NYC Metro Radio Ratings November 2022

[AceBiscuits]

I just still not sure the use for Q104.3 for IHM.

1. It performs very well for men 18-34, which is a desirable demographic.
2. It bills well, generating revenue for the company.

The NYC cluster is one of if not the most important cluster in the company. If iHeart had a weak station, they’d be doing something about it.

 

[DOB]

Q104.3 is the perfect male compliment to iHeartRadio's NYC wall of women. Then you have wwpr, which makes the cluster offer a complete blanket of the audience that advertisers want to reach.
Q104.3 is a special NYC adjusted classic rocker. It's to make the station more mass appeal but also they are competing with CBS Fm too.
Listen to the Q, in a set of 10 songs, often times only 2 songs will be ones that CBS Fm doesn't play. You will hear 70s and 80s pop rock songs that very few, some of any, classic rock stations play.
Q is a very well programmed radio station. Every market can support a classic rock station but Q really does it well for New York and just the right balanced playlist that keeps their rock cred and also brilliantly competes with CBS Fm. They play rock but sound New York by playing many for example Billy Joel songs that stations in other markets would never touch.

As for the new music discussion, the Adele example is perfect. She is a top well known artist and yet Easy on me never became a true mass appeal hit, and there haven't been any other songs from the album that made it, they released one follow up that was a stiff.
Just listen to the stations that play currents and observe how much gold is playing a bigger part in their playlists then ever before.

 

[AceBiscuits]

WINS-FM-HD2 1.3 down to 0.8. HD2 was "New Arrivals". I am assuming it went down since new arrivals disappeared and was
replaced with the main WNYL Alternative?

Again, WNYL-FM/HD1's ratings were combined or "renamed" to WINS-FM-HD2. New Arrivals Channel never encoded for PPM, so ratings were never measured for it. The drop from 1.3 to 0.8 is actually a drop from the alternative feed moving from FM to HD2 halfway through the book while encoding the same as it did on FM.

The WINS-AM listings (including WINS-AM-Stream) was renamed WINS-FM, as both the AM and FM feeds encode the same.

 

[MVB13]

1. It performs very well for men 18-34, which is a desirable demographic.
2. It bills well, generating revenue for the company.

The NYC cluster is one of if not the most important cluster in the company. If iHeart had a weak station, they’d be doing something about it.

I think Power is the weak link since it's the lowest.

 

[davideduardo]

I'm not sure how Q104.3 does well if Rock isn't a format NYC is friendly towards. 🤔 Also why is Q104.3 there in the first place, what's IHM's strategy for them in their cluster they seem out of place. Is it to protect Lite FM?

Nobody said Q’s format was not doing well. it is just that out of the 100% of audience, there are relatively few total shares for rock.

 

[dcowboy7]

Being spanish stations came up can anyone answer this question....
I notice alot of the songs have the same back drumbeat - bum BUM bum bum....repeat....why is that ??
Example "woman" by doja cat which i know cause it was a top 40 hit too.
I dont listen to it but when i hear it in stores or other cars i hear that beat alot & i mean alot.
Mainstream pop top 40 songs obv have a backbeat too but they seem to vary more in sound/speed unlike spanish songs.

 

[AceBiscuits]

I think Power is the weak link since it's the lowest.

Another situation where revenue/billing of the station keeps that format in place. 6+ ratings isn't everything. It is also the home station for The Breakfast Club.

WQHT and WWPR trade blows back and forth with one station being over the other and vice-versa. The hip-hop audience primarily relies on streaming, so it will be interesting to see how these two stations tend with that long-term. Perhaps one may move to a more gold-based presentation (a la WXBK, and to an extent KPWR) one day.

 

[davideduardo]

I think Power is the weak link since it's the lowest.

The lowest in what? It does very well in its target demo and bills quite respectably.

The two giant English language broadcasters have 14 stations that are not simulcasts. The two Spanish language operators have, together, 3 stations. Good Karma and Mediaco have 4 competitive stations.

Power beats 6 of those stations. And it is likely that all 21 make money, as do a number of the ethnic and brokered stations as well... and income, not ratings, is the important factor here.

