CLEAR CHANNEL 740AM "LA PRECIOSA"

[Joe Piazza]

What would they do with it? Most Spanish stations in CF are already targeting Puerto Ricans.

 

[KILOCYCLES]

Well, predictions were right. A Spanish balads format doesn't work in the Orlando market. Clear Channel "La Preciosa" didn't show in the last Arbitron. This format was tried by 1030AM some years ago with much better imaging, music and personalities and didn't work. What a waste of a 50 kilowatts signal.

 

[davideduardo]

Well, predictions were right. A Spanish balads format doesn't work in the Orlando market. Clear Channel "La Preciosa" didn't show in the last Arbitron.

La Preciosa is a regional Mexican oldies / adult hits format. it is not an never has been a Spanish ballad / pop format.

 

[KILOCYCLES]

Well, predictions were right. A Spanish balads format doesn't work in the Orlando market. Clear Channel "La Preciosa" didn't show in the last Arbitron.

La Preciosa is a regional Mexican oldies / adult hits format. it is not an never has been a Spanish ballad / pop format.

Eduardo, that regional/Mexican oldies format was dumped about four months ago. Their new format is Spanish Ballads. It doesn't seem to be working according to Arbitron.

 

[OrlandoGM]

Well Gentlemen...

According to my sources, it seems that Clear Channel is forcing new clients who try to make spot buys on WRUM buy on WQTM as well. Otherwise you cannot make a buy at all.

This sounds to me like WQTM is not selling at all.

That is a really bad sign for WQTM in the Spanish Format. I give it until the end of the year before the whole WQTM Spanish Project goes up on smoke, if it isn't in the works already.

I think that even at its lowest point the Sports format WQTM had it probably made 5-10 times the $$$$$ that it's making right now in Spanish Ballads.

Looks like the folks at folks at Clear Channel Hispanic Initiative got a little "Punch Drunk" from the success of Rumba in Orlando and thought anything they touched in Spanish would turn to gold. LMAO!!!!

Let's refer to their Philadelphia Spanish Format change some time back. I believe the FM they flipped from English to Spanish reverted back in less than 6 months of trying the Rumba format.

With all that money, why can't Alonso and Clear Channel take the time out to do some research in these markets.

OrlandoGM

 

[Parttimer]

It seemed pretty simple to me that with a reasonably successful rimshot on 98.1, that once they put Rumba on a full-market signal that it would pretty much be over for music on AM. So they try and compete against themselves?

I'd be willing to bet that the biggest driving factor was dumping the overhead from the sports format, but they could have scaled it back and kept the format with more national shows. Orlando's not a locally-driven sports market anyway, with only one local team. And besides, the local hosts just weren't that good. Frankly some of the stuff 1080 did was better, and it if their signal could be heard outside of Kissimmee they might have done some damage.

In general CC has done a lousy job in this market. 104.1 is declining, JRR is a mess, 540 never made a dent in DBO, they insist on keeping Sileo around, now they're wasting 740. Yes, Magic and Rumba are successful, but overall they have badly underachieved with the collection of signal they have.

 

[tanner]

OrlandoGM,

Sounds like the telephone conversation we had the other afternoon. If cheap channel needs to keep the overhead low maybe they should go with the Fox Sports net feed.

 

[davideduardo]

It seemed pretty simple to me that with a reasonably successful rimshot on 98.1, that once they put Rumba on a full-market signal that it would pretty much be over for music on AM. So they try and compete against themselves?

The two FMs are tropical and Caribbean CHR, while the Preciosa format is Mexican oldies. How do those compete?

[/quote]

 

[Parttimer]

While they may appeal to marginally different listeners, I'd be willing to bet that the sponsors don't comprehend those differences.

Clearly this is your area of expertise, but I have top believe that to 90% of the public spanish-language music is spanish-language music. That's not fair but reality's not always fair.

And let's play devil's advocate, do you believe there is a sufficient adult Mexican audience in Orlando to make this successful?

I'd be pretty surprised if they're trying to sell anything besides the traditional numbers. Their results seem to bear that out.

 

[davideduardo]

While they may appeal to marginally different listeners, I'd be willing to bet that the sponsors don't comprehend those differences.

Avertisers who use Spanish langauge media definitely know that Mexicans, in their vast majority, do not listen to the same formats, the same artists and the same music. They also do not listen to stations where the announcers use a radically different accent and where the vocablulary is significantly different. Mexican informal language is almost a different dialect from Puerto Rican and Caribbean Spanish.

Clearly this is your area of expertise, but I have top believe that to 90% of the public spanish-language music is spanish-language music. That's not fair but reality's not always fair.

It is not the same to the public who might listen to the various Spanish language stations or to the time buyers who might want to reach each highly separate group.

And let's play devil's advocate, do you believe there is a sufficient adult Mexican audience in Orlando to make this successful?

Yes, but not for an AM station. Right now, the Mexican equivalent of the FCC has set into motion a plan to move as many AM stations as possible to FM because they recognize that AM is no longer viable in Mexico. The Preciosa format is good, and could work in Orlando, but not on AM.

