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Atlanta Radio Ratings: September 2023

ksradiogeek said:
It isn’t dead, but it’s not the same format that had dominant power and influence as it did in the 90s.

And why do people want to hear the same stuff over and over? Because familiarity works and sells - human beings are guilty of it.
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Yeah that's what they said about tv networks when they reran the same popular stuff.

Look what is happening to cable. Streaming killed it, it's gonna happen to radio next as they're doing what tv is doing. "OH, you're familiar with this one hit wonder from 1993?? Sweet, we'll play it forever and you'll definitely be loyal with us!"
 
Also, I'm interested... what would make it influential again? I don't see them playing familiar stuff from decades ago ONLY (instead of a fresh mix of old and new) as helping it gain relevancy.
 
PrezSquid said:
How the hell is this format gonna survive if nothing new is doing well with focus groups? We're so doomed, it's just classic rock 2.0
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It may not survive with you, but a lot of people like oldies and always have. Oldies have traditionally done well until their P1s age out of the demo. That's how Fox 97 went from a top-rated station playing boomer 60s oldies to flipping to urban and then classic rock.

Classic rock has been a thing since the mid-80s--about 40 years ago. 96 Rock tweaked their playlist in 1985 to get rid of new rock and play more classic rock (then-defined as AOR from the late 60s and early 70s) to super-serve the boomers. As a GenXer I thought that sucked back then--a lot of new rock wasn't heard on Atlanta radio, and 96 Rock found themselves behind the curve eventually. We had some good CHR stations (Power 99) and college stations (as well as MTV when they actually played music) that filled the gap. It also opened the door for the original 99X.

But boomers have aged out of the demo, so now the "classic rock" target is GenXers and older millennials, playing mostly AOR from the 80s, with some from the late 70s and some from the early 90s. It is literally the oldest music you will hear on any commercial ATL station.

99X has ceased to be a "new music" station, sorry. They're now a classic rock station, although a very different one than, say, the River. Their target is Millennials and younger GenXers. In fact, they play more late-70s and 1980s alternative now than they did the first time. Going to a gold-based playlist (vs. currents) will let you do that.
 
jabba17 said:
It may not survive with you, but a lot of people like oldies and always have. Oldies have traditionally done well until their P1s age out of the demo. That's how Fox 97 went from a top-rated station playing boomer 60s oldies to flipping to urban and then classic rock.

Classic rock has been a thing since the mid-80s--about 40 years ago. 96 Rock tweaked their playlist in 1985 to get rid of new rock and play more classic rock (then-defined as AOR from the late 60s and early 70s) to super-serve the boomers. As a GenXer I thought that sucked back then--a lot of new rock wasn't heard on Atlanta radio, and 96 Rock found themselves behind the curve eventually. We had some good CHR stations (Power 99) and college stations (as well as MTV when they actually played music) that filled the gap. It also opened the door for the original 99X.

But boomers have aged out of the demo, so now the "classic rock" target is GenXers and older millennials, playing mostly AOR from the 80s, with some from the late 70s and some from the early 90s. It is literally the oldest music you will hear on any commercial ATL station.

99X has ceased to be a "new music" station, sorry. They're now a classic rock station, although a very different one than, say, the River. Their target is Millennials and younger GenXers. In fact, they play more late-70s and 1980s alternative now than they did the first time. Going to a gold-based playlist (vs. currents) will let you do that.
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To give a specific example, 96Rock tried to expand their playlist with The Safety Dance by Men Without Hats in 1983, but was hit by a tremendous backlash from their audience. A college station like WRAS, who helped make the song a hit, has an audience that wants to hear new music. Burkhart/Abrams weren't stupid - they knew they had to give their audience what it wanted and it wasn't a bunch of guys from London (or in this case, Montreal) with strange clothes.
 
jabba17 said:
99X has ceased to be a "new music" station, sorry. They're now a classic rock station, although a very different one than, say, the River. Their target is Millennials and younger GenXers. In fact, they play more late-70s and 1980s alternative now than they did the first time. Going to a gold-based playlist (vs. currents) will let you do that.
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Millenials and younger Gen Xers don't want to hear new music? What about Gen Z?
 
But eh, usually the people who crave new music will just stream anyway, they don't need radio. It's why there's a bunch of new bands popping off and radio is behind on playing them.

If they're not gonna appeal to fans of those young new bands, then screw it, radio doesn't care about the younger audiences pass millenials.
 
WCDukenfield said:
To give a specific example, 96Rock tried to expand their playlist with The Safety Dance by Men Without Hats in 1983, but was hit by a tremendous backlash from their audience. A college station like WRAS, who helped make the song a hit, has an audience that wants to hear new music. Burkhart/Abrams weren't stupid - they knew they had to give their audience what it wanted and it wasn't a bunch of guys from London (or in this case, Montreal) with strange clothes.
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"Their audience" meaning P1s, which was mainly boomers at the time. Hence the onslaught of deep-cut psychedelia shows like Psychedelic Psunday, Psychedelic Psaturday, and Psychedelic Psupper. Plenty of guys wearing strange clothes, as long as it was hippie wear.

To be clear, it wasn't a bad move by 96 Rock from a commercial POV--at one point prior to this, WKLS had "Purple Rain" on their playlist, and 96 Rock needed to clean that lack of direction up and focus on their P1s. A bunch of us wanted a KROQ clone, and that wasn't going to happen in an under-radioed market like ATL, and certainly not at the only album rocker in town.

