With audience ratings on overnights non-existent or at least hard to gauge. I'm curious about examples of programs and/or a basic checklist of things that are needed to make it happen.
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How do you create profitable live overnight programming?
- Thread starter waketheherd
- Start date
I've brought that up with sales people, and I agree, business to business is great for overnights, especially NTR... if you're going to heavy duty companies you can target the people that are still working in that industry at the time at a fraction of the cost (especially if you're in oil country). I'd suggest trying things out and make sure you can make money before you hire someone full time and loose money LOL
gr8oldies said:
These formats have worked well on A.M. stations with good night time power that reaches our with skywave to cover enough geography to assemble a reasonable audience. Coast-to-Coast seems to have amplified this concept by stringing together a significantly large network of stations.
Does anyone know with FM stations (which for all practical purposes are limited to a local audience) have joined Coast-to-Coast or similar networks?
There is one overnight broadcast that I find unique. It is hard to isolate the market, the station coverage from the unique talent, but "Steve and Johnnie Overnight" on WGN in Chicago would be a poster-child-example of nigh-time radio. When you have talent that has been sitting in the same chair for 25 years, and you can't have that talent transplanted to your market, I think many broadcasters write off that show at that point. I am convinced that if you will "de-compile" what they do, there are subtle elements in that broadcast that could be analyzed and a comparable element devised to fit your market.
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The big problem is: I don't have much expectation these elements can be replicated in another market at low cost. But one you identify the ingredients of their recipe, I have a feeling some of them would be valuable components for a broadcast in any time slot.
Corporate suits have written off radio from 7PM to 6AM as "unimportant". What they fail to understand is that there are shift workers in much of America, and that reducing the quality of the presentation will lead to a reduced audience. Of course, they then look at the reduced audience, and see a reason to reduce the quality of the presentation even more...
One other factor is that night-time radio also sets the table for the morning show. The stations with the strongest nighttime numbers often have the strongest morning numbers. I've seen several stations watch their morning numbers erode after they've "cut costs" by going with VT or syndication in the evenings and/or overnights.
There are businesses that cater to people who are out and about after 7PM, or on the way home after midnight. Creative sales people - if there are enough of them - find those sponsors and make nighttime talent affordable for the station. What's the cost? One spot an hour? In some cases, one spot per SHIFT? If a jock can't help bring in an extra couple of spots per shift, he/she ain't doin' the job. If a sales person can't sell those extra spots, then it's time to bring in more sales people, because they must be too busy to service those missing clients.
One other factor is that night-time radio also sets the table for the morning show. The stations with the strongest nighttime numbers often have the strongest morning numbers. I've seen several stations watch their morning numbers erode after they've "cut costs" by going with VT or syndication in the evenings and/or overnights.
There are businesses that cater to people who are out and about after 7PM, or on the way home after midnight. Creative sales people - if there are enough of them - find those sponsors and make nighttime talent affordable for the station. What's the cost? One spot an hour? In some cases, one spot per SHIFT? If a jock can't help bring in an extra couple of spots per shift, he/she ain't doin' the job. If a sales person can't sell those extra spots, then it's time to bring in more sales people, because they must be too busy to service those missing clients.
This is a very interesting topic.
We once had a station that was AC, They realized that the most of their audience dropped
off after 7 PM. They decided to go with a hard rock format, from 7 PM-5AM. It was hosted
by a host with a small but loyal audience for years on a smaller station.
The station at the time was WYSY, Y 108, it is now Mexican Regional station WLEY.
The station did get a small bump in the ratings, I'm not sure if it made a lot of money.
They were eventually sold to Cox Broadcasting and went 70's.
We also had a couple of AM's around a few years back, that were majority talk by day,
and played MOR music evenings, and or overnights.
Most smaller stations don't make much, if any money overnight, I would like to see them
play a format that is not available in the market, whether it be Jazz, nostalgia, oldies,
smooth jazz, rap, or metal or dusties, whatever type of music or programming that is
not on in the market.
Most smaller stations are just re runs of earlier programs or second and third tier talkers
on AM. On FM it's mostly automated or VT.
I know you said live, and that probably won't happen, but since nights will probably never
be live, like they used to be, and a lot of stations don't make much if any of their money
at night, why not try something different?
Take for instance an AM that re runs earlier shows, why not play nostalgia from 12-4, your
audience will be older, but, your not really selling overnight anyway. If anything, overnights
most of the time are just a bakers dozen in terms of spots. Especially if your target is over
35.
AM 740 Toronto, runs the all night jukebox, from 11PM- 5AM ET, there are very few commercials,
just music. There are some talk stations on AM, and music on FM, that are on the bird, that have
nothing but PSA's overnight, after the barter spots from the feed. Would they have much to lose?
I know you said live, sorry to stray off a little.
Just my thoughts.....
We once had a station that was AC, They realized that the most of their audience dropped
off after 7 PM. They decided to go with a hard rock format, from 7 PM-5AM. It was hosted
by a host with a small but loyal audience for years on a smaller station.
The station at the time was WYSY, Y 108, it is now Mexican Regional station WLEY.
The station did get a small bump in the ratings, I'm not sure if it made a lot of money.
They were eventually sold to Cox Broadcasting and went 70's.
We also had a couple of AM's around a few years back, that were majority talk by day,
and played MOR music evenings, and or overnights.
Most smaller stations don't make much, if any money overnight, I would like to see them
play a format that is not available in the market, whether it be Jazz, nostalgia, oldies,
smooth jazz, rap, or metal or dusties, whatever type of music or programming that is
not on in the market.
Most smaller stations are just re runs of earlier programs or second and third tier talkers
on AM. On FM it's mostly automated or VT.
I know you said live, and that probably won't happen, but since nights will probably never
be live, like they used to be, and a lot of stations don't make much if any of their money
at night, why not try something different?
Take for instance an AM that re runs earlier shows, why not play nostalgia from 12-4, your
audience will be older, but, your not really selling overnight anyway. If anything, overnights
most of the time are just a bakers dozen in terms of spots. Especially if your target is over
35.
AM 740 Toronto, runs the all night jukebox, from 11PM- 5AM ET, there are very few commercials,
just music. There are some talk stations on AM, and music on FM, that are on the bird, that have
nothing but PSA's overnight, after the barter spots from the feed. Would they have much to lose?
I know you said live, sorry to stray off a little.
Just my thoughts.....
waketheherd said:
There are ratings available both in diary markets and PPM ones. They are available in separate tables, but perfectly accessable.
The reason there is not much commentary about overnight numbers is that the midnight to 6 AM numbers are not included in the data we see at this site and others, which is all 6 AM to Midnight, M-Sun. Stations don't want overnights averaged in, as there is so little listening that it would drag down the "apparent" usage of radio.
The percentage of people using radio, particularly between 1 AM and 5 AM, is very low. Every time I have been a part of or observed advertisers sponsoring or advertising in this time period, the results have not justified the costs. At one point, the station I was with, KTNQ, was #1 in overnights and even beat the excellent numbers Art Bell had before his semiretirement. We never kept clients, and even the PI stuff was iffy as to results, generally not warranting the advertser having telephone staff at that hour.
Among the issues with nights and overnights is the fact that for most businesses these times are far from point of purchase as well as having very low audiences compared to other dayparts; a salesperson has only so much time on the street and won't sell cheap time if they can bring in a better order at higher daytime rates... many of us have tried higher commissions, quotas, etc., but it's a tough sell. Unless a station is fully sold out, nights are for value added bonus spots.
Like many, I put my first station on 24/7 because I was tired of having the transmitter not going on at 6 AM... it was better to have it never turned off. Whatever marginal benefit there is in delivering audience to the morning shift was just a bonus.
The only case I was able to make money on overnights was whith a station that was so totally #1 that we could sell everything on a 24 hour rotator. But that was 45 years ago and won't be repeated today.
In a better economy, I would favor fully live overnights, but I understand why many stations just can not do this.
This is really pretty simple:
Overnight programming is not a corporate problem, it's not a sales problem, it's not a ratings problem, or even a radio problem.
Overnight programming is an entrepeneur problem.
That's all it takes. No one is going to put a "help wanted" ad out for this position. No one's looking for this kind of person. But if one shows up, with a solution in their pocket, they WILL get a meeting with the GM. That's who you schedule the meeting with. Not the PD, and not someone in corporate. If you can solve the problem locally, that will be the only meeting you'll have to set up.
Right now, there are thousands of out-of-work radio people...most of them on-air people.
Their mistake is they're looking for jobs. There aren't any.
What they SHOULD be doing is creating a show and finding their own sponsorship.
How do you do it? Chicken & egg. That's what being an entrepeneur is all about. Sell something you don't yet have. But be willing to take the risk. The sponsor loses nothing, but has the potential to make a lot.
Take the brilliant programming idea with the promise of sponsorship to th GM of the most likely radio station. Tell them you don't want a job, but a cut of the profits. Make them an offer they can't refuse. And I bet they won't.
Why aren't more people doing this now? Too much work. Too much risk. But if it works, it's all yours. No corporate boss, no PD to tell you what to do, and you won't get fired.
We were once a nation of entrepeneurs. That's how radio got started. We got lazy and want a sure thing with no risk. Radio GMs have no reason to spend money on a shift that will bring in low return. But if you can take the risk out of their hands, they WILL listen. What do you have to lose?
Overnight programming is not a corporate problem, it's not a sales problem, it's not a ratings problem, or even a radio problem.
Overnight programming is an entrepeneur problem.
That's all it takes. No one is going to put a "help wanted" ad out for this position. No one's looking for this kind of person. But if one shows up, with a solution in their pocket, they WILL get a meeting with the GM. That's who you schedule the meeting with. Not the PD, and not someone in corporate. If you can solve the problem locally, that will be the only meeting you'll have to set up.
Right now, there are thousands of out-of-work radio people...most of them on-air people.
Their mistake is they're looking for jobs. There aren't any.
What they SHOULD be doing is creating a show and finding their own sponsorship.
How do you do it? Chicken & egg. That's what being an entrepeneur is all about. Sell something you don't yet have. But be willing to take the risk. The sponsor loses nothing, but has the potential to make a lot.
Take the brilliant programming idea with the promise of sponsorship to th GM of the most likely radio station. Tell them you don't want a job, but a cut of the profits. Make them an offer they can't refuse. And I bet they won't.
Why aren't more people doing this now? Too much work. Too much risk. But if it works, it's all yours. No corporate boss, no PD to tell you what to do, and you won't get fired.
We were once a nation of entrepeneurs. That's how radio got started. We got lazy and want a sure thing with no risk. Radio GMs have no reason to spend money on a shift that will bring in low return. But if you can take the risk out of their hands, they WILL listen. What do you have to lose?
Big A, you're right on the money.
12 In a Row, said exactly what I was thinking, when I read your post.
Your hit the nail right on the head with your post, Big A!
I've been thinking the same things for quite some time now.
Excellent observations!
Your hit the nail right on the head with your post, Big A!
I've been thinking the same things for quite some time now.
Excellent observations!
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