TALKERS HEAVY 100

[jaymarvin]

What about this idea: let's say a talk show host (local or syndicated) has good billing and just OK numbers. How about the idea you could put someone on who can get better numbers and thus bring in more dollars? Plus we all live by the ARB, but those folks so don't look so good these days.

 

[Slant]

How about the reality that many...actually LOTS of stations just can't afford local talent...even someone making 20K a year. Local ad dollars are disappearing and even on a national front with all of the big radio groups, profits are VERY low...you would probably see a better % return in your ING savings account!

At this point, the industry is on shakey ground and for the independent station owners, they are just struggling to pay their electric bills. The syndicated shows, voice tracking etc provide a valuable service for stations looking for content but can't afford another salary. At least now, the national product out there is pretty good.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

What about this idea: let's say a talk show host (local or syndicated) has good billing and just OK numbers. How about the idea you could put someone on who can get better numbers and thus bring in more dollars? Plus we all live by the ARB, but those folks so don't look so good these days.

Don't let your boss see this, Jay. He might start thinking about Stephanie Miller.

There is not a perfect correlation between numbers and billing. Local hosts often develop a following among local business people, who see value-added in personal endorsements and personal appearances and who are flattered when the morning guy shows up with the sales rep.

And nobody knows how a host will do until he's done it. Apparently a lot of broadcasters believe birds in the bush are worth more than a bird in the hand. And they do like to count chickens before they hatch.

 

[jaymarvin]

I'm not worried about my boss seeing what I posted. If think they can do better with Miller they should have at it. Last time I looked 25-54 she had like a 1.1 in LA. So she's not doing any better than the rest of us. Morning drive in the progressive format is hard to score in because of NPR and in my case signal problems in the winter months. Having said all that AM760 sounds better than most of the progressive stations. And if things hold up I could very well hit a 2.0 to a 2.5. We are also talking about adding a live afternoon show. I work for good people.

 

[ajhenderson]

Phil is right about what he says. The people who are syndicated come and go. What would be cool is to keep a list of who has a syndicated show say at the start of 08 and see who ends up still on at the end of 08 going into 09. A lot of the cutbacks were DJ's who can be replaced by voice tracking in formats that do not call for a lot of anything except giving song titles. Is that worth paying a half a million dollars for every year?

I was moving some stuff and came across a copy I made of the Talkers talk show cumes from around 2002. Hannity and Savage toward the bottom, Dave Ramsey barely doing anything, Dr. Joy Browne still on anyone's radar, plus Bruce Williams and the Dolans. Very interesting to see this from just a few years ago.

 

[ajhenderson]

MOST of our competition is from other syndicated shows. We rarely knock off local talent. Today I was pitching Mark Levin to a very big station in a top 10 market. They are dropping two syndicated shows at night and the PD want's to go live and local. They just hired one local host and are looking for another. They like Mark, but want to be live and local. You know I get that. It would annoy me if I lost out to another syndicated show when I know Mark is better. But I can't argue with their logic. If her local host does not score, I will still be waiting there with a great show. Somebody we will get Mark into this market.

The only way a syndicated show gets on a station is if the station thinks WE can do a better job with those 2 or 3 hours then they can. A syndicated show has to do well in the ratings or we get canned. Stations will not allow us to run 4 or 5 minutes an hour of network inventory if we don't score.

I feel bad for anybody in radio that loses their job, but the enemy is NOT syndication....it is mediocrity.

Phil is right; I hear a lot of bad local talk. When people bemoan the loss of endless local talk for syndication, or complain that WXYZ is mostly syndicated, I wonder what they'd prefer. Sure, there is a lot of bad syndication and there are stations that use syndication to unnecessarily cheap out or that give the format a bad name by starting a 7th talk station and picking up whoever's left. But the reality is the listener doesn't care in the end... they just want to hear good radio. For years I've heard people saying every market sounds the same; "there's a Mix in every city", "news is piped in from other markets", etc., etc. Well guess what: we all live in one city. To people who don't work in radio, their local Kiss FM is the only one in the world to them. They don't know how many stations Mark Levin is on and if they did they wouldn't care.

And Jay is right. Decisions are motivated by money. Curtis and Kuby, at the hands of Mr. Boyce, consistently beat Imus in the ratings. I would think Imus will do better under his supervision than that of WW1, but there was a decision motivated by money. Why would a station give up inventory to a syndicator to make less money? Everyone talks about how CC, et al have ruined the business with their greed, but in theory syndicated programming requires more listenership to sell ads at a premium to keep even with what a local show would make. This formula may not work in tiny markets, but those markets would have never had talk stations without syndication anyway.