 

[Parttimer]

Yes, but not for an AM station. Right now, the Mexican equivalent of the FCC has set into motion a plan to move as many AM stations as possible to FM because they recognize that AM is no longer viable in Mexico. The Preciosa format is good, and could work in Orlando, but not on AM.

I think that's the point we were really getting at. My totally unscientific observation from having lived in Orlando a few years ago was that Puerto Ricans seemed to dominate the economic landscape within the Hispanic population there.

If I remember correctly, I think that 760 in Tampa was regional Mexican, and that a niche signal like that was more appropriate for that format.

The last numbers I saw were that the Orlando market was only 17% Hispanic, and I have no clue what percentage of that would be Mexican. Beyond that, many of the younger Hispanics also listen heavily to Jamz and Party, and not exclusively to Spanish-language programming.

So I'm really puzzled as to what level this could succeed... if anything,to me the sheer numbers would indicate that this could work on a very small scale, say converting 1270 La Luz or something like that, but to reach the volume that a major owner needs to be profitable is another story entirely.

 

[Joe Piazza]

And let's play devil's advocate, do you believe there is a sufficient adult Mexican audience in Orlando to make this successful?

Yes, but not for an AM station. Right now, the Mexican equivalent of the FCC has set into motion a plan to move as many AM stations as possible to FM because they recognize that AM is no longer viable in Mexico. The Preciosa format is good, and could work in Orlando, but not on AM.

David, you seem to be off-topic here. La Preciosa in Orlando IS NOT Mexican Oldies. It was at one point, but a few months ago they turned it into a local "Pop/Romantica" format (and it's still not working).

 

[MarcB]

Let's refer to their Philadelphia Spanish Format change some time back. I believe the FM they flipped from English to Spanish reverted back in less than 6 months of trying the Rumba format.

OrlandoGM

There are a number of reasons why RUMBA 104.5 in Philly didn't work.

1. (The most important reason). They did little to promote this station. They didn't do much (if any) advertising.

2. MEGA 1310 AM had existed in the market for years. Listeners followed it as it moved from 900 AM to 1310AM. Davidson bought the station and a group has a multi-year LMA with the station. They did not shut down therefore there was no need for them to turn on the FM.

3. Perhaps if MEGA 1310 had shut down, their listeners may have found RUMBA 104.5 FM, but there's no guarentee.

4. If there's an existing station with a particular format and the station has listeners and a new station signs on with a similar format and it's not heavily promoted, why would the listeners of the established station try out the new station if they like the existing one?


Am I making any sense?

Peace Out,

Marc in Connecticut
(Long Time Radio Geek)

 

[davideduardo]

There are a number of reasons why RUMBA 104.5 in Philly didn't work.

1. (The most important reason). They did little to promote this station. They didn't do much (if any) advertising.

2. MEGA 1310 AM had existed in the market for years. Listeners followed it as it moved from 900 AM to 1310AM. Davidson bought the station and a group has a multi-year LMA with the station. They did not shut down therefore there was no need for them to turn on the FM.

3. Perhaps if MEGA 1310 had shut down, their listeners may have found RUMBA 104.5 FM, but there's no guarentee.

4. If there's an existing station with a particular format and the station has listeners and a new station signs on with a similar format and it's not heavily promoted, why would the listeners of the established station try out the new station if they like the existing one?

Here is my take:

1. Clear Channel created an Hispanic Initiative and hired a senior VP to capitalize on the fact that the only growth sector in radio was Hispanic.

2. Many stations were converted without research and a reasonable thought process. For example, in Philadelphia, under 5% of the market is Hispanic, but most are Puerto Ricans and those in the 18-49 Hispanic sales demo are mostly second and third generation and not Spanish dominant. The Spanish dominants are less than 2.5% of the market, and most of them are over 40.

3. Under PPM, the TSL for Spanish language stations comes down more than that of general market stations, while cume barely rises in markets with small percentages of Hispanics.

4. Clear realized they could not expect much more than a 1 share in the PPM, and bailed out. The mistake was not thinking this through ahead of time.

On the other hand, Hispanics use AM even less than non-Hispanics, so the limited coverage AMs had no chance of survival. The real issue is that this would have been an "everybody loses" battle as there are not enough shares to go around.

And, in markets with few Spanish stations, the word gets around very fast. Promotion in these cases is not needed.

 

[davideduardo]

David, you seem to be off-topic here. La Preciosa in Orlando IS NOT Mexican Oldies. It was at one point, but a few months ago they turned it into a local "Pop/Romantica" format (and it's still not working).

I was referring to the old format. We barely have any trend data on the new format... which won't work as it is on AM.

Either the old Preciosa (Mexican adult hits) or the new one with ballads could work on FM. Not on AM.

 

[austingrace]

i'm going to go back on what i said a few months ago... "i told you so." so, what will happen to 740? will it be this balids stuff forever or will some other format be on there by january? it could be vary interesting.