Phil Boyce Speaks Out on Hannity and WDEL

[Julius Leonard Marx]

In the "ABC/Cumulus" (sic) discussion on the News/Talk Board, WABC Program Director Phil Boyce has been commenting on the circumstances which prompted Sean Hannity to move from WDEL to WILM, and responded to comments that ABC/Citadel has been "cramming" the show down stations' throats.

Among other things, Boyce says WDEL seemed not care much about keeping Hannity and that WDEL was "difficult to deal with."

Some excerpts:

When I say we are not big on cram downs, I mean that my company has not felt the need to start ordering Citadel owned stations to take our syndicated shows. Maybe some gentle persuasion, but in the case of Imus every station that took him wanted him. I hope we can maintain that position.

As for your direct accusation above, that simply is not true. We have had a few situations which I can count on one hand, where a competing station in the market offered to take Levin if they could get Hannity who was already in the market. In every case without exception we offered the existing Hannity affiliate the chance to keep Hannity if they would take Levin. They had first crack and first option. Some of them did so...and some of them did not. Panama City, Florida is a great example of a great station that chose to keep Hannity and add Levin live at 5-7pm. When I spoke to the GM there he had never paid much attention to Levin. He now is a very happy camper, the numbers are great, and Mark has developed into a local star.

The other example, which the previous thread was about, was in Wilmington. We offered WDEL the chance to keep Hannity live if they would add Levin at night. They said no, so we moved both to WILM. In the first rating book, WILM beat WDEL slightly. Not sure if that will continue, but both stations got what they asked for. WILM got two great shows, and WDEL opted to go live and local. I am not sure of the bad thing that happened there.

Julius says:

In that situation in Delaware that has been mentioned, as I recall the incumbent Hannity station was willing to take Levin on delay. Hannity was yanked and the new station is running Levin delayed anyway. That's strange.

Nope...got your factoid wrong here Julius. WDEL wanted no part of Mark Levin. WILM wanted both. So we offered both to WDEL. They passed knowing we would take both shows across the street. WDEL decided to go live and local, and many on this board praised them. Hey, me included. If you can find better local hosts than Hannity and Mark, go for it. They got what they wanted...and we got what we wanted.

case closed. And this is not a cram down. This is a business opportunity. We are in the business of getting Mark and Sean cleared on as many stations as possible.

In the example that I gave, WILM wanted a package deal. They wanted Hannity and Levin together. You can say they "stole Hannity" and maybe they did. But they didn't do it without the other station having a chance to keep Hannity if they would take Levin. As for the first station planning to get rid of Hannity anyway, I was never sure about that. They were a difficult station to deal with, and had threatened to cancel Hannity because a station liner was not turned around fast enough. We probably would not have even considered taking Hannity across town if not for that threat. We ended up getting Levin cleared as well, so we did our job.

 

[MikefromDelaware]

Whether it was a cram down would be in the eyes of the beholder or in this case the former beholder (WDEL). If they truly weren't happy with the numbers from Hannity's show they may not have made any effort to keep the show. Only someone like Rick Jensen or Pete Booker could truly answer that question and my guess is they consider this topic to be water under the bridge as their station has moved on and probably consider this topic to be ancient history.

I listen to both WDEL and WILM and both have made the adjustments as WDEL has made an impressive effort at being the live and local station for Wilmington and regaining their former image from years ago of being the major source for both national and local news in Wilmington (their former NBC radio days from the 50's through the early 70's), today it's CBS radio along with the news/interviews of Allan Loudell (former of WILM) and their many local newscasts throughout the day along with the exclusive live and local talk. The possible problem for WDEL is that their live and local talkers may not be able to pull in enough listeners day after day as sometimes a local topic can be "dry". I listen to both Al and Rick if the topic interests me. Sometimes I listen to Rush and Hannity, if their topics are of interest. At WDEL it's a bit more interesting as Al Messitti is a liberal and Rick is a conservative so you do get different points of view whereas with Rush and Hannity on WILM they both basically see eye to eye, the worst Rupublican is better than the best Democrat. Of course that only works when Al and Rick are discussing national topics rather than the hot button topics from Dover.

WILM, on the other hand has continued to be a solid news force in town, but not to their former level as they only have the morning drive news block (Hannity has the afternoon former newsblock), both have a mid day newsblock WILM's is a half hour, WDEL's is an hour. Also I noticed last week when there were cancelations due to the snow storm Loudell's afternoon drive newsblock on WDEL offered frequent coverage where as WILM had to deal with ABC's Hannity show and offered the info far less often. It didn't used to be that way at WILM (they traditional were the better source, since they became a newsradio station back in the 70's, but such not the case as life with national shows can get in the way of local programming. Frankly it surprised me WILM didn't cut away from Hannity to offer the local cancelation info more often. WILM does have Joe LeCompte doing live news updates along with traffic/weather during Hannity so it shouldn't have been a big deal to have Joe break away from Hannity for better cancellation coverage. My guess is, that was an over sight at WILM, and the next storm WILM will offer more coverage as they'll not want their listeners tuning over to WDEL to get that info.