Oh, and Phil, were you referring to WPHT or WSB? I thought Boston since Mark is not on there, but it is no longer a top 10 market.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

When radio managers claim their decisions are motivated by money - and only money - and then said decisions don't result in money (which often happens), either ....

(1) They don't know what they are doing.
(2) They are lying.
(3) Both.

 

[jaymarvin]

Look, from what I see it's not like the old days. In the old days it was about numbers and the sound of the station and there was always a slight war going on between programing and sales over inventory and what kind of spots could and could not run. Major market talk stations didn't do whole weekends of "pay for play" shows. Now it's about money. Screw programing. How much money can we save or bring in? Imus is about money. Syndication is about money. I'm just glad I'm not starting out. Instead I'm 33 years down the road. I figure another ten years if I'm lucky. I will tell you this: if radio does not get back to content, talent, and more local shows I won't make it ten years, but the neither will anyone else. In the 12 years since the ownership rules went down the drain radio has gotten worse not better.

 

[ajhenderson]

Jay, I think you're right on. Nobody here likes him, but Tom Leykis made an interesting reference to a Woody Allen quote and how it applies to what broadcasting has become: "I wouldn't want to be part of any club that would have me as a member". It seems so many people who grew up in the golden years of radio are now part of a business nothing like that. But we move on.

The reality is, I think the top stations should focus on programming. KFI, KGO, and others like them don't sell time. I'm all for brokering time, even as a plurality of a station's entire schedule, but I think that should be largely reserved for the crappy AMs that have no viable alternative to remain in business. Every radio station should make a profit (even though many don't) and if you don't have a great signal or a couple decades' head start, maybe selling out is the way to go. What frustrates me as a proponent of pay-for-play is seeing WABC or WLS do it... I understand even on those stations there aren't any spot buys for 5am on Saturday, but is the $4 or $5k you get really worth it in the grand scheme of multi-8 figure annual sales? Even as a huge capitalist, I don't really know that it is.

 

[jaymarvin]

There was a time when you had crappy AMs in most markets that broker time. First one I ever heard was KTYM, I think were the call letters, in LA. The rest of the stations tried their best to come up with good weekend programing. Example when KLAC was talk they took people like Elliot Mintz and B. Mich Reed and put them on the weekends. They billed it as kind of a "youth culture weekend." Weekends was also the place where green peas could start out and learn how to be good talk show hosts. Now this stuff is gone. I love money too. Who doesn't? But what happens down the road? That's the question.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

Dear J and K ....

Are you two "The Men in Black?"

But seriously, folks ....

It was the one, the only Groucho who said originated the line about not joining any club that would have him as a member. Woody Allen quoted the line in "Annie Hall" (attributed to Groucho).

I am surprised you two buy management's spin that "it's all about money." Back in the good old days, when it supposedly wasn't about the money, radio was more profitable than it is now. Explain that. Every time a move is made that's "about money" (format change, playlists, ad load, infomercials, automation, syndication, consolidation), radio makes less money.

The suits claim that they embrace right wing talk and avoid progressive talk because of money. They knew they couldn't make money with progressive talk before they even tried. We keep seeing people come to this board and either (1) wanting to do a radio to play what they like on the assumption everybody else will like it or (2) complaining that their market doesn't have a ______________ (insert format name here) station and everybody would listen because all their friends like ________________. That same mind-set extends to PDs and station managers. Most every station I've worked at has been like church and the true faith and universally accepted dogma has been the current line of the GOP. These are people basking in the glow of a shared reality. In their world, everybody likes right-wing talk and nobody would listen to liberal talk. To be anything other than a mainstream Republican conservative around the radio industry is like being a gay guy when everybody else starts talking about chicks.

You have to spend it to make it. Radio is unwilling to spend it. Instead they cut quality, availability and service. Business goes down and so they cut some more and blame it on the current state of business (which they created). This is classic behavior for a business or industry in its last stages. Here's a non-radio example: Howard Johnson's. HoJo's had a captive market on turnpikes so they figured they could cut costs and get away with. People started avoiding HoJo's when they did have a choice (even on turnpikes, which wasn't easy) and company revenue went down. So HoJo's raised prices to increase revenue (plus did some more cutting and provided crappier food and worse service). This was all, of course, about money. Nothing personal, just business. People avoided HoJos even more and revenue declined even more. So HoJos increased prices again. Finally the company was taken over and they got out of the restaurant business. Yes, Howard Johnson management liked to think the problem was new competition but somebody else came in (Friendly's) and recreated the original HoJos formula and fills pretty much the same niche in the neighborhood chain restaurant business. And HoJos really believed customers would understand the company needed to maintain or increase revenue and keep paying more for a worse product.

