REQUIRED READING

[NoMoreLurking]

"We've insulted our listeners by succumbing to the lowest common denominator -- so they leave."

http://www.allaccess.com/net-news/archive/story/90489/date-of-death-tbd

 

[musichead1029]

Damned straight.

"We are not in competition with Internet radio, satellite radio, or digital music. Instead of embracing those options we have changed to the point that we have run our listeners off to those outlets instead of creating an atmosphere where both can exist profitably."

Radio should be both embracing alternate forms of distribution and using its unique strengths - a local connection and the understanding and capacity of real live entertainment - to compete with those canned alternatives. Radio still operates like it's 1996. It ain't.

We listeners don't need radio anymore. Radio needs us.

Give us a reason to want to listen to radio again.

Or perish.

 

[Jimmy128]

Absolutely correct. With internet stations we don't need regular radio. It's their own fault people are leaving.

 

[ansky212]

The fact that so many radio stations now have the same narrow playlist (or the same type of format) is the reason I have virtually stopped listening.

 

[radioguy39nj]

Very valid and very telling! Just look at the automobile industry as an example. When GM, Ford and Chrysler built cars that only their accountants could love, the marketplace looked at the fun-to-drive, high quality cars from Japan and the demand for those cars skyrocketed. The Japanese built cars the American public wanted to own and drive. Hence the near extinction of GM, Ford and Chrysler in 2008. The Detroit 3 built cars it thought people wanted.

Radio needs to take a look at what happened in the automobile industry and use it as a wake-up call!

 

[TheGrooveBoutique]

"We stopped asking our listeners what they wanted. Instead we gave them what we thought they wanted."

"We play scared. We allow ARBITRON to control us instead of maximizing the listener’s influence without advertisers. We've become reactionary instead of having courage."

"When a consumer (in this case listener) is disrespected... they will leave."

Substitute "CD101.9" or "Broadcast Architecture's smooth jazz clients" for "we", and that explains the demise of the format.

 

[davideduardo]

"We stopped asking our listeners what they wanted. Instead we gave them what we thought they wanted."

It's hard to read that statement without gagging. This comes the same day that Clear Channel announced that it had hired Steve Casey, one of the best when it comes to finding out what listeners want. And within recent weeks, they hired Gary Marince from Arbitron, who was also a successful programmer, and before that another Programmer who had joined Arbitron, Bob Michaels... all part of a major effort to find out what listeners want and deliver. Chalk that all up to Bob Pittman's appointment to a senior management position.

"We play scared. We allow ARBITRON to control us instead of maximizing the listener’s influence without advertisers. We've become reactionary instead of having courage."

Arbitron is a measure of whether listeners like us. If you go up, you are doing a better job of being likable, and if you go down, others are doing a better job than you.

Unless you have a station doing paid religion or something niched like Russian or Farsi or are below 92.1 on the dial, you can't ignore advertisers because without them you can't continue operating. The formula is to build a good station that attracts listeners that are of interest to advertisers. You do that, and have a competent sales force, and good things happen.

"When a consumer (in this case listener) is disrespected... they will leave."

Substitute "CD101.9" or "Broadcast Architecture's smooth jazz clients" for "we", and that explains the demise of the format.

That format "expired" because the core listener became too old for advertisers to wish to reach them. Add in the fact that the long time spent listening in the diary was proven to by somewhat mythical by the PPM (true almost universally for high TSL and low cume stations from the diary days) and you see that market forces killed that format, not the stations themselves.

 

[abonita]

Substitute "CD101.9" or "Broadcast Architecture's smooth jazz clients" for "we", and that explains the demise of the format.

That format "expired" because the core listener became too old for advertisers to wish to reach them. Add in the fact that the long time spent listening in the diary was proven to by somewhat mythical by the PPM (true almost universally for high TSL and low cume stations from the diary days) and you see that market forces killed that format, not the stations themselves.

David, I wouldn't dispute the validity of that ... but I also think there's more to the story. A few years before the decimation of the format, there was a confluence of a lack of original product and a conscious effort on the part of some influential programmers to change the direction of the format itself. It had the unfortunate effect of blowing out existing listeners while not picking up the desired demographic. So while Smooth Jazz may not have been pushed, it didn't jump all by itself.