WRAS's problem was weak production values--I wasn't expecting slick bumpers, but the DJs needed to engage with the audience more and "play it and say it" in the days before RDS and Shazam as opposed to just spinning records and doing TOH IDs. It made for a rather inaccessible station.

After the CHR doldrums of the early 80s, Z-93 never really recovered. If Z-93 had played more new rock (like Power 99 eventually did), they might have done a lot better and taken some of the pressure off of 96 Rock to be everything AOR. Especially since there was a glut of AC stations chasing the pop boomers at the time--B98.5, Warm 100/99.7, Peach, 94Q, Lite 106, Fox 97--there was no room in that lane. The AC glut and the weakness of Z-93 opened up an opportunity for Power 99 to flip from AC to CHR, which played a lot of new rock and really took it to Z-93.

Z93 flipped to classic rock and doubled down on what 96 Rock was doing, which freed up 96 Rock to play more new rock just as the boomers were starting to age out of the demo.
 
radioislife2020 said:
neilsen will be making a revision on the last few books .. apparently some stations or one was not playing by the rules .
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This could get interesting, Back in the day Christmas ads were ordered being ordered before Halloween. If I were an agency buyer and I bought the "wrong" station or allocated incorrectly I would not be happy.
 
The error only applied to WTBS-FM and WAZX-FM. The estimates for the rest of the market remain unchanged, but the rankings changed now that they will appear as two listings.
 
PrezSquid said:
@garrettloudin is working for a small dallas country station, Evan Brando I'm not sure if he's even working for 99X anymore, I talked to him before.

It is funny however how the cool local music show had more engagement on social media than 99x's tweets about goo goo dolls or whatever. Such a barren twitter page.
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Where did you get that info? Garrett is on The Kincaid and Dallas Morning Show and has the Mid Day show with Amanda in WKHX in Atlanta
 
The Fish is quite successful in Atlanta for some reason probably cause Georgia is a more conservative state compared to the more liberal states/markets which usually have lower-rated 6+ Christian stations. It is also the only Christmas station in Atlanta which is why it always gets #1 during the Holidays.
 
They seem to be "involved" with local charities and the promote a lot of CCM acts when they play in the area. They also don't dwell on the negativity of mainstream news. (The local TV newscasts almost always have multiple shootings with a few multiple fatality car and truck wrecks and drownings at Lake Lanier mixed in the summer.)

Technically their signal reaches the non urban parts of the market (except Peachtree City) very well. K Love uses the same antenna with quite a bit more power but the "local" focus of The Fish has seems to be still working.

another surprising station (6+) is the Urban Gospel 102.5 Praise
 
PrezSquid said:
Then how come 91X has terrible numbers with classic alt? I don't want all new and only new, you need a mix of both.
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There are many varieties of mixes of old, recent and new music that work across different formats. Only if the mix you want is common to a significant group of other people is it important.

Generally, those with preferred mixes not shared by most potential listeners are called "outliers" and ignored.
PrezSquid said:
screw your tests, you gotta appeal to music lovers and young people
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Music tests identify potential listeners to a general kind or blend of music and then find out which songs are playable and which should be played more than others.

  • Many stations have no desire or need to appeal to "young people", whoever they are.
  • "Music lover" is not a measurable quality. Stations that play music want to appeal to people who find radio stations enjoyable to listen to.
Please, if you don't know anything about radio programming and research techniques, pay attention to the people who do know who post here rather than shooting off irrelevant and incorrect personal opinions.
 
PrezSquid said:
How the hell is this format gonna survive if nothing new is doing well with focus groups? We're so doomed, it's just classic rock 2.0
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Focus groups are not used to judge or scale music.
 
Prez
I think the term "broadcasting" in radio is wrong these days. Too be successful in commercial radio you have to find a sub group of the market (P1's) that advertiser's want to spend money buying advertising on. It really should be call "narrowcasting".

If you personally can pick songs that will attract a large percentage folks in the any given demographic, then you can easily start an on line radio station and develop a large audience and show experienced professionals how it's done. You could then go to a "failing" station and either become the Program Director or LMA it.

I personally think there are "undiscovered" formats that might be valuable. If I knew what these are I would a 6 or 7 figure consultant

Don't be discouraged! IIRC: Top 40 Rock and Roll started at a daytime AM station so anything is possible.
 
103.7 Chuck FM (C3, 4100W, CoL Maysville, tx Lula) is classic hits and receivable in the NE metro.

WXKT-FM Radio Station Coverage Map

radio-locator.com radio-locator.com

89.1 WBCX (the Brenau college radio station, class A, 840W, CoL/tx Gainesville) plays 80s classic hits when other programming is not scheduled. Also receivable in the NE metro. They also carry BBC World Service news if you want a break from American news.

WBCX-FM Radio Station Coverage Map

radio-locator.com radio-locator.com

WRAS 88.5 HD3 is also classic hits, more focused on the 60s and 70s.

WJBB 1300 AM (the old WIMO, class D, 650W day/50W night) /107.1 FM (250W class D xlator) out of Winder plays a 70s-centric format. They also have 96 Rock alum Christopher Rude in AM and PM drive.

W296CX-FM Radio Station Coverage Map

radio-locator.com radio-locator.com
The translator is on the River Chateau Elan tower, but nulls hard towards town to, I presume, protect WTSH out of Aragon/Rome (La Raza 107.1).
 
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