The Rest Of The East Tennessee Market is Dead ...apparently

[SpeakIngles]

Radio in East Tennessee is going down the tubes. No new posts about anything in months.
HD is CRAP. Ipod is King! "And That's The Way It Is!" ...Cronkite signing off.

No group or independent operator wants to invest a dime to promote or make any station any better. So we are satisfied with poor ratings and sales. It stinks working four or five jobs for less than one person's pay. I don't want a bailout. But even interns won't work long for free, and I see radio dying. Does anyone beg to differ?? Will radio save itself or continue to tune off into oblivion?

Yes, I'm having a bad day. Thank you.

 

[Pratte4Life]

My last post was in response to a guy who stated something along the lines of "if it was as easy as you say you wouldn't be on an internet message board!"

I told him that with the condition of radio in this area, that's where a lot of the talent really is and the new ideas are coming from.

I don't know if radio is dead. We heard that TV would kill radio in the 1950s and yet it survived.

I think it can and will survive but it must learn to adapt. It seems it is still the place to listen to new songs (how else are you going to know what to load on your iPod?), for instance.

Talk radio must embrace what is local but also must learn to lean less on callers and more on their own talent, whether it is their interview skills, news gathering, or commentary. I think caller-generated talk is going by the wayside. We'd much rather write on a board or send an email to a show that will be read than wait on hold and then hung up on.

People talk about brokered programming. I think the future might be to have something along the lines of instead of sports talk- 24/7 Vols talk, or Braves talk, or in another market Seattle Seahawks talk.

A network of stations throughout the state would have the monopoly on the broadcasts but also then have discussion, profiles, etc. of the entire program. Obviously this would be propaganda filled (as if the local media doesn't do that enough), with a lot of rerun programming- but it would be a tremendous promotional tool for a sports franchise.

We pretty much do this already with religious and political programming. WJCW is essentially 24/7 Republican radio, and an Air America affiliate is essentially 24/7 Democrat radio.

Talk needs to evolve beyond political and sports discussion. Why not more pop-culture talk? A talk station focusing on movies, music, gossip, etc. could work as well, if not better, than what is being aired now on talk radio, and also would serve as a good place to capture a younger demographic currently not listening so much to talk.

That's a look into my crystal ball. The problem around here is that I really don't think that many people think to the future. They resign themselves with their niche and never look beyond it. "Cutting edge" around here means John Boy and Billy. Upsetting the norm is not looked with healthy skeptism but rather out and out contempt and scorn.

It isn't just that, say, the market didn't get an all-sports radio station until 20 years after the format debuted, or, for that matter, that it didn't get an all-talk station until 30 years after that format debuted.

It's that the aforementioned talk station was recently bragging in promotional advertisements they were one of the first talk radio stations in the country WHEN THEY ADOPTED THE FORMAT 30 YEARS AFTER IT DEBUTED. They legitimately had no idea; their grasp of broadcasting trends and history was so terrible.

Also- the idea that a broadcaster is a spare part to be paid a few dollars an hour is prevailent around here. Let's look at Tom Taylor, who for years was the "Voice of the Dobyns-Bennett Indians." While I realize some of the circumstances relating to his departure from Citadel to the Hills were by his own choice, I don't think it's a stretch to say that he was/is to D-B what John Ward was/is to the University of Tennessee.

So why is he calling Sullivan South now? This isn't a knock on the Rebels, where he does a fine job and they have to be happy to have him. But it's like when Bob Prince did Houston Astros games. Either the Hills need to pay to get the D-B broadcasts, or there needs to be some sort of way he can get back on the air doing the Indians on a freelance basis with the station broadcasting his games. If not the station(s), Dobyns-Bennett should demand it- no knock on the current broadcasters of the Indians.

In other markets successful radio broadcasters enjoy great reverence even after they die. They are part of the community's history.

So where is the reverence here for the late Bill Cramer, Red Kirk, or Curly White? It is as if with their deaths, their legacies left as well.

The problems with radio in the Tri-Cities are many and they are great. There are a few "diamonds in the rough;" but what market doesn't have them?

I believe that the conservative nature of the area creates a mindset where anything creative is squashed or feared.