 

[davideduardo]

WQHT and WWPR trade blows back and forth with one station being over the other and vice-versa.

The other factor: WQHT does much, much better with Hispanics and non-Hispanic whites, while Power has the higher percentage of Black only audience.

 

[kevtronics]

Being spanish stations came up can anyone answer this question....
I notice alot of the songs have the same back drumbeat - bum BUM bum bum....repeat....why is that ??
Example "woman" by doja cat which i know cause it was a top 40 hit too.
I dont listen to it but when i hear it in stores or other cars i hear that beat alot & i mean alot.
Mainstream pop top 40 songs obv have a backbeat too but they seem to vary more in sound/speed unlike spanish songs.

There are no real drummers in pop music anymore. It's all programmed on a computer using digital samples. So the same programming and samples can be copied and used over and over again with slight modifications. For example, that skittering Hip-Hop-style beat that's used on everything from the latest Top 40, R&B, and Country hits to TV commercials for laundry detergent.

And really that's nothing new. When the Gibb brothers produced Barbra Streisand's "Woman in Love", they reused the drum track from a Bee Gees disco song, slowed way down to a ballad tempo. Reusing drum tracks also made the Beatles (with posthumous John Lennon) sound like ELO, Shania Twain and the Corrs sound like Bryan Adams, and Britney Spears and Celine Dion sound like the Backstreet Boys.

 

[Marcos_C]

Being spanish stations came up can anyone answer this question....
I notice alot of the songs have the same back drumbeat - bum BUM bum bum....repeat....why is that ??

Yes, I have noticed that a lot of reggaeton songs have the same drumbeat. Honestly, I have never minded so many reggaeton songs using the drumbeat, nor have I questioned it.

 

[VicRadio]

I know the signal is limited but 94.7 should be able to adjust to get some of that WBLS pie.
Yes, WBLS heritage loyalty is unparalleled in this market, but getting just a little more sharing should be maximized. Obviously in New York it's a much better piece in their cluster than Country ever was.

This market has so much gold music playing on every signal now.
90s on wnew, WKTU(few 80s too), and wxbk.
Whtz goes back to 2000.
Wqht and wwpr play 2000s.
And obviously WCBS, WLTW, Waxq and the leader WBLS.
I think that makes the state of new music as a new level of awful. What new songs work now are lots of rehashes of older hits too.
It's subjective I guess, but I wonder if we are now in a place where true mass appeal hits are a thing of the past. Maybe Blinding lights or even Uptown funk will go down in history as the last truly mass appeal hit song.

About 94.7 the block… the reason why the ratings are low is because they play the same throwbacks all the time. There’s thousands of records that were #1 on the charts that they don’t play. They have great on air personalities, but they need to work on their playlist. What Audacy fails to understand is that New York is different from Chicago, LA and San Fran. New York is an urban city. 98.7 should have been a throwback station before they decide to sell to Espn. This is my opinion. I wish 94.7 the block the best, because Skip Dillard is a nice person, Miss Jones, Shelley Wade, mr cee and ed lover are great people. Let see what happens. Peace

 

[victorres43]

About 94.7 the block… the reason why the ratings are low is because they play the same throwbacks all the time. There’s thousands of records that were #1 on the charts that they don’t play. They have great on air personalities, but they need to work on their playlist. What Audacy fails to understand is that New York is different from Chicago, LA and San Fran. New York is an urban city. 98.7 should have been a throwback station before they decide to sell to Espn. This is my opinion. I wish 94.7 the block the best, because Skip Dillard is a nice person, Miss Jones, Shelley Wade, mr cee and ed lover are great people. Let see what happens. Peace

Maybe the Block needs to expand the playlist a little bit, though not too excessively to the point that a lot of stiffs in a row are played.

With the claim that New York is more urban in music taste than Chicago and LA... WBMX is closer to WVAZ than WBBM-FM circa 1990s. And urban KRRL is doing better than Rhythmic KPWR in LA. (KJLH has higher 6+ shares than KDAY, though KDAY cumes more.)

