Right now, I am recruiting a morning drive host, for a 50KW AM station in a GREAT market, owned by a GREAT owner. And the bozo factor among applicants is sobering.

4. And IF you could find weekend help, ask most owners about putting more part-time bodies on the payroll, and you'll get the horse laugh.

Don't shoot the messenger.
I'm just reporting.

FORTUNATELY, one thing we're hearing lots-less-of lately is "Best of" weekend re-runs. With El Rushbo et al making so many references to things-happening-right-now, those replays REALLY tell listeners that the station has gone to sleep for the weekend.

<< To use your logic, they should go pay-for-play seven days a week. Just think how much more they could command for Tuesday at 7 a.m. versus Saturday at 11 a.m. >>

There's more of that going on than you seem to realize.
How do you think Bill O'Reilly gets his show on WOR/New York?
Call it "comp" [network commercial compensation] if you want, but that show is paying to be on that station.

<< Talk is the only format where it is considered completely acceptable to change format on the weekends. >>

I agree.
A non-music AM is more like a TV station than it is like a music FM in that regard.
News/Talk/Sports stations are more program-driven.
Music FMs are more appliance-like.
Once you interrupt "Continuous Country" for play-by-play, the Country is no longer continuous.
But play-by-play -- very different than Rush -- plays well on the garden variety Rush station.
And it brings-in cume-the-station-otherwise-wouldn't have.

As for your condescending zinger about WKZO/Kalamazoo:

1. You work in a much bigger market? And you got to the majors without playing any minor league ball? THAT'S impressive. YOU might play in-the-bigs, but consultants tend not to. Although I have a client station in market #1, people-who-do-what-I-do are, more often, used by smaller-market-stations-who-want-not-to-make-small-market-mistakes.

2. I'll bet that even your much-bigger-market station doesn't have WKZO's reach. AM590's non-directional daytime pattern goes 100 miles in every direction. It's the biggest signal between Chicago and Detroit.

3. And don't all those listeners between Chicago and Detroit deserve the best programming they can get? You may be on a bigger station in a bigger city, but people in Kalamazoo, and Fargo, and all those other cities-just-big-enough-that-you-don't-have-to-say-the-name-of-the-state -- markets that use consultants -- THOSE LISTENERS use the same GE clock radios and Delco car radios that people in New York and LA use.

Everyone's own market is his/her most "major" market.
And shame on us if we perform otherwise.

HC
www.HollandCooke.com
 
WKZO goes beyond being a "hertiage" station (to use an over-worked phrase); it approaches legendary.
Same for WFGO in Fargo (and a handful of others).
WKZO made its owner enough money that he bought a major league baseball team.
"Kalamazoo Direct To You"
 
RE "WKZO goes beyond being a "hertiage" station...it approaches legendary"

<< WKZO made its owner enough money that he bought a major league baseball team.>>

Fred's right!
And it's a great story.

When the station celebrated its 70th anniversary several years ago, we made HIM the centerpiece of the entire on-air campaign, even though he was long-since deceased.

"John Earl Fetzer came to town with $156 in his pocket...and a dream.
On September 20, 1931, he signed on Kalamazoo's first radio station, WKZO.
Eventually, he BOUGHT The Detroit Tigers...to keep the games on WKZO."

Hear CBS's Charles Osgood tell the story @ http://www.hollandcooke.com/tigers.ram [Real Audio] or http://www.hollandcooke.com/tigers.wax [Windows Media].

Michigan radio buffs will also note that, during World War II, WKZO's Program Director was one "Paul Aurandt." Back then, he used his real name on-air. Today, you know him as "Paul Harvey." And now you know...THE REST...of the story.

And for those-of-y'all who tuned-in late, help yourself to the document that set-off this thread, @ http://www.HollandCooke.com/weekendgold.pdf
 
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