But stations here MUST embrace the creative. They MUST take chances. If their budgets are low- don't be afraid to do something outrageous to get attention; be it publicity stunts, programming, or whatever.

Otherwise, as you fear, more stations will go the way of WKPT-TV news.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

This could turn into a really interesting thread. To the original poster: I share your pain, but please look around a realize that you are describing something that IS NOT peculiar to East Tennessee alone. It is an illness that has spread far and wide.

Having said that, I realize there are some bright spots here and there around the country. Are you sure there are no bright spots left in broadcasting in East Tennessee?

And for the second post: I'm having a handful of a day. Let me come back another day and let us explore your thinking a bit further.

 

[SpeakIngles]

Now that it's a better day for me...Yes there are bright spots. I am actually employed at a radio station! We could be completely off the air, but somehow we manage to make enough to keep the transmitter on. I just suffer the effects of not having any other people around here to really motivate me. Here, I am the PD, (in title only) the MD, the whole airstaff, and a salesperson, the receptionist, the IT person, and the traffic manager, the engineer, and just whatever else needs doing 24/7 365x2+, and I seem to get tired fast these days and take the easy way out on most days. It doesn't make for good radio. We have a great heritage, and I love this station. I probably would be mowing yards, driving a truck, or making your burger if I weren't here. For that I'm blessed.

If AM's stream, (Yup, it's an AM) and and maybe could pick up FM translators, we'd be some better off band-wise. I read in one of the latest trades that the average AM listener is 57 and over. Like vinyl, AM radio is headed off the map I think... eventually. But there are so many different things formatically and promotionally that could be done to bring those lost listeners back. 'Live and Local'... you HAVE to do it to succeed.

Much of the good talent I know is mostly outside the business now. Trick is getting the powers that be to believe what we're doing is not really working on a larger scale, and getting them to change some things. (read: hire me some help) When you don't crack the book with what you're doing, something is wrong somewhere. But without more information, research and analysis, (read:money) I just can't put my finger on it. Some days I think I'm just lazy, and If I were more motivated to do a better job, (read:even MORE hours) I could get us back in the book. But I just put in tomorrow's log and let it track and go home. ;D

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Obviously you are not the only person in the world having to shoulder this kind of load to keep a station going. Knowing that doesn't make it any easier, though, does it.

Do what you have to do to keep your head together. Come here to read and post. Maybe get a hobby... one that doesn't take much time. Choose friends who have the ability to keep you enthused, not sour folks that help you feel sorry for yourself.

Spend at least a little bit of time thinking about "Plan B". What would you do, what could you do that would be equal to or better than working in radio, and what do you need to do to prepare yourself in you choose to someday make an exit. Feeling trapped is never good. Feeling like you have an alternative in your shirt pocket makes it possible to keep doing what you are doing.... if that is what you want to do.

 

[Pratte4Life]

Let's see here-

A man is gainfully employed in the industry he loves.

He is not pigeonholed into a role as he would at a larger station.

He (or she) has essentially free reign at this station. It can be shaped into his image. In essence, HE (or she) commands the listenership, the popularity, the amount of money he or she makes.

And the people here say "think of a Plan B for your career."

In an area where the population often seems to be filled with not optimists, but COCKEYED optimists, this is about as negative as you can get.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

And the people here say "think of a Plan B for your career."

In an area where the population often seems to be filled with not optimists, but COCKEYED optimists, this is about as negative as you can get.

I guess I'm the guy who introduced "Plan B" to this conversation, so let me "'splain".

I have had to come up with Plan B at least five times in my life.

You're going for a great ride in a job you love, and they walk in some afternoon, send everybody home, and slam the door shut and turn everything over to the bankruptcy court. Been on that ride twice.

You're going for a great ride in a job that is great and they walk in some afternoon, invite you into the office and explain times are a bit tough and so they don't end up dealing with bankruptcy, they're going to throw a few people overboard, now, today. Tag: You're it. Been on that ride twice.

You come to the conclusion you are trying to build a business that your wife is not fond of. The marriage may not work if you stay with the business. I decided the wife was more important (and more fun) than the business.

