Breaking them down.....
Justin Case said:
Tony, but KTU went #1 after its launch without that abundance of current, the station for all the KTU sucks comments is basically back to where it was, rhythmic leaning pop/dance with recurrent and gold dance... mainstream public likes the familiar... a sharper lean to the classic dance tweak saved the station earlier this decade when rhythmic stations across the country were blown up in favor of other formats. Over the last two years they've essentially tweaked back to what worked before - just we're 14 years later and the disco has by in large been replaced with late 80's and 90's gold, with earlier 2000's recurrents, mixing with current rhythmic pop tracks and mass appeal dance cuts.
It became number 1 because dance (for whatever genre it was) was missing for 5 years on the NYC dial so in that sense people just accepted it, but those that were more core in nature wished there were more currents. In the process of doing their tweak, the lean went further into women 25-54 (which was 'KTU's main audience anyway) and yes, stayed on the familiar.
Justin Case said:
So what do we have? We have a dance leaning pop station basically with 4.5-5 million listeners, the third most listened to station in America, in a market currently swamped with 4 pop/rhythmic sounding stations... Z, Now, Party, and KTU... that's a success and to most people, KTU is dance, period!
In terms of the target audience they have sought, 'KTU is dance..yes. But ask someone under 30. They may call 'KTU "dance" but more for their parents or older folks with music that didn't reach to their tastes (meaning the under 30's). Those under 30, are the people that listened to Pulse, Now and to a small extent, Z-100 and as well as those above that age that didn't like 'KTU
s presentation of the format and wanted that "edge". They may listen to 'KTU in an older adult's car but I don't necessarily see them tuning in outside of that. 'KTU isn't for them, nor was it meant to be, so right there you have a segmented audience. That's also why 'KTU really didn't feel much of a "threat" when Pulse was around.
Justin Case said:
My question is, what would happen if they tweaked even more to current dance, would they win or lose audience - I think that's what they are probably asking themselves too... can we pick up the 800,000 pulse dance fans and not chase away mass public numbers, while just as importantly to the bean counters that write the checks to flank between Lite and Z to protect the company line...
Honestly, it would be a BIG mistake for 'KTU to tweak things to current dance at this point. It's like I said, those under 30 aren't going to rush over to 'KTU because even if they did lean more current dance, there will still be the 90's and 80's recurrents in there to which current based fans may not be necessarily into. Granted, Pulse did play classic freestyle, something that 'KTU recently took OUT as part of revamping the format to where it is now. The ONLY appeal with 'KTU going current while mainly keeping format, should they do that, is the fact that the station DOES NOT play hip-hop, something that Party does and has had its share of criticism for doing so. That would be the only "catch". And yes, they still have to consider the Lite/Z-100 cluster. In that sense it would be a mistake for 'KTU to go current. They set their audience to W 25-54, to which they have been consistently in the Top 5 with. If that works for them, great...why change? But you do have an audience that mainly wants current dance out there.
The one station above 92 that could benefit with doing a current dance lean? 92.3 NOW.