Bottom line, as I see it, both have adjusted and do what they do very well. If you want to hear the big names in daytime talk (Rush/Hannity) then WILM is the place to be. If you want live and local with more local news during the day then WDEL is the place to be. Two different approaches done well. It will be interesting to see how the next book turns out as both stations were close in the last ratings 12+ with WILM having a slight lead.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

Sorry, Dude, you lost me.

The station executives might have "truly" answered the question but there is no way to know for sure who was telling the truth. The station tried to present it as a "cram down" or as a competitor stole Hannity. Now the syndicator says the station didn't seem interested in keeping the show and became "difficult" for the syndicator to deal with.

Somebody is not telling the truth. Maybe everybody.

 

[MikefromDelaware]

Well, let's face it, any executive, be he/she a radio executive or an industrial executive, etc, will try to put the best face or spin on a situation that maybe didn't work out the way they planned, etc. Prior to losing Hannity, WDEL was all about Rush and Hannity and Jensen would promote those shows during his former morning talk show as he'd pretty much agree with both conservative hosts. Today WDEL is all about live and local. My guess is, WDEL didn't want a change as they were doing fine ratings wise and it sure sounded like they had a decent spot load, so why change. Now as WDEL carries Phillies and sports talk in the evenings they may not have wanted to carry Mark Levin's new show from ABC radio and wasn't willing to make that change, especially if that was the only way they could keep Hannity. WILM made have made it known to Phil Boyce that they were interested thus giving ABC a Wilmington affiliate for those two shows may have not been willing to negoiate with WDEL any longer. As you said, we'll never know what exactly happened as Boyce will give it a spin that's positive for him, WDEL will give it a spin that works for them, and WILM may have a spin too. Bottom line, which was part of what I was saying in that prior post is, both stations adjusted and both are doing fine now, even though they both made major changes to their programming and how they do what they do. Wilmington has too good news/talk stations, not bad for a medium sized market #75.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

You are much closer to scene than I. I am an occasional I-95 drive-through listener. The market does seem to have more local programming than many. This brings to mind a debate that keeps coming up on other boards (like news/talk). Some people say syndicated shows are better and that people would rather listen to a good syndicated show than a bad local show. I say normal people are often oblivious to production values and voice quality and other things important to radio people. Often somebody who is clearly not a radio talent has developed a long-standing and devoted following in small and medium markets, possibly because listeners regard him as one of their own. Maybe that's the case here.

 

[MikefromDelaware]

The other thing going for live and local vs national satellite is that if you want to participate on air, you can. It's pretty hard to get on a national show. If you're at work it's impossible as Rush and Hannity leave people on hold for over an hour sometimes as they appear to see calls as an interuption to their 3 hour monologue(they've commented on this and say we're glad you waited over an hour to talk to me, then they give them for 15 seconds before a hard spot break at the end of the hour and Hannity guite often won't hold them over to the next hour as he might have an important guest waiting, etc. Rush is better with this than Hannity) from what I've observed from listening to both shows.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

The other thing going for live and local vs national satellite is that if you want to participate on air, you can. It's pretty hard to get on a national show. If you're at work it's impossible as Rush and Hannity leave people on hold for over an hour sometimes as they appear to see calls as an interuption to their 3 hour monologue(they've commented on this and say we're glad you waited over an hour to talk to me, then they give them for 15 seconds before a hard spot break at the end of the hour and Hannity guite often won't hold them over to the next hour as he might have an important guest waiting, etc. Rush is better with this than Hannity) from what I've observed from listening to both shows.

I agree that Rush is generally more considerate of callers. I know this has been said before but talk shows are for the listeners. About one per cent of talk show listeners ever call. The percentage who feel inclined to call at any given time is even less. A national show can be selective and thus they have better callers and this results in a better show. The problem with local shows, especially in medium markets, is they tend to get the same callers repeatedly, callers who have their own agendas and callers who don't come off well on the air. Often I've heard local hosts begging for people to call and then letting people go on too long and wander off topic.

This was talked about in a recent discussion (on the public radio board, as I recall) but producers and call screeners should not let callers sit on hold needlessly. Don't promise callers they will get on in the first place and when you know they won't get on, tell them nicely. I also am not comfortable with demographic call screening, which some shows practice. I think more hosts should accept text messages and emails during shows and then summarize what some of those people are saying, to broaden participation a bit more while not letting callers drag down the show. Some shows even have message boards to let non-callers (or unused callers) sound off.