Optimism flowed a bit more lavishly in my decision-making back when I could throw my stuff in the back of a car and then a bit later hitch a 4x8 U-haul trailer on the back of the car and relocate for the next opportunity. When it got to the point that everything I owned would not fit in the biggest truck U-Haul had to offer.... I don't know that optimism took a kick in the teeth, but something that looked a little big like pessimism was seen on the premises.

I got out of the broadcasting business a few years back. Said I would consider coming back when the kids were grown and out of the house. In the last few years I have reconnected with some of the people I worked with many years ago. I have been crawling through radio stations doing due-diligence with the idea of making a purchase offer. Stations that at one time I could have worked for with an optimistic attitude and great hopes for the future today, in some cases, look (and smell?) like an overgrown, unkempt two-holer outhouse. I look at some of those towns and some of those stations and ask what would it have done to me, my wife, my family had I refused to consider Plan B.

I have also visited some stations, places I couldn't dream of buying today because I don't have the capital, and I have to fantasize, what if, what if I had made ONE MORE MOVE and ended up there, and eventually ended up as the owner, or at least the manager.

Life is one hell of a gamble. I stand by my recommendation: Plan B can be a handy thing to have in your shirt pocket.

 

[Pratte4Life]

I understand that.

But everyone who has been in this business has had that experience. The best broadcasters in the business- the titans- Limbaugh, Stern, etc.- have all been fired.

My thing has always been with my "Plan B" that after about a week I realize I can't STAND Plan B, so I highly recommend working through the kinks of "Plan A."

Your post tells me you'd rather have a wife and kids than a radio career. I wouldn't.

But the topic of this thread is not to gripe about the paths our lives have taken. It's to ask if the market is dead.

 

[Pratte4Life]

So with that in mind-

Today- the ratings came out in the Tri-Cities. I see the same old same old, WVEK is expanding their audience; other than that, not much to report.

HOWEVER . . .

I'm listening to WXSM. I'm a sports fan, want to hear what Bill Meade has to say- even though it's been the same thing for the past 20 years (Vols can do no wrong, Bud Selig is the devil, we need a playoff in college football, I stay away from commenting on local sports for fear of reprisal, etc.).

They do a promo for the "Morning Monster" show.

It's a cut of Bobby Rader and Kenny Hawkins interviewing Mike Keith.

AND IT IS FROM WEEK 6 OF LAST FOOTBALL SEASON!!!!!!!

Is it any wonder why Citadel's stations here are taking such a beating? We talked about how stations no longer have budget for promotions, but this one isn't the fault of corporate. This is a free way they can promote their programming and they can't even keep it contemporary.

You wonder why WXBQ has won 60 straight books now, and when I say it is by default, now you know why.

The concept of radio in the market may not be dead- but it appears the people running it are.

 

[SpeakIngles]

An even better day....Maybe my initial observations were not so accurate. Things are starting to shake in the market. News in the papers about new competition for MY listeners. I've got to do something...I can make it happen! I pray for strength and keep my head up. It IS a load to shoulder. Like I said first post, I was having a bad day, but bad days don't last, and I will survive, I'm sure. But I don't want to be the one looking back after the fact and wishing I had another chance. I want so badly to make this work, and work well. But I don't want to burn myself out doing it, and wonder if that's what's happening sometimes.

You guys are right about trying to stay positive. I've been fired before...from my dream job. But along came another dream job, although it took a while...and maybe someday another, who knows. But right now I feel pretty secure, and again, I am thankful. I am off to plan the next move...

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

Your post tells me you'd rather have a wife and kids than a radio career. I wouldn't.

But the topic of this thread is not to gripe about the paths our lives have taken. It's to ask if the market is dead.

I agree with your logic that our overall purpose here is to find an answer to: "Is your radio market dead?", and I assume your next question would be, "Now that we have analyzed our market, can we do something to make it better, and what would that be?"

I realize that in Eastern Tennessee you can identify some people who are weird, sluts, abnormal, vulgar, and something less than law abiding. However, Eastern Tennessee has to be a geography that has a high a percentage of those folks who are classic Americans who believe in family values, moral values, they teach Sunday School classes, they vote on election day, they expect a bride dressed in white to be a virgin.... you get the picture. You are in a part of the country that like where I live, having Southern Gospel Music as the foundation of your music radio station is the most profitable format in small rural towns. (I realize Knoxville is going to have tastes and values in line with Atlanta or Nashville, or Kansas City.