 

[Jeffrey]

Substitute "CD101.9" or "Broadcast Architecture's smooth jazz clients" for "we", and that explains the demise of the format.

That format "expired" because the core listener became too old for advertisers to wish to reach them. Add in the fact that the long time spent listening in the diary was proven to by somewhat mythical by the PPM (true almost universally for high TSL and low cume stations from the diary days) and you see that market forces killed that format, not the stations themselves.

David, I wouldn't dispute the validity of that ... but I also think there's more to the story. A few years before the decimation of the format, there was a confluence of a lack of original product and a conscious effort on the part of some influential programmers to change the direction of the format itself. It had the unfortunate effect of blowing out existing listeners while not picking up the desired demographic. So while Smooth Jazz may not have been pushed, it didn't jump all by itself.

That was back when they tried the Chill format. I gave them alot of credit for thinking outside the box and trying to pull in younger demos. In my opinion it wasn't programmed correctly.
What kind of demographic would you get when playing Stevie Wonder followed by the Brazilian Girls?

 

[davideduardo]

David, I wouldn't dispute the validity of that ... but I also think there's more to the story. A few years before the decimation of the format, there was a confluence of a lack of original product and a conscious effort on the part of some influential programmers to change the direction of the format itself. It had the unfortunate effect of blowing out existing listeners while not picking up the desired demographic. So while Smooth Jazz may not have been pushed, it didn't jump all by itself.

In that sense, it's a similar scenario to when Beautiful Music "died." Demos aged, product almost totally dried up, and syndicators tried going with more vocals, more modern or upbeat cuts, etc. Similarly, blame was laid at many different doorsteps... but perhaps there was never the passion for the format that smooth jazz had, even if Beautiful Music had many times the audience, thus less criticism.

 

[hubcity]

In that sense, it's a similar scenario to when Beautiful Music "died." Demos aged, product almost totally dried up, and syndicators tried going with more vocals, more modern or upbeat cuts, etc. Similarly, blame was laid at many different doorsteps... but perhaps there was never the passion for the format that smooth jazz had, even if Beautiful Music had many times the audience, thus less criticism.

I'd say the key word there is "passion". If competent programmers, competent sales and competent management are passionate about it, it will succeed. If any one of them says "I wish this were hit radio instead", it will fail.

 

[Dick Skinner]

"We stopped asking our listeners what they wanted. Instead we gave them what we thought they wanted."

It's hard to read that statement without gagging. This comes the same day that Clear Channel announced that it had hired Steve Casey, one of the best when it comes to finding out what listeners want. And within recent weeks, they hired Gary Marince from Arbitron, who was also a successful programmer, and before that another Programmer who had joined Arbitron, Bob Michaels... all part of a major effort to find out what listeners want and deliver. Chalk that all up to Bob Pittman's appointment to a senior management position.

"We play scared. We allow ARBITRON to control us instead of maximizing the listener’s influence without advertisers. We've become reactionary instead of having courage."

Arbitron is a measure of whether listeners like us. If you go up, you are doing a better job of being likable, and if you go down, others are doing a better job than you.

Unless you have a station doing paid religion or something niched like Russian or Farsi or are below 92.1 on the dial, you can't ignore advertisers because without them you can't continue operating. The formula is to build a good station that attracts listeners that are of interest to advertisers. You do that, and have a competent sales force, and good things happen.

"When a consumer (in this case listener) is disrespected... they will leave."

Substitute "CD101.9" or "Broadcast Architecture's smooth jazz clients" for "we", and that explains the demise of the format.

That format "expired" because the core listener became too old for advertisers to wish to reach them. Add in the fact that the long time spent listening in the diary was proven to by somewhat mythical by the PPM (true almost universally for high TSL and low cume stations from the diary days) and you see that market forces killed that format, not the stations themselves.

This whole article made me gag, David. The author is an out of work DJ who, during his tenure at WCOO, barely cracked a 2 share. His bitterness is apparent in that he takes a whole industry to task for what he sees as a host of irreparable failures. I suspect the stress of being on the beach for six months has clouded his perception.

