This is all speculation. It sounds like a David Field "Talking Point". How can the sales people generate revenue for The Wolf when they all work for Buddy? Sales people don't need passion for Country music to sell. They need a viable format to sell. Unless advertisers on Country stations are complete morons, a one share station won't excite them...
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September '21 book
- Thread starter ckg279
- Start date
Country is a viable format. WYRK proves that. Buying The Wolf now is a bargain as the ratings rise. You can reach some of the same people for less money, and buy more impressions.
Country is a viable format, but that doesn't guarantee that The Wolf will be. It failed miserably in San Francisco for Entercom. Just rolling out a Country format doesn't guarantee anything. Time will tell...
You were wrong when you said the station hasn't generated revenue, and nothing you have said since changes that.
Dude, you are really not smart. I own an ad agency and spend money on wolf. Nielsen is not the Bible for results. Ideas are. According to Nielsen, , 40,000 people listen to wolf. And yes, salespeople do need to have a passion for what they are selling.
Many years back, I switched a Beautiful Music station to what, in my market, was the functional equivalent of country. The station had decent ratings but there were four similarly formatted stations in the market and our AM outperformed it about five to one.
When we switched, one seller said that "we had created a sales disaster" and that sales would go down as our new listeners did not earn as much as the old ones and advertisers would shun us. I said, "thanks for your service. We'll make out your severance check immediately".
The station debuted 21 days later in a Mediastat survey with a 22.5 share at #1. It sold more in its first month than it had ever done before, and went on to more than quadruple its former billings. But we had sellers who listened to and knew the format, understood the concerts we were scheduling and loved interfacing with the artists.
Very wrong comparison. San Francisco is approaching 70% ethnic and has no country "core" audience. Advertisers are skeptical of it because the format has not worked for decades, despite many attempts. It does work moderately at the very southern end of the market around San José, and in the northern extreme in the Santa Rosa area, but not anywhere else.
"Toto, we're not in Buffalo any more".
Dude, you're not smart to buy time on a station just because you like Country music. Have any data that shows The Wolf Top 10 in its target demos? Didn't think so. If Country is the gold mine, dump the Oldies and flip WECK to Country. If anyone can make it work, it's you...
I hardly buy time because I like country music. That is the last reason I would buy it. I buy it to get huge frequency to 40k listeners at a rock bottom rate
So what if the wolf is top 10 in its demo . Who gives a shit. Do you buy a car from a car dealer who is only rated in the top 10?
You make silly observations, assumptions and your comments are worthless.
Bravo!
I don't think that there is awareness among most listeners that a lower rated station can make money and also be a good ad medium. And... sell for advertisers!
I had an FM in Ecuador years ago that was not rated. It was foreign language embassy shows (paid) in the daytime and classical at night. I got business from banks, international airlines, higher price cars, the better restaurants and even hotels in Miami. It made money when few FMs world-wide did.
My other 5 stations in the market lived on ratings. That one lived on offering a niche audience very efficiently.
In LA, Dallas and Houston, Lenard Liberman made lots of money on some marginal signal FMs by being the lower cost Regional Mexican station for direct accounts that could not afford the top stations. He charged less, and clients still got a big audience and could buy frequency at the lower rates.
There are lots of examples of lower rated stations that run a tight ship, give better local client services, and make nice money.
Oh, and I love your car dealer and car brand analogy.
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Buddy already has a viable format, and one that is not duplicated on any other local station. But I'll bet if The Wolf goes up for sale, he will be submitting a well-calculated bid to add it to his group of agency/outdoor/radio.
Why in the name of all things holy would Audacy sell 107.7 now? Their previous incarnation blew $10M on it. They'd be lucky to get 20% of that now. It will stay in their cluster and keep its role as a flanker. Make bank on it.
In the case of most large groups that overspent on stations based on more recent prices, they have taken "impairment charges" which is a procedure where a paper loss is taken on a devalued asset. In such a case, marginal stations that are not significantly cash flowing can be sold with no further paper loss while providing cash to buy down some debt.
It would take quite a few such sales to make a difference. But, on the other hand, once marginal stations are eliminated, the margin for the remaining properties increases and that looks good to investors.
Going from a 0.8 to a 1.3 share from the August survey to September survey, is a good sign for The Wolf. It means AQH share in the month added (Country) is, in all likelihood, much stronger than the month dropped (Alternative).
It would not surprise me to see The Wolf knock on the door of a 2 share within the next 60 days, which for that set of signals, is a perfectly respectable result.
It would not surprise me to see The Wolf knock on the door of a 2 share within the next 60 days, which for that set of signals, is a perfectly respectable result.
Exactly. The Wolf went country on July 1st. The current book is July-August-September. Considering that they had to attract a completely new audience and that they didn't move the needle in the July and August books, the September ratings had to be pretty welcome on Corporate Parkway.
Remember, the September book is the average of July-Aug-Sept.
July was .7.
August was .8
To get a 3-month average of 1.3, September must have about a 2.4. That looks like a pretty good reason for WYRK's 1.2 share drop.
We'll see where things go from here, but it looks like they're already equaling WBUF's numbers.
Here are the exact quarter hours of wolf
July 1.0
Aug 0.9
Sept 1.3
This is BEFORE weighting, which actually helped wolf or else they would be at a 1.0 for the three months . This is actual listening time . My Nielsen rep said wolf did not really move the needle at all.
As an example, here is the same QH time frame for WECK 12 plus
July 4.3
Aug 4.4
Sept 4.6
So, in reality, with the unfair weighting, WECK should be a 4.4 12 plus
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Correct again "That dog aint huntin"
Even if the wolf does not go up in ratings, I'll get it for direct revenue
Glad to hear the station is not for sale. Anything I posted was just curiosity having read that report elsewhere. I'm rooting for you - when I'm back home visiting the only station I have on is WECK-AM (not the translators) and mostly up in Niagara County where reception of the AM is fine and the audio quality is just fine on my radios. When home I stream WECK quite a bit.
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I really can't figure out why few stations do the fairs anymore. Probably because most of the day is voice tracked and there is no one on staff to go hang out there. Always thought it was pretty cool to see stations broadcasting live from those events and fun to see your favorite on air people there. Here in MA WBZ had their 100th anniversary and were hyping broadcasting from the Big E fair which is where their first broadcast was from 100 years ago. I pictured they would have a tent set up, various of their on air staff there, maybe be there for the entire fair, etc. Instead they sent a field reporter out for the afternoon who barely talked about the station's 100th birthday. Pretty weird in my opinion to let such an opportunity go. At least they sent someone there but it was a pretty lame effort.
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