MOVIN dies in PPM

[TakeItFromMe]

My friends in Dallas report that MOVIN Dallas is dead and will flip Spanish soon :-[ Seems MOVIN formats, AM News-Talk and Smooth Jazz are hurtin big time in the PPM in lots of markets :-\

Lots of anticipation at the Entercom cluster with a big PPM event set for advertisers this month. Some big data to show off for the tin cans in Seattle. AAA, Rock, Alternative and WOLF Young Countries all look boffo in the PPM so Entercom looks like the market winner 8)

This cowboy bets CBS is the next big winner with KZOK, JACK and COMPASS 8)

Biggest PPM losers got to be a tie between Sandusky, Clear Channel, Fisher and Boneaville Each have got one station that will probably be okay in PPM like WARM and KJR-FM and STAR and KIRO play by play sports. The other AM stations, Rhythmic, Smooth Jazz and now MOVIN look like they are gonna be makin cowpies Course maybe the biggest loser of all is KCMS, cause PPM ain't kind to that format at all :-\ One thing for sure, things will be changing ???

 

[AQH]

With pre-currency coming in April (everybody on this board knows what that is, right?), I'm surprised it has taken this long for some PPM discussion lately.

 

[Jay F]

I disagree about KCMS. You say PPM isn't kind to the format at all. Yet KLTY/Dallas (along with KCMS the most successful station in the format) is doing well with PPM. Another Contemporary Christian station, WFSH/Atlanta, is doing better in PPM than it ever did in the diary system.

 

[TVradioguru]

I disagree about KCMS. You say PPM isn't kind to the format at all. Yet KLTY/Dallas (along with KCMS the most successful station in the format) is doing well with PPM. Another Contemporary Christian station, WFSH/Atlanta, is doing better in PPM than it ever did in the diary system.

I agree with Jay. Contemporary Christian stations should do well with PPM because the TSL is shown to be quite high.

The main problem with a Movin station according to the research I've seen, is unless you're willing to buy a lot of TV to keep the format top-of-mind, it fades into the background with listeners rather rapidly. Since promotions budgets are the first thing on the chopping block in a bad advertising economy, blowing that much on TV other than a launch is out of the question.

 

[Seattleradiodude]

unless you're willing to buy a lot of TV to keep the format top-of-mind, it fades into the background with listeners rather rapidly.

I’m sorry but this couldn’t be FURTHER from the truth.

Extensive PPM studies in active markets with encoded commercials have shown that the repetition required for a TV spot to have
Any significant effect is a 100% waste of promotional dollars. TV is absolutely not the way to promote a radio station and promotion
Departments everywhere must find better ways to get the station "to stick".

That being said, lets also remember that the name and frequency of a station now is no longer as important as it was with the diary system.
EVERY tune in with PPM will result in addition to the stations ratings data. Listeners no longer need to be drilled with constant reminders of who they are listening to.
Heritage stations WILL be hurt because of this.

PPM is a whole new game folks!! EVERYONE needs to think creatively!
Traditional Promotions and Programming no longer works and thats why huge changes have been made in the PPM active markets.

 

[LITTLEBOYBLUE]

PPM is a whole new game folks!! EVERYONE needs to think creatively!

So are we saying something really dumb like....."PROGRAM A STATION WITH GREAT CONTENT?" YeeGods...that seems like such a backwards strategy after all these years of trying to "fool" listeners and get them to write your slogan, contest, calls, etc. in a diary ...and program AROUND any decent content.

Anyone notice the correlation between when we took our eyes off the prize and when our listeners got bored and went elsewhere?

Didn't think so.

 

[brlmedia]

well with 2 movin's gone in 2 days, there had to be a reason, if ppm was part of it, other movin's might be in trouble?

 

[TVradioguru]

I’m sorry but this couldn’t be FURTHER from the truth.


PPM is a whole new game folks!! EVERYONE needs to think creatively!
Traditional Promotions and Programming no longer works and thats why huge changes have been made in the PPM active markets.

Well I for one wouldn't argue that something creative needs to be done by someone, but for whatever reason, perhaps it's the demographic, having to stay in the face to remind listeners of a Movin station seems to be necessary. As we've seen so far, if one doesn't even sample, then the PPM obviously won't give credit.

Movin saw a relatively big pop when the, (albeit dumb), TV spots were running. I guess what I was trying to suggest, is the ONLY way Movin in Seattle is going to save its a$$ with that format, is to blitz TV and drive cume while metered. If it doesn't, then it will be movin the way of the Dodo.

