US "All-News" Radio Stations

[nowradioguy]

Mike Kinosian, Managing Editor of Talkers magazine, lists the following stations as "all-news" in his monthly ratings analyses:

ENTERCOM
WINS - New York
WCBS - New York
WBBM - Chicago
KYW - Philadelphia
WWJ - Detroit
KRLD - Dallas
KCBS - San Francisco
KNX - Los Angeles

iHEART MEDIA
WBZ - Boston

HUBBARD
WTOP-FM - Washington, DC

SINCLAIR
KOMO - Seattle

Some may insist that WBZ is "news/talk", since Dan Rea and Morgan White, at least for now, still have their evening talk shows. But I'd suggest that labeling WBZ as "news/talk" puts it in the category of the rest of iHeart's news/talkers, e.g., KFBK, KOA, WLW, WGY, KFI, which, IMHO, it definitely is not, since these mentioned are almost exclusively talkers.

Were it not for the fact that iHeart has WRKO and WXKS-AM in Boston, my fear is that iHeart would remake WBZ as a news/talker, i.e., news perhaps in AM/PM drive, and talk the rest of the day.

 

[TheBigA]

Were it not for the fact that iHeart has WRKO and WXKS-AM in Boston, my fear is that iHeart would remake WBZ as a news/talker, i.e., news perhaps in AM/PM drive, and talk the rest of the day.

You may be right. What might confirm that view is what Bonneville is doing with KTAR Phoenix. That's a station that was mostly all news, except for Dave Ramsey. A few weeks ago, they added a local talker in mid-morning. Adding talk to a news station improves TSL. Assuming news & talk are formats that mainly attract older demos, they are starting to look for things that will improve revenues. Most of the stations on that list have already added informercials on the weekends. That's one way of making up for lost spot revenue on weekdays. All News as a format appears to be evolving, and we may see more changes moving forward.

 

[Kemosabe]

What about Bonneville's KSL Newsradio? Isn't its hybrid of news and talk similar to WBZ's?

 

[semoochie]

Is there any growth with Gen-X or is it just a matter of time?

 

[davideduardo]

What about Bonneville's KSL Newsradio? Isn't its hybrid of news and talk similar to WBZ's?

It's basically a talk station with regular newscasts and a news block in mornings.

https://kslnewsradio.com/schedule/ shows the morning drive newscast, with the rest of the day being talk shows.

All-news is hard to sustain outside the Top 10 markets, and even then there were newer ones like those in Atlanta and Houston that could not get traction with more recent launches. It seems that heritage all-news stations going back decades are still alive, but the average listener age is increasing.

 

[davideduardo]

You may be right. What might confirm that view is what Bonneville is doing with KTAR Phoenix. That's a station that was mostly all news, except for Dave Ramsey. A few weeks ago, they added a local talker in mid-morning. Adding talk to a news station improves TSL. Assuming news & talk are formats that mainly attract older demos, they are starting to look for things that will improve revenues. Most of the stations on that list have already added informercials on the weekends. That's one way of making up for lost spot revenue on weekdays. All News as a format appears to be evolving, and we may see more changes moving forward.

All news is hard to sustain anymore in any market, here or abroad.

30 years ago, Puerto Rico had 4 news networks, 24/7, and two of them were in the top 5 stations in ratings. Now it has none. There are news blocks, but all those stations changed to talkers with newscasts, but the all news operation is gone.

Mexico City, the largest city in the Hemisphere, had one all-news station. It is off the air now. But there are a dozen talk stations that focus on news events, half of them on FM.

 

[TheBigA]

All news is hard to sustain anymore in any market, here or abroad.

I think it's a function of presentation. News is becoming a core element in public radio. This is because of its unique presentation, combining actual news with short bursts of conversation, in a cycle that is less repetitive than commercial news formats. The public radio approach, heard in All Things Considered and Morning Edition, gets consistent ratings, and generates content that can be reused in podcasts and other digital platforms. The fact that it's non-commercial is attractive to the target demo, and the target demo is willing to subscribe for the opportunity to hear the content and presentation.

 

[davideduardo]

I think it's a function of presentation. News is becoming a core element in public radio. This is because of its unique presentation, combining actual news with short bursts of conversation, in a cycle that is less repetitive than commercial news formats. The public radio approach, heard in All Things Considered and Morning Edition, gets consistent ratings, and generates content that can be reused in podcasts and other digital platforms. The fact that it's non-commercial is attractive to the target demo, and the target demo is willing to subscribe for the opportunity to hear the content and presentation.

That is an issue of formatics.

The commercial all-news formula that has worked is based on a headline approach with low TSL per incident, but frequent usage.

The NPR formula is more like a TV newscast, longer in length; it is sort of like "60 Minutes" combined with newscasts. But it is still not a 24/7 format.

And the age of listeners is just as old as commercial all-news. But since the underwriting is not demographically driven, they can do very well even with most listeners over 50.

 

[TheBigA]

But it is still not a 24/7 format.

It can be when combined with similar programming from foreign broadcasters such as the BBC.

 

[davideduardo]

It can be when combined with similar programming from foreign broadcasters such as the BBC.

Yes, but that would very much limit the appeal; most US listeners are not interested in much international news.

What percent of the population would know where "Upper Volta" is or that it changed to "Burkina Faso" about 35 years ago?

Heck, when I lived in Ecuador and visited Cleveland, quite a few college educated persons asked what it was like living in Africa.

 

[itsTheRolyPoly]

It's basically a talk station with regular newscasts and a news block in mornings.

https://kslnewsradio.com/schedule/ shows the morning drive newscast, with the rest of the day being talk shows.

All-news is hard to sustain outside the Top 10 markets, and even then there were newer ones like those in Atlanta and Houston that could not get traction with more recent launches. It seems that heritage all-news stations going back decades are still alive, but the average listener age is increasing.

Actually, KSL also has a half-hour noon newscast and a 4-hour block of news in the PM as well.

 

[davideduardo]

Actually, KSL also has a half-hour noon newscast and a 4-hour block of news in the PM as well.

But the PM drive segment is personality based to some extent. It does have some resemblance to the NPR news blocks in the sense that it does not repeat over and over several times an hour.

I've listened to the tail end of it here in "the desert" where KSL has a near-local night signal. The afternoon block is rather entertaining and much more "story" based than "headline" based. Like the NPR shows, it is a blend of "60 Minutes" with an all news format. Particularly, they do interviews which the traditional "Give us 20 minutes..." format did/does not do.

You made me consider something I had not noted before: KSL is more like NPR than, probably, any other news talker in the country.

 

[TheBigA]

Yes, but that would very much limit the appeal; most US listeners are not interested in much international news.

We're talking about mostly after midnight. That's a limited appeal anyway. NPR has already prepared its audience for more international news anyway.