Spanish Radio Ratings

[AbqAnonymous]

The latest numbers for February has KXOT 106.3 "La Mexicana" making a big jump into the top 10 tied for eighth place with KKOB (a bit of a low point for them). However the ratings for Spanish language stations are often the most unstable compared to English language formats. KXOT went from 1.0 to 3.5 in just two months while KLVO has about the same average in the 2s and doesn't appear to be affected in any way while KRZY-FM is the big loser in the low 1s. Then you have Fuego 102.9 KABG-HD2/K275AO often bouncing from the low 1s to the mid 2s. Is there some difficulty measuring Spanish radio listening compared to English formats which often maintain an continuing average? That may be one of the best ratings anything on 106.3 has gotten since the Wild 106 era! It may also be the first time a Vanguard station has cracked the top 10! However it appears that this station while licensed to Vanguard is operated by something called Sandia Media Group from a studio on Yale Blvd near Gibson. Whoever is behind this seems to be doing something right. Of course can they keep it up is the question.

Additionally for Vanguard, The Oasis is doing better than before, however it looks like the 80s have bombed on KRKE. 80s music may be too saturated on the airwaves right now. The 90s on the other hand seem to be lacking a bit. KMGA is still in its slump and even Christmas music didn't help them much last winter. What's worse is that KPEK is at the top and very far ahead of them. KKSS is also up there well ahead of KOBQ but KRST is now ahead of KBQI which has slipped just out of the top 10.

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[DavidEduardo]

Is there some difficulty measuring Spanish radio listening compared to English formats which often maintain an continuing average? That may be one of the best ratings anything on 106.3 has gotten since the Wild 106 era! It may also be the first time a Vanguard station has cracked the top 10!

The issue is that only about 15% of ABQ Hispanics speak Spanish, so the proportion of Spanish speakers to total Hispanics is very low and thus the sample of them is tiny.

 

[DavidEduardo]

Additionally for Vanguard, The Oasis is doing better than before, however it looks like the 80s have bombed on KRKE. 80s music may be too saturated on the airwaves right now. The 90s on the other hand seem to be lacking a bit. KMGA is still in its slump and even Christmas music didn't help them much last winter. What's worse is that KPEK is at the top and very far ahead of them. KKSS is also up there well ahead of KOBQ but KRST is now ahead of KBQI which has slipped just out of the top 10.

ABQ is not a big agency town. It's a local-direct and local small agency market. When you get outside the top j3 or4 in the major demo sets, buys are made based on service and results.

Don Davis, the owner, has decades of providing better service to local accounts than the big groups do. His stations are targeted on that market. No, not an audience market... a client market.

KOAZ has over half its audience in 65+, while KRKE has a third of its listeners in 25-34. It helps to have the demo breaks before evaluating stations. Remember, a lot of younger listeners grew up on stations that played the 80's songs as gold and a common finding in talking to those listeners is something like "that is when all the good music came out".

I have plenty of friends and contacts in ABQ going back to when HBC had, unfortunately, stations there. I'm quite convinced based on feedback that KRKE is profitable. They have even had to work with some new clients because they have sold-out periods.

Any station analysis based on the diary 12+ numbers is going to be seriously flawed.

 

[K.M. Richards]

Now that I have been invited back on RD, I would like to expand on what David said, in my capacity as the de facto Program Director at KRKE (and my format running there was also the result of being "invited back" ... in this case, by Don Davis).

The Eighties Channel™ is more or less KABG without the 70s and 90s, or the chatterbox jocks who can talk for a minute or more into stopsets without actually saying anything. And that is the way Don and I both want it. I do a lot more music research than my esteemed competitor, and pretty much every other song is a Power ... the songs which people who deride the Classic Hits format call "burnt to a crisp". But we have enough Powers to be "no repeat" every day from 6:00am to 7:00pm, so even heavy listeners don't hear a lot of repeats (and when they do, it's always going to be a song that is a consensus favorite and therefore welcomed).

I have slightly less than twice as many secondary titles, which prevents any of them from playing excessively ... especially since a few of their scheduled plays are in positions where they are going to be dropped for time. About 20% of those are the bigger New Wave hits, which I have found tend to keep listeners very satisfied. They probably grew up watching those songs' videos on MTV.

As for the younger listeners: David is correct that we have a lot of them and they do seem to prefer the 80s to current music, which doesn't say much for today's hits. Personally, I am glad I do not have to program a station with Taylor Swift in rotation!

David is also spot on when he says that in market #70, the ratings are not a major factor in sales and profitability. Which I think is just as well, because I would rather not be dependent on agency buys for our success. Don makes a lot of sales personally and he tells me that the "elevator conversation" for KRKE is an easy one. The real ratings for us are the number of happy advertisers, most of whom like the station themselves. (And if a business owner likes what you play, he's going to presume that others who listen to the station are people that he wants as his customers. Ka-ching!!!)

I consider myself fortunate to be working with Don again after all these years. We understand each other and have a common vision for the station. He even likes the retro jingles -- TM Penetrators, first released in 1974 ... and these are the first new Penetrators recorded in at least three decades! -- which is the same package I used at the first station I programmed some 45 years ago. It's amazing how well they work with an all-80s music library.

Having talent like my old friends Gene Knight and Freddy Snakeskin doing all the voicetracks and Don Elliot as the imaging voice doesn't hurt either. Albuquerque may not be Los Angeles, but we sure sound like we are.

Finally, to answer Mr. Anonymous' "evaluation" of the 12+ ratings, ABQ is one of those markets where listeners are more likely to keep writing down their long-time favorite stations in the diary instead of reporting their actual listening, so I find them suspect and am glad we don't have to rely on those numbers for sales. (I have heard stories of diaries referring to on-air personalities and programs years after they last aired on a station.)

So ... I'm happy, Don Davis is happy, the listeners are happy, and the advertisers are happy. I don't need validation from an "armchair quarterback" to call this a success.