PPM Numbers

[davideduardo]

True, which is why it should be the parent company and not a small station developing a megasite.

There are only a few companies capable of doing this. The other 11000 or so stations in the US are part of small groups or independently owned.

 

[Rebafan]

True, which is why it should be the parent company and not a small station developing a megasite.

There are only a few companies capable of doing this. The other 11000 or so stations in the US are part of small groups or independently owned.

KKGO originally had Kevin, the former webmaster of KZLA, and owner of Countryboards.com build their website The website at that time was as good if not better than the former KZLA site as technology allowed this.
Now there is a new person taking care of the website, and the format of the site is the same although they have added the playing now feature and videos to it as well as taking down pictures of former jocks and events.
KKGO is independently owned, and has a well designed website for listeners and potential listeners to explore, my only constructive criticism is that currently it is hard to find on the search engines unless you are already aware of the station, it's slogan or it's call letters.

I believe that a website is as good as the person who builds it, not necessarily the money the business has to put in it... That is just my 2¢

 

[nmoore6676]

Just curious, as the token computer geek here, how would you search for a station on Google or Yahoo? Generally you know something about the station, such as their call or slogan.

As a test I Googled "LA Country Radio" and KKGO came on the first line. Then as a comparison I picked a small town near Dayton Ohio where I grew up and Googled "Xenia Country Radio" and wah lah up comes Classic Country Radio WBZI. The Google rankings are dependent, based on a esoteric formula that that they have constructed to keep certain businesses and other entities from an unfair advantage. There are the paid ads at the very top and on the sides but the general responses are tied to things like how many times people search for them and how many times they have cross links or referrals elsewhere.

By the way I did the same test on Yahoo with the same results, haven't tried ASK.COM or any others.

 

[Rebafan]

Just curious, as the token computer geek here, how would you search for a station on Google or Yahoo? Generally you know something about the station, such as their call or slogan.

As a test I Googled "LA Country Radio" and KKGO came on the first line. Then as a comparison I picked a small town near Dayton Ohio where I grew up and Googled "Xenia Country Radio" and wah lah up comes Classic Country Radio WBZI. The Google rankings are dependent, based on a esoteric formula that that they have constructed to keep certain businesses and other entities from an unfair advantage. There are the paid ads at the very top and on the sides but the general responses are tied to things like how many times people search for them and how many times they have cross links or referrals elsewhere.

By the way I did the same test on Yahoo with the same results, haven't tried ASK.COM or any others.

Not sure why I am getting different results...
I typed in "LA Country Radio" "LA Country Radio Station" "Los angeles Country Radio" etc. and I do not see the main site for KKGO coming up on the first page. In contrast, I typed in Chicago Country Radio and WUSN US99 comes up first. country music los angeles on Google for me brings up the KZLA website... los angeles country radio station brings up information about the KZLA flip... Cullman Alabama Country radio brings up WKUL a station there as the 1st link... WKUL uses meta tags with the station description as well as meta keyword tags...
In Yahoo country radio station los angeles gives me KKGO in the top of the list. country radio station los angeles ca in contrast puts the KZLA page as the 2nd on the list... country radio station ventura, CA. in Yahoo brings up KHAY near the top of the list.

I stream the ranch out of Tyler Texas ALOT as I like classic country... don't have the station bookmarked so, I check Tyler Texas country radio and the website for the station comes up on the 1st page.

My post about KKGO was in response to the earlier comment by djmimi saying "True, which is why it should be the parent company and not a small station developing a megasite."
KKGO has a "megasite" in my opinion, but being someone who builds website, there has to be some web optimization so if someone has NO clue what the slogan or call letters of a station is that they can find it via the web. I also believe you shouldn't HAVE to sign up for anything to stream a station... YES a station would like to know perhaps who is streaming them but for some perhaps privacy would be more important then streaming and they would find another station to listen to via the internet.

 

[djmimi]

There are only a few companies capable of doing this. The other 11000 or so stations in the US are part of small groups or independently owned.

Well...couldn't they be recruited as, ahem, affiliates to the megasite?? At some point, radio has to stop taking an us vs. them approach and start thinking of survival.

Regarding search - Google and Yahoo use different algorithms and they place different emphasis on the weighting of keywords vs. popularity of search, so you are going to get different results from different search engines. I am looking forward to semantic search which is more in line with the way natural language works contextually as opposed to sheer mathematical keyword based searches.

 

[nmoore6676]

Its going to take a lot of different approaches which can be as creative as they can imagine. Some stations that have to strip commercials are starting to run replacements on the stream that are directed to computer users specifically. As David has pointed out radio commercials (on air) are sold for the local audience so stations that stream should find commercials for the net that, at least for now, are directed to the kind of people who are most likely to be listening on line. The problem I see though is that a lot of people listen to local radio on line if they are in buildings or areas with poor reception. It will be interesting to see how it shakes out if and when internet and WiFi radios become more popular.

I'm not sure that I would appreciate some sort of interactive content along with the stream. Normally I am working or doing other stuff so I have the audio in the background like I use radio normally. To be honest I hardly ever sit raptly in front of the TV either but I've always had ADD anyway. The bottom line is that I stream for content, so the web site doesn't by itself drive me to surf there so much something I don't get otherwise or in the time that I can listen.

A fly in the ointment will be if ISPs start charging more for the largest users or go back to charging per byte. If that happens it could but a damper on streaming listening. Conversely there is the bandwidth cost to the streamers and the servers needed to service larger numbers of listeners.

 

[djmimi]

I believe that a website is as good as the person who builds it, not necessarily the money the business has to put in it... That is just my 2¢

I heartily agree with this sentiment! I think it's all about ingenuity on the web, not how much money you can pour into it. Technology is so cheap now, that anyone can put up a pretty sophisticated website using fairly inexpensive software. BUT, you do have to have a flair for it. You can add anything to it (as long as you can afford the bandwidth!). I now have the capability within the confines of my house, to record CD quality material AND shoot HD, edit video and make DVD's, etc. I have a camera that was used by steven soderbergh to film a couple of his movies. It's all so astonishing how technology is at the point of DIY.