 

[newhampshiredude]

MOST of our competition is from other syndicated shows. We rarely knock off local talent. Today I was pitching Mark Levin to a very big station in a top 10 market. They are dropping two syndicated shows at night and the PD want's to go live and local. They just hired one local host and are looking for another. They like Mark, but want to be live and local. You know I get that. It would annoy me if I lost out to another syndicated show when I know Mark is better. But I can't argue with their logic. If her local host does not score, I will still be waiting there with a great show. Somebody we will get Mark into this market.

The only way a syndicated show gets on a station is if the station thinks WE can do a better job with those 2 or 3 hours then they can. A syndicated show has to do well in the ratings or we get canned. Stations will not allow us to run 4 or 5 minutes an hour of network inventory if we don't score.

I feel bad for anybody in radio that loses their job, but the enemy is NOT syndication....it is mediocrity.

Phil is right; I hear a lot of bad local talk. When people bemoan the loss of endless local talk for syndication, or complain that WXYZ is mostly syndicated, I wonder what they'd prefer. Sure, there is a lot of bad syndication and there are stations that use syndication to unnecessarily cheap out or that give the format a bad name by starting a 7th talk station and picking up whoever's left. But the reality is the listener doesn't care in the end... they just want to hear good radio. For years I've heard people saying every market sounds the same; "there's a Mix in every city", "news is piped in from other markets", etc., etc. Well guess what: we all live in one city. To people who don't work in radio, their local Kiss FM is the only one in the world to them. They don't know how many stations Mark Levin is on and if they did they wouldn't care.

And Jay is right. Decisions are motivated by money. Curtis and Kuby, at the hands of Mr. Boyce, consistently beat Imus in the ratings. I would think Imus will do better under his supervision than that of WW1, but there was a decision motivated by money. Why would a station give up inventory to a syndicator to make less money? Everyone talks about how CC, et al have ruined the business with their greed, but in theory syndicated programming requires more listenership to sell ads at a premium to keep even with what a local show would make. This formula may not work in tiny markets, but those markets would have never had talk stations without syndication anyway.

Oh, and Phil, were you referring to WPHT or WSB? I thought Boston since Mark is not on there, but it is no longer a top 10 market.

Phil was probablt talking about 96.9 WTKK in Boston. They rae getting rid of Bill Oreilly from 7PM-9PM and adding McPhee from 7PM-10PM. Laura ingrham currently airs from 9PM-12AM, so I wouldn't be surprised if they were to get rid of her

 

[cm454]

I would think Imus will do better under his supervision than that of WW1

Who's going to be supervising who?

Do you think Imus will be taking much direction at age 67, after 35 years in the market?

I don't think the duck will even be taking any direction.

Quack-Quack.

 

[jaymarvin]

Look Jullus are you in radio? If so how long have you been in it? I've been in it since I was 13. You sound like one of my left fringe callers with this crap about "buying management's spin." I've fought with, and been fired by more management then you'll ever know. Back "in the old days" you had ownership caps and you had an FCC that had regulations and enforced them. You don't have that now. Stations had to do things like PSA's, news, and because there was open competition in most of the formats you couldn't get away with bad radio, bad numbers because if you did you paid for it in lack of dollars, and the bottom line suffered. Sure there were plenty of radio stations that were dumps. I ought to know I worked at a lot of them. There were also great stations with great talent, and great companies to work for like Jacor being one of them. ABC, when it was owned by Cap Cities, was another. My days at WFLA and WLS were the best. Radio is like anything else that turns a buck. Why so many right-wing hosts? Because many will tell you it works. And in a lot of cases it does. Progressive radio isn't working now because of the way it is done, the stations it's on, and talk radio suffers because of the right and left split. But it is all done because of money. You note every radio station you've worked at. Where has that been? If you've worked in enough radio stations, both music and talk, then you would know about the tug of war between sales and programing. What's going on now is sales is wining and programing is losing. It's going to take a company with guts and leadership to find a third way in talk mixing both right and left with other issues to make talk more entertaining and unpredictable again. But please don't insult my intelligence by telling me or the people on this board that KJCB or myself are just buying management's spin. We've both been in far too long for you or anyone else to pull that line.

 

[KFodor]

Look Jullus are you in radio? If so how long have you been in it? I've been in it since I was 13. You sound like one of my left fringe callers with this crap about "buying management's spin." I've fought with, and been fired by more management then you'll ever know. Back "in the old days" you had ownership caps and you had an FCC that had regulations and enforced them. You don't have that now. Stations had to do things like PSA's, news, and because there was open competition in most of the formats you couldn't get away with bad radio, bad numbers because if you did you paid for it in lack of dollars, and the bottom line suffered. Sure there were plenty of radio stations that were dumps. I ought to know I worked at a lot of them. There were also great stations with great talent, and great companies to work for like Jacor being one of them. ABC, when it was owned by Cap Cities, was another. My days at WFLA and WLS were the best. Radio is like anything else that turns a buck. Why so many right-wing hosts? Because many will tell you it works. And in a lot of cases it does. Progressive radio isn't working now because of the way it is done, the stations it's on, and talk radio suffers because of the right and left split. But it is all done because of money. You note every radio station you've worked at. Where has that been? If you've worked in enough radio stations, both music and talk, then you would know about the tug of war between sales and programing. What's going on now is sales is wining and programing is losing. It's going to take a company with guts and leadership to find a third way in talk mixing both right and left with other issues to make talk more entertaining and unpredictable again. But please don't insult my intelligence by telling me or the people on this board that KJCB or myself are just buying management's spin. We've both been in far too long for you or anyone else to pull that line.

Jay:

You couldn't be more right here. The "third way" you mention has been done before and can be done again. And, perhaps, it's the "predictability" of some, not all, but some of today's "Heavy 100" talk stars that's contributing to the slight ratings downturn we're seeing in some, not all, but some markets.

 

[ajhenderson]

Oh, and Phil, were you referring to WPHT or WSB? I thought Boston since Mark is not on there, but it is no longer a top 10 market.

Phil was probablt talking about 96.9 WTKK in Boston. They rae getting rid of Bill Oreilly from 7PM-9PM and adding McPhee from 7PM-10PM. Laura ingrham currently airs from 9PM-12AM, so I wouldn't be surprised if they were to get rid of her

You are probably right - I hadn't heard about McPhee moving to evenings. O'Reilly, when he first came on, did better in Boston than almost anywhere else. Granted, he was on complete dumps in some markets, but still. If 96.9 adds another nighttime host, they'll be local from 9 or 10am until 1am; not bad. But, as I'm sure Phil knows, Boston is now the 11th largest market, not in the top10.

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

Look Jullus are you in radio? If so how long have you been in it? I've been in it since I was 13. You sound like one of my left fringe callers with this crap about "buying management's spin." I've fought with, and been fired by more management then you'll ever know. Back "in the old days" you had ownership caps and you had an FCC that had regulations and enforced them. You don't have that now. Stations had to do things like PSA's, news, and because there was open competition in most of the formats you couldn't get away with bad radio, bad numbers because if you did you paid for it in lack of dollars, and the bottom line suffered. Sure there were plenty of radio stations that were dumps. I ought to know I worked at a lot of them. There were also great stations with great talent, and great companies to work for like Jacor being one of them. ABC, when it was owned by Cap Cities, was another. My days at WFLA and WLS were the best. Radio is like anything else that turns a buck. Why so many right-wing hosts? Because many will tell you it works. And in a lot of cases it does. Progressive radio isn't working now because of the way it is done, the stations it's on, and talk radio suffers because of the right and left split. But it is all done because of money. You note every radio station you've worked at. Where has that been? If you've worked in enough radio stations, both music and talk, then you would know about the tug of war between sales and programing. What's going on now is sales is wining and programing is losing. It's going to take a company with guts and leadership to find a third way in talk mixing both right and left with other issues to make talk more entertaining and unpredictable again. But please don't insult my intelligence by telling me or the people on this board that KJCB or myself are just buying management's spin. We've both been in far too long for you or anyone else to pull that line.

Sorry, Phil - I mean, Jay ....

I guess you don't like it when somebody has a different opinion, even a different experience, from your own. And you won't consider a different opinion until you see the resume of the person who holds. Instead you trot out a phrase ("left fringe") that sounds like it came from some Republican campaign attack ad. I have admired your work and I'm disappointed.