I don't want you to take this as a personal attack on you. I don't know you except for your one statement related to what I say next:

If your market is indeed dead, maybe a major part of your potential audience got tired of radio programming that put more emphasis on pleasing talent and management at the radio station who selfishly love their own emotional needs and less emphasis on what people who put family and wife ahead of fun in their career want to hear.

People who love building homes are sitting home watching soap operas.

People who love making automobiles will never do it again.

Captains who love flying airlines have been laid off and will never fly again because the age limit will grab them before the market returns.

After I left the business, I would still stop by my hometown radio station in hopes that the owner might eventually be willing to sell to me. I'll tell you the I put my dream away with the scrapbooks. He was upbeat on one of the visits. He was looking forward to what the station was going to bill that year. It was less than my own salary would be two years from then. That was the day I began sleeping better at night about my decision, the day I knew the career was NOT more important than my marriage.

You want to see lively radio in Eastern Tennessee? Make the station sound like you know something about the people who could be listening.... if they found it worthwhile.

 

[kd4rnc1964]

Let's not mention any more names here. I worked with the "voice of Kingsport" as he was reffered to. He was more concerned with his big mouth on the air than making money for his beloved WKIN and being the BMOC. There's more to the story why he left Citadel. Yes, I admit I was a "bored-op" there and got fed up with the egos. The place has had a corporate cleaning since I left three years ago. I failed to make it there and haven't looked back. No offense but someone needs an enima. Borrow about a mil and build your dream station. I smell the ramblings of a Marky here....listen close..

 

[Pratte4Life]

"Let's not mention anymore names," he/she says, before mentioning names.

Don't like the Taylor example? Then we could discuss on a sports relm how Chip Kessler and Scott Robertson were replaced by a total incompetent before Jay Sandos took over, or we could discuss how Marty Osbourne was treated, or we could talk about any number of examples.

Again, the market is notorious for paying people garbage and treating them worse.

I go back to what I said before- in other markets broadcasters become legendary figures of the hometown culture even after they die. Where is the reverence here?

But it's the lack of competition, of really giving a damn, that bothers me.

Want to fix it? Broadcasters- I think it might be time at looking to organize. As a political conservative I never thought I would say something like that, but what other options do broadcasters here have?

Let's get that country station to compete against WXBQ instead of "I've been here for 15 years and know how to do it" while sporting a rating of less than 1.0 in market No. 102. Let's get WFHG to do something other than have slobbering voices and out-of-it intellectuals for a bold try against WJCW. Let's use the airwaves to make a difference rather than be afraid to take a stand.

But, alas, the culture here is not to praise those ON the air. It is for that talent to be treated as a spare part while bowing to master.

 

[TennStud]

It's real Simple.....Define your target audience and deliver what they want/need. Don't give the most econonomical programming...i.e. lowest cost. Sometimes you have to spend money to make even more money!!! Know your audience and relate to them. DeRegulation of the broadcast industyr was the Worst thing to ever happen to the radio listening public.21st Century corporate radio couldn't give a **it about serving the public need as we did in the past. Just try and get a severe weather warning on any of the Big 3's stations(BBC,HVBC,and Citadel) on Sunday night...You could end up blown into another state before you heard a severe thunderstorm warning had been issued an hour ago or you could get really lucky and get Friday's recorded weather forecast on Saturday or Sunday night....It's not rocket science...it's what any other business must do to survive...provide your customers a needed and valuable service!!!

 

[Pratte4Life]

Stud- if that was true, then explain to me . . .

A- How it seems whenever there is a minor fender bender I hear about it as the lead story on the news.

B- How WJCW routinely beats its competition with rip and read while its competition fails with a news staff.

As far as getting a severe weather report on one of the other stations on Sunday night, I believe most of them are on automation then.

Actually, I do know for a fact WXBQ doesn't want their board ops running the computer to make such on-air announcements when they break. I mention that for all you fellas praising the PD over there.