 

[davideduardo]

About 94.7 the block… the reason why the ratings are low is because they play the same throwbacks all the time. There’s thousands of records that were #1 on the charts that they don’t play.

That is the case with all stations that play oldies/gold/throwbacks, no matter what the format. Stations test each and every potential song among listeners or possible listeners. Only the songs that do not have strong negatives get played.

Charts from the past are history. Whether a song from "back in the day" can be played today depends on asking people how much they still like it and want to hear it now.

They have great on air personalities, but they need to work on their playlist.

It's near a total certainty that they researched the playlist, right down to getting the right proportion of Hispanics, African Americans and non-Hispanic whites in the sample.

What Audacy fails to understand is that New York is different from Chicago, LA and San Fran.

That is why music is tested in each market for stations in larger markets.

 

[TheBigA]

About 94.7 the block… the reason why the ratings are low is because they play the same throwbacks all the time.

The playlist for The Block is one of the biggest in NYC. It's bigger than WCBS-FM. It's bigger than Q104. They change half of that playlist every week. So I'm saying the library they draw on is huge. This is what I see looking at Mediabase. Almost 600 songs, with 300 getting replaced every week. WKTU has less than 400 songs,

 

[davideduardo]

The playlist for The Block is one of the biggest in NYC. It's bigger than WCBS-FM. It's bigger than Q104. They change half of that playlist every week. So I'm saying the library they draw on is huge. This is what I see looking at Mediabase. Almost 600 songs, with 300 getting replaced every week. WKTU has less than 400 songs,

And that research you did makes me think that the list may be too long, particularly if they want to attract Hispanics who are the larger group in their coverage area.

Thanks for doing the comparative analysis. I never would have guessed the song count was so different.

 

[JeremyAndrews]

WBMX has generally been playing the same songs since they launched 5 years ago. A couple years ago they added in a couple more recent songs from 2017, which was the year the station launched. I have not listened much lately, but when I do there's nothing out of the ordinary there. Same songs as always.

Ratings have been steady. It could be compared to when it was an Oldies station in the 80s-2000s. They played the same songs for years. This is basically a modern variation of Rhythmic Oldies. That format was also extremely limited in what they played. But they have more to work with. They can play more than just Motown and Disco. They can play Hip-Hop, R&B, they can mix in some 80s, they can sneak in pop, they can add newer songs. Ratings in general have been the same. It's popular among 30-something Hispanics.

I'm a 35 year old white male. Most of the music I heard on Top-40 growing up. Some of it I heard on Rhythmic CHR, some I heard on Urban stations, but the vast majority was played on Top-40 and Rhythmic. 35-54 Adults who listened to any of these formats growing up should be familiar with the music.

 

[TheBigA]

WBMX has generally been playing the same songs since they launched 5 years ago.

They may draw on the same basic library, but the number of spins of the songs changes every week. This week, Bone Thugs N Harmony received 18 spins, making it most played. Last week, Mariah Carey's Fantasy was played 21 times. They also cycle half of their playlist every week, like WXBK.

WBMX's playlist is exactly half the size of WXBK's playlist.

 

[JeremyAndrews]

WBMX's playlist is exactly half the size of WXBK's playlist.

Like David said above, that might be one of the problems with WXBK.

There's going to be burnout with some songs. Resting them for awhile and putting others in, and then adding them back, changing the amount of spins over periods of time is pretty basic with Gold based formats. Guessing whatever they do is the result of music testing. If people don't want to hear it anymore, they'll ease up on them. If they want to hear them more, they'll up the spins.

 

[Theater of My Mind]

It's near a total certainty that they (WXBK) researched the playlist, right down to getting the right proportion of Hispanics, African Americans and non-Hispanic whites in the sample.

That is why music is tested in each market for stations in larger markets.

Same explanation every time. And as icing on the cake it's a rhythmic station which, as we are endlessly reminded here, is all New York wants to hear. Endless research plus rhythmic format = can you believe what a BIG WINNER this formula has created in NYC?

Except for the umpteenth time in a row WXBK shows up with a sub-2 share. 1.4 this time, down from 1.7. Even Alt did better than that.