• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Could there be a WHAM -FM in the future?

T

therealjm12

Since Clear Channel has created a couple FM simulcasts in Albany -WGY and Syracuse -WSYR could it happen in Rochester?
I know this has been discussed here for WBEN in Buffalo (Entercom, not C. C.) but I don't think WHAM has been brought up here.
WHAM seems to continue to have a huge 12+ rating but so did WGY & WSYR. If Clear Channel did blow up a FM in Rochester to similcast WHAM, which one would it be? I would think 100.5 would be the prime candidate. Incidentally, at this point I don't think it would be a good idea to similcast WHAM, but no one at C. C. asked my opinion about Albany & Syracuse.
 
In Albany, WGY, whose transmitter is a good 15 miles west of the Capitol, apparently had some coverage dead spots in the downtown district that the FM can fill...and in Syracuse WSYR-AM coverage in the southern burbs is weak because of their DA pattern, especially nights and pre-sunrise. Maybe the FM can fill it. I think they'd have been better off picking up the southern burbs by flipping news and talk to 620 AM rather than killing an urban contemp signal that, if well programmed, could have done for CC Syracuse what WDKX is doing for the Langston family in Rochester.

WHAM has neither of those problems. So why waste a full class B FM signal on a simulcast that adds little or no coverage, just because they haven't yet figured out how to program it effectively?
 
Bob1370 said:
So why waste a full class B FM signal on a simulcast that adds little or no coverage, just because they haven't yet figured out how to program it effectively?
Click to expand...


To get more younger demographics not listening to AM.
 
pbf1 said:
Bob1370 said:
So why waste a full class B FM signal on a simulcast that adds little or no coverage, just because they haven't yet figured out how to program it effectively?
Click to expand...


To get more younger demographics not listening to AM.
Click to expand...

Precisely.
 
pbf1 said:
Bob1370 said:
So why waste a full class B FM signal on a simulcast that adds little or no coverage, just because they haven't yet figured out how to program it effectively?
Click to expand...
To get more younger demographics not listening to AM.
Click to expand...
Programming the same-old talk radio as it's been defined by Rush, Beck, Hannity and Savage, as it's known on WHAM and WBEN, isn't going to instantly draw "young people" to an AM talk station just because it's on effem. Equal time: Stephanie Miller and Randi Rhodes aren't automatics on FM either. Shredd & Ragan are the closest definition of "young" talk radio in Buffalo. They do well 18-34. 45+, not so much. Pick your poison.
 
Wow. And everything old is new again. In the '60s, it was done because FM didn't have enough audience yet to justify separate staffs. I remember listening to WBEN-FM while vacationing all the way up in Georgian Bay in Canada, when it simulcast Clint's morning show.

Now, the tables are turned, and the simulcasts are happening because AM is in a decline.

Out here in Utah, KSL-AM is a 50-kW news/talker at 1160, but simulcasts on FM. The promos invite listening to the FM for better sound, and the AM "when you're farther out." The daytime signal of the AM is amazing.

The bad news: It seems as if everyone, including the production folks, monitors the FM in stereo. On the AM side some jingles are unintelligible, spots muddy, and sounders bury the newspeople.
 
Paul_Warren said:
Out here in Utah, KSL-AM is a 50-kW news/talker at 1160, but simulcasts on FM. The promos invite listening to the FM for better sound, and the AM "when you're farther out." The daytime signal of the AM is amazing.

The bad news: It seems as if everyone, including the production folks, monitors the FM in stereo. On the AM side some jingles are unintelligible, spots muddy, and sounders bury the newspeople.
Click to expand...

Paul: Maybe the board-ops/producers need to monitor the mix on a Supertuner ;) With a mono switch.

A few weeks ago I was listening (over the air) to a prominent news-talk station in a major market. The bumper music consistently overwhelmed the host. My reaction was "dude, bring the music down about 5 dB!" (We often wonder why so many talk show hosts are shouting rather than talking.) I then thought about what might be going on in the control room. Board-op juggling three functions: Screening calls, on the intercom with the news room, recording a phoner or scrambling to get a sat feed... or talking about yesterday's with the PD or production guy.

The board-op and talent often monitor pre-delay, board out, flat, without processing. The solution might be to have a phantom monitor, such as having a limiter/processor, old Optimod (or Audimax-Volumax) in-line to simulate an off-air sound.

Many jocks think it's better to talk "through" rather than "over" the music and let the processing (hopefully adjusted properly) do the work. That might work for CHR, Oldies, maybe Classic Rock, but not for news-talk. It's a different environment where the talent should (IMHO) always be dominant. It's advisable to listen to the station on a monitor or speakers that best duplicate what's being used by the listener... a cheesy alarm clock or mono table top radio. I worked in a production room that had big JBL 4311's, but I preferred to hear mixes on a set of well-worn small Radio Shack speakers. With the monitor in mono.
 
"To get more younger demographics not listening to AM."

Not working too well so far on the FM stations Clear Channel is using for its "Rush Radio" experiment. The demos and the audience size really haven't justified the flip from a strong AM to an FM, the younger audience just isn't responding any better to older-skewing, older-thinking programs on FM than they did on AM.

And that's why it won't work if Clear Channel tries it in Rochester either.

To get the younger audience you have to program the way the younger listeners think...and for talk radio, that means looking at the 2008 voter demographics, the last cycle where under-30 voters turned out, and programming to the way they voted. And while you're at it, program with people who not only align with their politics, but also with their cultural and entertainment preferences, who 'get' Jon Stewart, or Katy Perry, or 50 Cent.

The usual suspects just don't get it done.
 
I agree with Bob. I don't see many educated 35 year olds tuning in to hear Michael Savage or Beck on AM or FM.. They might tune in to hear a strong local news dept.
 
I can see one "reason" for WHAM to do it: competition from WYSL's nifty new translator on 92.1FM. It doesn't take much loss in audience from something like that to hurt. And while it may be using a nuclear bomb to kill a single tank, it'd be difficult to justify putting WHAM on a small FM signal if the point is to prevent "leakage" to WYSL. They'd almost HAVE to sacrifice a full-market Class B FM for the simulcast. I admit, it'd take WYSL causing an awful lot of pain before that could be justified.
 
Not sure WYSL figures in the equation. I have a feeling the mediocre results of "Rush Radio" on both AM and FM may give them pause. It comes down to one question. Why waste still another full-B signal for minimal gain and no real increase in coverage, when a better-programmed music station would add far more to the bottom line?
 
One thought:

When a station moves from being on one signal to two, the cost of that station goes up.

Now, that station has to make enough money for two transmitters and their power bills.

And the cluster has to make its margin with 5 products instead of 6. (Or 4 instead of 5; whatever the cluster size is.)

At the same time, the simulcast makes no new ad inventory available. (Unless the signals break apart for something like Yankees baseball on FM only, but even that provides only a marginal increase in inventory, with costs for the extra programming.)

Some costs come off the books when a simulcast is created. Program costs on the former station, for example, and savings from any layoffs.

Do these initial cost savings offset the long-term costs?
 
Good point.

Simulcasting does, in theory, give you more leverage to increase your rates. In a case like WHAM, though...they might be able to increase WHAM's rates but you'd presumably have to take an FM whose billing was already in the dumps (or at least significantly depressed) to make up for the lost in inventory.

BTW, Mr. Savage, I wasn't saying WYSL isn't worthy competition for WHAM. Just that in this particular case I agree that WYSL's FM translator isn't, by itself, a very strong reason for CC to make the major step of sacrificing an FM for a WHAM simulcast.
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom