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Michael Smerconish Leaving Terrestrial Radio

You have to wonder how much of this decision was influenced by the Philadelphia fade in Smerconish's WPHT audience numbers? He is also heard in 79 other markets too.

In terms of operating the show, doing it on satellite radio is more of a guaranteed pay check once the contracts are signed, since spot sales aren't the exclusive source of revenue as with terrestrial broadcasting. But, audience growth is limited to those who have satellite receivers and pay a monthly fee. Stern has only a fraction of the total weekly listeners he had when he was on regular radio, and Smerconish won't likely have the same kind of loyal core following him over that Stern did. Stern's show is unique, Smerconish's show is not.

It would be interesting to know what kind of forces drove the deal? Does Sirius think it will get enough die hard Smerconish fans to follow him over and pony up the monthly subscription fee to make this a profitable move? Does Smerconish see his terrestrial radio, and syndication prospects fading with AM Conservative talk, and is he just getting out when the "gettin's good"?

This is interesting news, and says more about the state of AM talk radio, and WPHT's future, than it first might indicate.
 
80 affiliates isn't a lot in the world of syndicated political talk. Don't most of the "majors" have 300+ affiliates?

I think Sirius/XM might have its eye more on Smerconish's MSNBC contributions than his current syndicated talk show. I would have to say that appearances on MSNBC, including fill-in hosting for Chris Matthews, probably gets him more national exposure than his clearance on 80 talk radio stations.

The POTUS channel he's going to doesn't have a specific political lean. S/XM has channels that are all conservative and all liberal talk. The unifying thread on POTUS: it's Washington politics and the shows are exclusive to S/XM, instead of the many of those on the conservative and liberal channels that are also broadcast on terrestrial radio.

As for WPHT: Wow, talk about losing your identity. How about this for an idea for 1210: now that 610/WIP is the syndicated CBS sports product, and since the Phillies are already simulcast on 1210 and 94.1, why not just make 1210 an AM simulcast of 94.1 WIP? Something low-cost for the station until CBS sells it to someone else.
 
radiophiler said:
why not just make 1210 an AM simulcast of 94.1 WIP? Something low-cost for the station until CBS sells it to someone else.
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How about Sid Mark 24/7? All Sinatra. Probably do as well as they're doing now.
 
Huge blow for 1210 WPHT-AM. huge blow. I'm really concerned about the future of this radio station after learning this news tonight.
 
@TheBigA: That'll probably be the interim format when 1210 starts stunting after dumping talk. Losing Rush and maybe Hannity is one thing, but on top of all that, you now lose your "local" star?
 
I have no sympathy at all for WPHT. They ceded to the demands of their local "star", Smerconish, who tired of doing his semi-successful morning show after many years, instead of demanding that he continue as part of what got them where they were. Smerconish wanted to bag the local morning show and just do his national afternoon show, so WPHT gave in to their "star" and basically began the gutting of their mostly national (but successful) programming line-up, by dumping Hannity and Beck, and going instead with a bastardized Smerconish show on tape delay plus a local hour.

In concert with that was the move of Giordano to late mornings as they began a bogus claim of "live and local". It wasn't. They hired an out-of-towner to do mornings (Stigall), still had Rush Limbaugh in the noon to three slot, and had Smerconish doing a four-hour-old national show in the afternoons. Not exactly "live and local" as claimed.

Then after losing Rush to WWIQ, they could put their "star", Smerconish on at its real national time at noon. But it turned out that their "star" wasn't so much of a "star" and couldn't compete with his former stable-mate Rush, one-on-one. So the "star" now tucks tail and runs to the satellite world, rather than wait for the inevitable cancellation of his show by his flagship station. And in the process blames the state of the industry, politics, audience, for his failures.

I have no sympathy for him - and I have no sympathy for a radio station run so poorly. They both deserve whatever they get.
 
Surprisingly, we are having a discussion about Smerconish on the Pittsburgh board. He has never had a bona fide presence in that market. But, here is my take on how his politics affect his radio, posted on that board:

With regard to Smerconish's career in the media, ideology has not been the main driver - ambition has. He is above average in talent, but way above average in scrambling. He graduated from Lehigh University, as I did. During the (different) times we were there, it was highly ambition driven. If your skills weren't tops (and mine aren't) you learned to work hard and be opportunistic. Another poster used this term for Smerconish and it fits well. He has been opportunistic in his relationship with Obama, Specter & Matthews to advance his career, not their ideology. And if it advanced their agenda, that was OK with him.

I listened for years before and after his embrace of Obama. My impression of his positions:
National security, support for military personnel and police - conservative
Taxes and deficit spending - in favor of reducing govenment expenditures, especially waste in defense & entitlement as well as a major tax overhaul - moderate/conservative
Social issues - very tolerant of values that are more liberal than his own - moderate

Hard left liberals probably find him easier to take than hard right conservatives, even though he skews conservative, and the liberal/moderate radio audience has not proven strong enough.