As Rush points out, callers are there to make the host look good. The callers are selected to play straight-man to the host and to give the host an opportunity to launch into a rant on some pre-determined topic. The only thing worse than too few calls, are bad callers.

 

[oaktree]

I guess that if WABC PD Boyce is correct about Citadel not cramming shows down their own stations throats ... "just a nudge," ... and the situation with Imus, for example is out of "our stations want it," then why in the heck on their O&O in Los Angeles, KABC ... did they clear Imus for 3 a.m. to only 5 a.m. as of Monday a week ago? Maybe Phil didn't get the memo.

As one in the business, I'll tell you why. Boyce is talking the company line.

Here's a station that clears an ABC product for two hours of four ... and in the middle of the night at that on KABC in the nation's second largest market. It's a protective affiliation at best, because nobody else wants it ... and to say that it's "on in LA" period...rather than risk a station like KCAA (a former Westwood One/Imus affiliate) outside of LA putting ABC/Citadel in the middle of saying, "Well, it's not LA ... but it's close."

If Imus is "that wanted," by their own station, why not clear it 6-10, as the numbers there aren't that great in the first place?

If Boyce were as smart as he wants all to believe, he should put I-mush (pun intended) on KGO from 2-5 a.m. and dump that ultra-left crackpot that is a non-rated waste of liberal broadcast spectrum ... instead of worrying about "deals" in markets like Wilmington and Panama City.

 

[WTUX]

I have been noticing lately that Rush seems to use demographic screening. In the past few months there have been a lot of "Rush babies" getting through to tell him they grew up listening to the show. I understand the need to do this as advertisers often view talk radio as reaching only the older demos.

I enjoyed local talk shows back in the early years with shows like "Its Your Nickel" on WILM, "Voice of the People" on WDEL and "Comment" on WNRK. It was novel, listeners enjoyed it and participation was high. There were usually enough local issues to keep talk going. But these days, issues are national. That is why you have so little participation in local government. We can't even find enough candidates to fill the ballot for general assembly seats, town governments and county elected positions. We have given so much power to the central government that it makes being a state rep or senator pretty meaningless.

As issues continue to be national, the local hosts are at a clear disadvantage. Rush and Sean have the sound bites, the guests (in Sean's case) and thousands of callers to choose from. Local hosts have few topics, few quality guests and they have to pretty much air who ever calls. Tackling national topics can be done, but then you really notice the lower quality. You also notice the difference if a local show follows a national one. Even on big stations like 1210 in Philly when they tried local talk after Imus, the production quality really showed up. Like the I-man or not, the show was always well produced. Tom Bigby insisted on going straight from Imus to a local talker. At 10am you went from a slick production to amateur hour. I remember e-mailing him and saying they should at least air CBS news at the top of the hour. His reply was I could, well, you can guess. But several months later he was gone and there was a newscast at 10am. You needed some break. WILM is smart with having Watson on first, then a news break before Rush.

WDEL has to make local work because there are few quality national shows to go up against Rush/Hannity. Basically, daytime talk radio IS Rush/Hannity. If there is a noticeable drop in the fall ratings, they have a major problem.

 

[OldNumber7]

I enjoyed local talk shows back in the early years with shows like "Its Your Nickel" on WILM, "Voice of the People" on WDEL and "Comment" on WNRK. It was novel, listeners enjoyed it and participation was high. There were usually enough local issues to keep talk going. But these days, issues are national. That is why you have so little participation in local government. We can't even find enough candidates to fill the ballot for general assembly seats, town governments and county elected positions. We have given so much power to the central government that it makes being a state rep or senator pretty meaningless.

As issues continue to be national, the local hosts are at a clear disadvantage.

Part of the problem is unique to Delaware; it is a small state, the elected leaders tend to avoid controversy and strong partisanship, and there isn't a whole heckuva lot going on. Factor in the larger transient population (retirees, immigrants, professionals transferred from other states) and a sizable chunk of the potential audience doesn't have the close ties to the state that would cause it to be interested in local issues in the first place.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

The problems you mention seems to happen all over, not just Delaware. Outside of major cities, most of which have some kind of "home rule" charter and a good deal of autonomy, most so-called "local issues" are really state issues. NJ101.5 is very successful doing state-wide "local" radio and talking about "close to home" issues. Many states have state-wide news networks and some of those networks (like in Michigan) offer state-wide talk shows (they often don't get carried in any major markets in the state but they do get carried in most of the other markets).

Granted, the federal government has taken over a lot of areas that used to be strictly state or local concerns. But again, except for big cities, local media don't pay much attention to county and suburban governments or to the state capitol. People can't talk about what's going on because state and local governments are mostly invisible.

Mostly, though, to do a good talk show you need a large base of callers and topics for them to talk about. Here again, NJ 101.5 is smart because they get away from politics and talk about "water-cooler" topics. Most talk shows have too much focus on government, politicians and the host's designated political position.