 

[Bongwater]

I’m sorry but this couldn’t be FURTHER from the truth.


PPM is a whole new game folks!! EVERYONE needs to think creatively!
Traditional Promotions and Programming no longer works and thats why huge changes have been made in the PPM active markets.

Well I for one wouldn't argue that something creative needs to be done by someone, but for whatever reason, perhaps it's the demographic, having to stay in the face to remind listeners of a Movin station seems to be necessary. As we've seen so far, if one doesn't even sample, then the PPM obviously won't give credit.

Movin saw a relatively big pop when the, (albeit dumb), TV spots were running. I guess what I was trying to suggest, is the ONLY way Movin in Seattle is going to save its a$$ with that format, is to blitz TV and drive cume while metered. If it doesn't, then it will be movin the way of the Dodo.

SHHHHH! Do you really want them to blitz us with more wiggling butts on TV?.......

 

[bossbill]

Even if all PPM does is eliminate the unfair advantage heritage stations have with faulty recall, then I like it.

Re: TV advertising...

"Extensive PPM studies in active markets with encoded commercials have shown that the repetition required for a TV spot to have
Any significant effect is a 100% waste of promotional dollars."

There is no advertising that is a 100% waste of dollars. Some forms of advertising are more effective than others. And I'd be interested in your sources for the "extensive PPM studies".

 

[djdan]

Interesting thread. MOVIN formats, Smooth Jazz, Urban, Hispanic, Rhythmic, all AM Stations are seeing significant declines in the PPM when you analyze all current PPM markets in total. There are always exceptions to the rule like the Christian station and the Hispanic station in Dallas, but in general these formats face larger declines. The biggest gains are seen with Sports (especially play by play), HOT/AC, CHR, ROCK and Classic Hits formats. AC and Country see moderate increases. This is why we are seeing a huge number of smooth jazz, hispanic and similar stations getting blown up. Sports stations and CHR stations are being added. Look for an announcement in La and Boston this week with a new CHR in each. 22 of the 50 PPM markets have added sports stations, many on FM, this year. Seattle will get a new one next month. Moral of the story. If you have a format that wins in PPM, expect competition right away from losing stations.

Heritage CHR, AC, HOT/AC and ROCK morning shows are seeing substantial increases in PPM, but only the ones that play some music. Those that talk all the time are seeing declines. Maybe they aren't as interesting as they think they are? TV promotion may be more vital than ever, according to PPM panelist Jerry Lee. Not the bland music or image campaigns but exciting TV that creates "appointment" listening according to Lee. He should know, his station may be the biggest PPM winner in the country in Philadelphia.

So what does this mean for Seattle? Nothing. Each market seems to have its own quirks. TSL is important, but any arbitrion PPM panel will confirm that CUME is the key. Stations that cume like CHR's, Play by Play, HOT/AC, Classic Rock seem the real winners. Stations with small cumes and big TSL like Smooth Jazz, Urban Hispanic tend to have tough times. There are always exceptions and I would bet money Seattle will have a few.

One other thing to keep in mind. Under the PPM "going up" is relative. The average station in PPM declines 30% in GRP's. Sales managers are scratching their heads right now as are all of us in the rep world. How do we sell declining ratings in a down economy? Very challenging.

 

[TVradioguru]

Anyone notice the correlation between when we took our eyes off the prize and when our listeners got bored and went elsewhere?

Didn't think so.

I interpret your meaning in "the prize" as representing the popularity that radio held when it was the only game in town anywhere in the US. The fact remains that technology, and marketing of it therein, combined with economic conditions are what put pressure on traditional broadcasting.

You're certainly entitled to your opinion on the ills of terrestrial radio and play the blame game, but just as FM started dilution of AM listening back in the 1970's, cassette tapes, CDs, MP3 players, satellite radio, and now streaming content, have reduced traditional radio listening nationwide by about 10% to date, most of that measured in the form of advertising revenue where it counts as a business.

I for one see some of the best, and most stable days ahead for traditional radio and television. Wall Street has turned it's collective back on broadcasting, and I see that as a good thing! The reason being that radio has no business being owned by publicly traded companies, who's share price fate is driven by 22 year old stock pundits which understand the business about as well as some posters on this board.

Will radio or television return to the hay days of being the only electronic entertainment game in town? No chance, those days are over, even if you paid listeners to listen to your radio station. And believe it or not, it has nothing to do with what music the stations play...

What's to come for many stations will be forced liquidation from the large publicly traded corporations, to more regional family-owned LLC's and S-Corps. Radio will settle into the model where it runs the best, as a locally/regionally owned business, but it will still, as it has from the beginning, still be a business rather than a commodity.