 

[Jimmy128]

I don't think that his perception is that clouded. People have choices now like never before. Radio isn't getting away with it like it used to.
Now there are thousands of choices on the internet with radio. It can be likened to T.V. in the '50-'70s where people had to rely on a few local broadcast stations and now they have hundreds of choices. Internet radio is going to keep growing.

 

[ansky212]

Internet radio is going to keep growing.

The biggest problem with internet radio is that it is difficult to listen to in the car. I often connect my blackberry to my car stereo to listen to music and as the cell signal fluctuates it causes audio dropouts in the music. HD radio suffers the same way - as the signal weakens the sound completely drops out.

 

[Jimmy128]

Internet radio is going to keep growing.

The biggest problem with internet radio is that it is difficult to listen to in the car. I often connect my blackberry to my car stereo to listen to music and as the cell signal fluctuates it causes audio dropouts in the music. HD radio suffers the same way - as the signal weakens the sound completely drops out.

That's true, for now.

 

[Dick Skinner]

I don't think that his perception is that clouded. People have choices now like never before. Radio isn't getting away with it like it used to.
Now there are thousands of choices on the internet with radio. It can be likened to T.V. in the '50-'70s where people had to rely on a few local broadcast stations and now they have hundreds of choices. Internet radio is going to keep growing.

That's true, Jimmy, but you'll notice that the broadcast networks still garner the highest ratings, as does terrestrial radio. There's no question that Internet radio will grow, but the "radio is dead" and "radio sucks" messages from disillusioned clowns like this are tiresome and just plain wrong.

 

[TheBigA]

Interesting that his first paragraph links radio and the music business: "Radio, along with the music industry, was not prepared for the technological boom and then did not accept it right away." Let's stop there a minute, and talk about the music industry. Twenty years ago, the music industry was at its peak, with artists like the Dixie Chicks and Backstreet Boys receiving Diamond Awards for selling 10 million copies of a single CD. Now, it's a huge accomplishment to go platinum. If music is what we in radio use to attract listeners, and the music has stopped selling, perhaps that's really where the problem is. Once CDs stopped selling, the music industry decided it needed to make a change: Instead of a few artists selling lots of records, the strategy was lots of artists and subgenres releasing more individualized styles of music. That decision was bad for radio. Because radio needs to attract a large group in order to appeal to advertisers. Narrow niche radio doesn't make money. Advertisers base their decisions on media that can attract large numbers. Passion isn't one of the factors advertisers consider. It's all about numbers. But the new music being made today isn't made for filling football stadiums or selling 10 million copies. It's made to attract a small but passionate fan base that will support that particular artist. So a radio station plays that artist and satisfies the fan base for 3 minutes, then plays a different artist and alienates the previous fan base. People aren't fans of formats or genres, but of specific artists and songs. That's a significant change in the way listeners use music. Meanwhile the business model of radio is still built around formats and genres. This is why Pandora is attracting so many users. It's built around "favorites," not formats. Radio can't be as individualized as Pandora. It can't even be as individualized as satellite, since no market has as many stations as Sirius. To say "we've ignored our listeners" is wrong, because the listeners aren't behaving as a group. We've ignored SOME of our listeners, and refocused on those who we can reach. Radio is a mass medium, and by definition isn't going to work for people with niche music tastes. That's not something radio can fix or change.

 

[Jimmy128]

I don't think that his perception is that clouded. People have choices now like never before. Radio isn't getting away with it like it used to.
Now there are thousands of choices on the internet with radio. It can be likened to T.V. in the '50-'70s where people had to rely on a few local broadcast stations and now they have hundreds of choices. Internet radio is going to keep growing.

That's true, Jimmy, but you'll notice that the broadcast networks still garner the highest ratings, as does terrestrial radio. There's no question that Internet radio will grow, but the "radio is dead" and "radio sucks" messages from disillusioned clowns like this are tiresome and just plain wrong.

All I'm saying is that there are many more choices today than there were years ago. Don't forget, radio is in the "please like me" business.