Now 97.5: Feel The Excitement!

[DToTheJ]

From Greater Media Philadelphia's website:

Bala Cynwyd, PA (September 8, 2008): Greater Media has officially unveiled NOW 97.5 FM in Philadelphia. The exciting new, younger leaning adult contemporary format will feature a variety of artists ranging from Madonna, Rob Thomas and Kelly Clarkson to Rod Stewart, Elton John and Phil Collins.

“We saw a great opportunity for a station that takes a new, younger approach to today’s soft rock in the Philadelphia market,” said Greater Media Vice President and Market Manager John Fullam. “We are excited to offer our listeners this exciting new choice.”

Maybe it's me, but I think the folks at Greater Media are a little excited over this new station. Three times in two paragraphs, including two in the same sentence?

Is it worth getting so worked up over a station that's just going to change course once again in 18 months?

 

[Soon Yi CIV.V]

Eighteen months is a bit generous, don't you agree? I'm thinking they're going to sound quite a bit different in four months.

 

[eyg2181]

im gonna say 6 months. tops.

 

[John1]

Or in 6 weeks when they go all-Christmas...

 

[orange434]

can someone explain to me what they are doing? in the last 3 hours, i count TEN songs that were in the former WJJZ playlist! how on earth is this a younger leaning AC? do they have any idea what they're doing?

 

[CTNYRADIO]

Yawn...what a bore--so predictible. Safe, overplayed songs, I mean, do we really need to hear more Rob Thomas and Phil Collins? I mean come on.... I bet they wont even have real DJ's--just some voicetracked crapola.

 

[jaypea]

orange434: it has nothing to do with the music and everything to do with positioning.

because perception is reality, for years mainstream AC's have had to fight the "old fogey" station image. they'd combat this by dropping some older softer tunes and adding newer harder tunes. but that never worked because it changed the whole feel of the station and affected the audience make-up. this caused inconsistencies in ratings and revenue.

someone somewhere decided rather than change the sound and feel of the station, let's just bash them over the head with the message that our mix is younger sounding. true or not, if you say it long enough and with enough conviction, it becomes the new perceived reality.

here's the problem in this situation though. greedy media has learned nothing from the B101/Sunny battle a few years ago. B101 has a bigger audience in the order of a magnitude. so anything a challenging station does, B101 will do--even if it's stupid like Now's "younger approach." this makes it seem to B's listeners (or at least those who will eventually sample Now) that they were first, and the challenger is just trying to get over on B101 by copying them. driving home this afternoon, B101 was now pushing the position that they are, "Today's Soft Rock--younger, fresher......better." and to millions of listeners who have yet to even know about 97.5's switch, B101 will have been the first to make this position known. Now will always be an also-ran...

 

[nd2023]

Now 97.5 should take out billboards, SEPTA ads, TV commercials. They need the exposure to get people to sample them. It won't spread by word of mouth because it's a cookie cutter AC.
"Check out this awesome dance station Pulse 87, it sounds way better than KTU and is the hottest new station in town"
"Check out Now 97.5, it sounds exactly like B101, but since it says it's younger, I don't feel old listening to them"

Guess which station is more successful by word of mouth

 

[jaypea]

nick: greedy media will never do that. 1) they're too cheap (it wasn't until the bitter end that they broke down and bought some billboards and bus ad's for 'JJZ). and 2) in this case jerry lee will outspend them ten-times over. you watch. within weeks B101 will be plastered all over the place. we haven't had a B101 ad storm since Sunny collapsed...

 

[nd2023]

I see many ads for Magic 98.3 on the backs of CoachUSA buses all over NJ. Even in Atlantic City and New York City, I have seen bus ads for Magic 98.3, which is a waste. Bus ads tend to work well for stations with a large signal and buses which don't go too far.

 

[TheBigA]

can someone explain to me what they are doing? in the last 3 hours, i count TEN songs that were in the former WJJZ playlist! how on earth is this a younger leaning AC? do they have any idea what they're doing?

I like that idea. They shouldn't completely lose the JJZ listeners, or they're going to have to start from scratch and the fall ratings book is just two weeks away. If I was them, I'd play at least one JJZ vocal song per cluster. Try to keep the old listeners who still have their pre-sets on 97.5.

 

[nd2023]

The common theme between WJJZ and Now 97.5 is that both are good stations for at work listening. Just hope the WJJZ listeners are still listening to the same station. But in this age of Internet radio, they can just pick a smooth jazz station from somewhere else.

 

[orange434]

can someone explain to me what they are doing? in the last 3 hours, i count TEN songs that were in the former WJJZ playlist! how on earth is this a younger leaning AC? do they have any idea what they're doing?

I like that idea. They shouldn't completely lose the JJZ listeners, or they're going to have to start from scratch and the fall ratings book is just two weeks away. If I was them, I'd play at least one JJZ vocal song per cluster. Try to keep the old listeners who still have their pre-sets on 97.5.

i highly doubt playing the AC vocals that were heard on JJZ would keep any of the former JJZ P-1s at all. they tuned in for the instrumentals. unless Now starts cranking out "songbird" from kenny g there isn't going to be any holdover.

 

[TheBigA]

unless Now starts cranking out "songbird" from kenny g there isn't going to be any holdover.

Are you serious? Is Kenny G still alive?

 

[John1]

Since B101 owns the 'Fresh' name they can always counter with that if they see any slip in ratings (unlikely) dropping some older songs as they've done before and becoming the 'Fresh, new sound of B101'. I doubt they'll have to play that card - they have a fiercely loyal audience who doesn't tune away. The women I work with who listen to B101 complained when they started Christmas music early a few years back - then they turned off their radios for a few weeks rather than to try and sample another station!

 

[DToTheJ]

The common theme between WJJZ and Now 97.5 is that both are good stations for at work listening. Just hope the WJJZ listeners are still listening to the same station. But in this age of Internet radio, they can just pick a smooth jazz station from somewhere else.

... until that station ends up being blown up... rinse, lather, repeat...

 

[fennessy]

Excited! Excited? Why wouldn't they be. Who wouldn't be excited about a radio station with absolutely no talk for your work day, a continuous all in a row mix of today's favorites that everybody at work can agree on. I'm so excited, I'm having a sex change...and after that, I'm marching back in to work to change all of the radios to 97.5, with a continuous mix of today's favorites that everyone at work can agree on, because there's absolutely no talk for my work day. Then, I'll email and text all my new girl friends, and tell them about the all new, all in a row, one right after the other, continuous mix of today's fresh favorites on Now 97.5, that everybody at work can agree on, and when they all get jobs, they'll march into their offices and switch every radio to the new sound of Now 97.5, today's fresh new mix of today's favorites for your workday that everyone at work can agree on, with absolutely no talk for our workday. And if we all earn enough money, we'll all have swimming pools installed in our backyards, shaped like the station with today's fresh new mix of today's favorites with absolutely no talk, that everybody at work and at the pool can agree on, continuously, all in a row, one right after the other, with no talk and hardly any commercial interruption for our work day.

I'm sorry...what was the question?

 

[LibertyNT]

Excited! Excited? Why wouldn't they be. Who wouldn't be excited about a radio station with absolutely no talk for your work day, a continuous all in a row mix of today's favorites that everybody at work can agree on. I'm so excited, I'm having a sex change...and after that, I'm marching back in to work to change all of the radios to 97.5, with a continuous mix of today's favorites that everyone at work can agree on, because there's absolutely no talk for my work day. Then, I'll email and text all my new girl friends, and tell them about the all new, all in a row, one right after the other, continuous mix of today's fresh favorites on Now 97.5, that everybody at work can agree on, and when they all get jobs, they'll march into their offices and switch every radio to the new sound of Now 97.5, today's fresh new mix of today's favorites for your workday that everyone at work can agree on, with absolutely no talk for our workday. And if we all earn enough money, we'll all have swimming pools installed in our backyards, shaped like the station with today's fresh new mix of today's favorites with absolutely no talk, that everybody at work and at the pool can agree on, continuously, all in a row, one right after the other, with no talk and hardly any commercial interruption for our work day.

I'm sorry...what was the question?

That would be hilarious if that became a commercial on TV for 97.5

 

[8638]

can someone explain to me what they are doing? in the last 3 hours, i count TEN songs that were in the former WJJZ playlist! how on earth is this a younger leaning AC? do they have any idea what they're doing?

I like that idea. They shouldn't completely lose the JJZ listeners, or they're going to have to start from scratch and the fall ratings book is just two weeks away. If I was them, I'd play at least one JJZ vocal song per cluster. Try to keep the old listeners who still have their pre-sets on 97.5.

I kept the presets on 97.5 when it flipped from classic rock to smooth jazz, as I like both formats. I was driving along yesterday when I remembered to hit the 97.5 button. I guess, since I'm not a chick, that I don't get this format. Deleted that preset pronto!

 

[AnotherCat]

can someone explain to me what they are doing? in the last 3 hours, i count TEN songs that were in the former WJJZ playlist! how on earth is this a younger leaning AC? do they have any idea what they're doing?

The smooth jazz format has been shifting to "smooth A/C" over the last year and the pop vocal to instrumental ratio is about 3:1 at this point so "SJ" plays a lot of Lite A/C. Obviously this means they were not giving SJ listeners what they came for so SJ listeners were bolting but they weren't imaging A/C so A/C listeners weren't listening so why not ust go ahead and turn into a mainstream A/C. No loss really unless you like to hear "100 ways" 100 times a day with some Kenny G thrown in.