So your complaint should not be on corporate radio. Your example criticizes modern technology.

The problems here aren't coming from corporate. Look, if WQUT changed to AOR in the late '80s, when it was locally owned, I could make an arguement that this was what the local audience wanted anyway and making the switch would have been able to prevent the great WXBQ takeover.

That's debatable, I realize.

But here's what isn't. Corporate isn't telling the boys on Free Hill Rd. to run year-old promos. Corporate hasn't told Bristol to run their sports station as an afterthought on automation. Corporate didn't present the mindset of one station I know that resisted buying a FAX machine for years because the owner thought FAX machines were a passing fad.

In this market, Citadel is the only real "corporate" radio group.

The failures of this market simply stem from local management. Plain and simple.

 

[TennStud]

Simple my Friend!!!

As For A...that is easy to get..listen to police scanners..Low Costs....You ver rarely hear of any subtantive local news reporting that requires any effort,reporting or expenses....Remember what I said..give the people what they need and/or want and be a true public servant

B-if you're referring to WFHG as WJCW's competition....two words....Better Signal and surrounding national programming

Not just Sunday night but for many station...most any night..You're right...Automation..Technology and lower costs...not serving the public and their needs..Under old rules that would be unheard of....Why have a live body as a board-op if they can't serve the public with useful and needed info. I Use the term "corporate" to mean not totally locally run and owned by a group that has more station that the previous 7/7/7 rule allowed.


It's still very simple....basic marketing...that any other business follows.....find your niche and do it better than anyone else and serve the public's BASIC needs

 

[Pratte4Life]

I'm buying most of what you're saying. "Better Signal and surrounding national programming" is actually six words, not two, but that's nitpicking.

But it stands to reason then Bristol's abandonment of the AM band and their programming acumen might not be as great as advertised.

But I don't think penny-pinching in radio is the result of corporations being able to buy up lots of stations in a market.

The station too cheap to buy a FAX machine? It was a local owner who had an AM/FM combo.

Tell you the truth, I think if a corporation bought them, they'd have got the place a FAX machine.

Look, I agree with you. Concerning the news reporting- Citadel is very rip-and-read, I once heard a newscaster at Bristol use the station's newscast as a forum to promote his ham radio classes.

The problem with your "simple" answer is that it is a cliche. Every station everywhere will tell you they serve the public's basic needs and they have their own niche in the market.

It's rather obvious around here- by merely the examples you give- that they don't. And that has nothing to do with corporate ownership- proof being since Citadel is really the only corporate ownership in the Tri-Cities.

 

[TennStud]

Read as owners...Most of these will do no more than necessary to keep their "big sticks" on.....as soon as the FCC deregualted broadcasting.....regular community service went out the window...oh there's still the occasional radio-thon to look involved, but on a daily basis..it is gone

 

[SpeakIngles]

A little OT maybe, but still funny nonetheless...You mention running old clips, and not staying up on servicing the community with current information...About three weeks ago, I was riding down I-75 and tuned in the TDOT highway advisory AM, way up on the dial about 1620. They were broadcasting that 'today is' a date in April, and I-40 was closed through downtown Knoxville! I got a kick out of that!

 

[Pratte4Life]

Both WTFM and WXBQ are locally owned.

What do they do- really- that involves "community service?"

Local morning shows? Citadel has them on their AMs.

Look, you want more examples? I got up early on Sunday morning and heard on one of those community service shows that come on early Sunday morning Keith Turner, the athletic director of Science Hill, talk about the need for a new football stadium in Johnson City.

This is a great interview of community service, right?

Until I realized, what they did was just take sound for 10 minutes of a speech Turner gave to the school board. It WASN'T an interview.

Furthermore, why didn't any of the local sports talkers pick this up? I mean have Turner on the show, take calls on the subject, make a liner of the points he made for promos?

This would be of community interest, be perfect for a sports talk show, show your editorial influence, etc.

This has nothing to do with corporate or local ownership. As I said, my experience is that corporate spends more than the local stations around here do.

Look through the posts and you'll find the story of how a prominent locally owned station lost the station's van because they never budgeted oil changes.