As he tried for national exposure, his radio program became more political with attempts at focus on popular culture. I'll bet that he is disappoined and worried that his national syndication performance has been tepid. Philadelphia home base WPHT may be spiralling down, so in satellite he is seeking safe harbor and one more run at a national cable TV hosting gig.
 
HGN2001 said:
I have no sympathy at all for WPHT. They ceded to the demands of their local "star", Smerconish, who tired of doing his semi-successful morning show after many years, instead of demanding that he continue as part of what got them where they were.
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You've obviously never managed a "local star."
 
From today's Daily News:
No plans could be confirmed for how WPHT will handle Smerconish's departure, but sources close to the station told me that instead of replacing Smerconish, they might shift programming around, extending Chris Stigall's morning show and then shifting Dom Giordano and the afternoon-drive slot, now hosted by Steve Martorano and Rich Zeoli, earlier.
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http://www.philly.com/philly/entert...st_Smerconish_makes_Sirius_career_change.html . Inquirer article: http://www.philly.com/philly/entertainment/20130307_Smerconish_leaving_WPHT_for_SiriusXM.html
 
Losing Smerconish is no big deal, except it will delete a hugh chunk of payroll cost. He is truly a radio has-been. He's smart: leave while still having some value.
 
Smerconish is not "conservative" and left the GOP a few years back. I don't really care about that but I am certain that a lot of conservative listeners tuned him out. My issue was after he went "national", his show became a borefest. He was very strong on local issues and customs but I think he spread himself too thin. JMO
 
Stigall is probably the best thing to happen to that station. Definitely the strongest talker they have IMHO. Dom is ok for his current slot, but they need someone compelling to go up against Rush. I don't know who that someone is, but they need to find that person because it definitely wasn't Smerconish. The afternoon show needs work too.
 
So after reading the link, I am supposed to believe from Smerconish that more independents listen to satellite and that he will do better with them than he would with traditional radio? It makes no sense to me.

Honestly, after Stern leaves Sirius, it is pretty much all over for sat radio, imo. Auto manufacturers have already begun installing Pandora in new cars. With an auto being a hot spot, internet radio is the future.
 
MDefl said:
So after reading the link, I am supposed to believe from Smerconish that more independents listen to satellite and that he will do better with them than he would with traditional radio? It makes no sense to me.
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The thing about satellite is that people subscribe for the service. It's a different business model. He doesn't have to convince a bunch of radio stations to carry his show, or advertisers to buy spots. He feels his syndication has been limited by radio stations that want one point of view. Satellite doesn't care about that. To them, he's just more content for subscribers.
 
A

I completely understand that. My point is that a majority subscribe to satellite for Howard Stern. When he leaves which I think is a year or 2 away (and given his acrimonious relationship with Sirius almost a certainty), Siruis will have far fewer listeners than they have today and what they have today is only a small fraction of the overall listenership.
 
MDefl said:
A

I completely understand that. My point is that a majority subscribe to satellite for Howard Stern. When he leaves which I think is a year or 2 away (and given his acrimonious relationship with Sirius almost a certainty), Siruis will have far fewer listeners than they have today and what they have today is only a small fraction of the overall listenership.
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1. Documented proof that the majority of the SXM audience subscribes only for Stern.

2. Where the hell is he going to go if he leaves SXM? Terrestrial doesn't want him back because they don't want the headaches and despite all the hype, podcasts would make his audience even smaller than his SXM audience (and let's not kid ourselves--fewer people listen to him on SXM than on terrestrial). Steve Dahl and Adam Corolla's podcast schemes don't have the listeners they had on terrestrial--do you really think the so-called "King of All Media" would be any different?
 
Can someone provide a link to numbers that show Stern is the main reason people listen to S/XM?

We have two XM radios, one in each car. We don't listen to Stern at all. Music stations primarily, occasionally a news station and the traffic channel for Philly when I miss traffic on the 2s on KYW. Also, I know several friends and family members who have it. There are several more among this group who don't listen to Stern at all (although a few do listen). From my own personal observations from speaking with people who have S/XM, I'd say the most popular thing is the music channels.

One thing I don't hear anyone listening to: the S/XM talk radio channels. I have friends, family who like pop, rock, country, classical, jazz, standards, decade channels, etc. No one ever says to me, "I listen to S/XM for talk radio."

Which gets back to Smerconish ... even though he was on only 70 or 80 (depending on the source you read) radio stations, I've gotta assume he may actually have fewer listeners once he goes to S/XM.
 
radiophiler said:
Which gets back to Smerconish ... even though he was on only 70 or 80 (depending on the source you read) radio stations, I've gotta assume he may actually have fewer listeners once he goes to S/XM.
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Suppose he gets paid the same or more, and doesn't have to beat his head against the wall for those 70 affiliates?
 
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