 

[LITTLEBOYBLUE]

No...not waxing nostalgic for different era. Am simply saying that if you run a business (ANY business) and forget what your product is and who the customer is .... you're toast. The moment Wall Street began to reverse engineer this business to make the only focus a bottom line, the product and customer were off the table.

Damn hard to program a great radio station if you don't have a blueprint of who would CARE in the first place, and how to reach that specific group of people.

By doing marathon sweeps of over-burned songs, having talk hosts repeat the same rants, etc. --- probably not going to keep ANYONE who is supposed to be interested in those formats remotely involved. THEN, as you point out, all those competing media are wide open to eat radio's lunch. But those other media don't have most of the advantages radio has ... but that advantage is USELESS if the perception is that achieving that "quality content" standard is an unnecessary expense.

NEWS, done well, is great example of quality content.

MUSIC ... in the RARE cases, the jukebox thing can work. Otherwise, what is really wrong with talented, interesting people who can tie it together. Maybe it's humor...maybe it's knowledge of the music...maybe it's just someone who does a great job of making people feel like part of the community ..... but I do know that "KR-KR-KR-KR-KRAPPPPPPP FM.....WE REALLY ROCKKKKKKKKK" liners really don't deliver on that "connecting" front.

TALK ... this one is tough. A person just wrote a fascinating article about Rush ... saying that as an old "jock" he knew that you have to shake up the bushes to get people to listen. But the act is getting old...yet if you stray from the act you lose the listening base, and certainly if you add any degree of "truth" or "intellect" to the act, you'll especially lose THAT listening base. Intellectual talk doesn't attract listeners....hateful and dumb, relatable talk does. Unfortunately I really believe that "dumbing down" is what has made most of our recent elections so primitive and based on so many attacks and lies. People find that very much like the talk radio they tune in every day. Air America has never gone to that extreme ... and it's why they have so much trouble getting any traction in any market.

THAT's what I mean about the product and content.

 

[kentuckymedia]

We had a talk in a recent market that we just picked up about PPM vs DIARY. This market will go PPM this year, so it was very important we got a lot of the basics out of the way.

DIARY:

Its 100% based on recall. You have to remember something about the station from dial position to moniker or morning show and dial position. I could write down Jackie and Bender, but Kiss wont get credit unless I write down KISS or 106.1 or KBKS and the list goes on and on.

The reason Rhythmic, Urban, Jazz, Spanish all do so well under Diary is due to the "unenhanced method" which is sad but true. If I were listening to KUBE this afternoon and I heard a song I didnt like, I am going to switch to KISS. So I listen 6-10 minutes on my comute home and they play a commercial, so I flip back to KUBE. I open my diary and write down I listened to KUBE for 20 minutes. I lied to Arbitron!!! I didnt tell them about flipping to Kiss for a few minutes then going back.

PPM:

Completely different game. It monitors EVERYTHING you listen to! It even picks up internet streams at work and HD2 subchannels. Im not going to write in my diary I listened to HD2 subchannel, Im going to write down I listened to KUBE.

Look what happened in NYC. Z100 used to have a cume of 2 Million people. With PPM it has a cume of 5.5 Million listeners....what? Because if Im listening to HOT 97 and they play a commercial, im gonna flip to Z100. Then go back to HOT 97. Holy cow, the PPM said I listened to both and gave them both credit. If I were filling out a diary, I would have wrote down I listened to HOT 97 the entire time giving them the advantage.

 

[radioprofessor]

A big asterisk to this whole discussion about the PPM parameter versus the Diary parameter is that markets in both are radically different. I find it amusing, in my humble view, that programmers are projecting PPM success looking at other markets. One would never do that with diary methodology. Based on LA, Dallas, Boston, Chicago would youproject Mainstream CHR is number one in Seattle ??? That is the case in the diary. Each market is different. Formats are different, populations are different and competition is different. I have worked from SF to Boston to LA to Seattle. Seattle is dominated by Country music in the diary, but in SF and LA Country music is a non-factor. It could be the same in the PPM. MOVIN formats are failing everywhere but the format parameter has had limited success in Seattle. Why wouldn't that be true in the PPM? In general I agree that cume based formats work better in the PPM but who really has the cume in Seattle? Hard to say at this point. If KIRO AM goes sports with the Mariners play by play, the only bet is April 1st many will be tuned in to hear the return of Griffey. It just so happens the PPM begins the same day. There is luck in all of this too, in my humble view.