I don't deny there is an inherent "tug of war" between programming and sales. I was talking about other issues and I don't think the "tug" is the most important one.

Sales has always won. Of course, with the kinds of regulations you mention, some issues were not always in play. And sales runs the show. Radio has always employed the Peter Principle. Take a good salesman and make him an incompetent manager, a manager who has been on the opposite end of the rope from programmers and now gets to fix things.

Maybe if liberal talk were not left to well-intentioned amateurs, it might be done better. Maybe if more people were doing it, somebody might have hit on the winning formula. Your "third way" sounds like the original approach to talk radio and it was successful as a business. Ask yourself why it was abandoned when it was working and making money if, as you claim, money is management's only concern.

From what you write, you have spent much of your life in the industry. You do repeat the conventional wisdom of programming. And you are immersed in the culture of the industry that you repeat it's assumptions (many of them, in my opinion, flawed assumptions).

You say you've been in radio since you were 13. Did you get much studying done in high school? Did you go to college and grad school and study something other than radio? Did you spend any time working outside of radio (and in looking at radio from the outside)? The experience you cite to validate my opinions may actually limit your own view.

The profit motive is not the enemy (a fringe left position, all by itself). Incompetent management and a lack of focus on the end user are.

 

[jaymarvin]

I don't mind at all if people have another point of view. And yes, I did work outside of radio, and yes I did get my school work done. I'm also not part of the GOP or using any phrase from the GOP. Ther are many out there, like yourself, who claim there is some GOP driven agenda in talk radio. All I'm telling you is the only agenda is to make money. It's not like the old days. Most companies are now public owned and their mission is to make money for their stock holders. I'm not repeating anything. I'm tellig you how I see it from someone who goes back to the days of the Fairness Doctrine, and FCC First Phone tickets. You have right to think as you want. But anyone inside radio will tell you it's money. All right-wing is on all the time because it has worked. Do I agree with it? No. I think talk would be a lot better if you had conservative and liberals mixed together. That's the way it was at one time. It's not that way now. Syndication is one big factor. Everyone is out looking for the next Rush. Progressive radi is badly done and has NPR to compete with. Bottom line, with exception of Salem, and look how good they do, radio is about money not political agendas. To say otherwise is a sure sign of someone who doesn't know the workings of radio. By the way what stations have you worked at?

 

[Julius Leonard Marx]

I don't mind at all if people have another point of view. And yes, I did work outside of radio, and yes I did get my school work done. I'm also not part of the GOP or using any phrase from the GOP. Ther are many out there, like yourself, who claim there is some GOP driven agenda in talk radio. All I'm telling you is the only agenda is to make money. It's not like the old days. Most companies are now public owned and their mission is to make money for their stock holders. I'm not repeating anything. I'm tellig you how I see it from someone who goes back to the days of the Fairness Doctrine, and FCC First Phone tickets. You have right to think as you want. But anyone inside radio will tell you it's money. All right-wing is on all the time because it has worked. Do I agree with it? No. I think talk would be a lot better if you had conservative and liberals mixed together. That's the way it was at one time. It's not that way now. Syndication is one big factor. Everyone is out looking for the next Rush. Progressive radi is badly done and has NPR to compete with. Bottom line, with exception of Salem, and look how good they do, radio is about money not political agendas. To say otherwise is a sure sign of someone who doesn't know the workings of radio. By the way what stations have you worked at?

Jay, I think I know the "workings" of radio. I do look at it differently. There is a school of thought in sociology called functionalism. To boil it down (at the risk of over simplification) it says don't look at a group's stated goals, purposes, reasons or intentions, look at effects in the larger society. Radio says it's about the money and I'm even will to go along with the idea that the people running radio actually believe it. But that's not how radio functions.

Maybe you've heard the story about the three blind men and the elephant ...

 

[Shoot From Hip]

There is a rather substantial gap between the theoretical and the actual. The theoretical fails to take in to account the outside factors that have changed the industry. Knowing the workings of something and actually working it are not the same. Let's stop beating the dead horse with the rhetoric that suggests one person knows better than the entire industry how to appease listeners, advertisers, managers, and investors. Soon enough we'll be hearing about preferred topics, the need for reimposing mandatory inventory levels and public service programming, some thoughts on how great it would be if only we had equal access for all advertisers and posted lowest unit rates to encourage market competition...