Friday, March 20, 2015

READER QUESTIONS & COMMENTS


REGARDING MY COVERAGE OF HD RADIO

Q:  Are you still pursuing your FCC Complaint that iBuiqity’s HD Radio system is a failure and does not service because so few people are using it?

A: I am but there is nothing new to report. I’ve noticed that my readership drops if I post too often about HD Radio.  I don’t think many people care about HD Radio – they given up on it. To most folks in the media biz, an HD Radio tuner should be put in the same storage box as AM Stereo and FM Quad receivers.  All are technologies that looked good in the lab but failed to catch on with the public.

Most of messages about HD Radio have reached me via my business email: publicradio@hotmail.com.  Some are confidential from “insiders” who have grievances or feel they have been burned.  In my 40+ years in the biz I have never seen such hard feelings expressed about a broadcasting technology and the way it was implimented:

COMMENT ONE: Are you aware that there may be a restraint-of-trade issue in the "HD" radio mess? [confidential company name], one of the two entities that merged to form Iniquity licensed the earlier technology of a small silicon valley firm which was then called Digital Radio Express, Inc. [“DRE”]



DRE went on to develop a much better compatible digital system for the FM band under the trade name "FMeXtra." The DRE system replaced the traditional analog SCA carriers with digital SCA signals. FMeXtra did not interfere with adjacent-channel stations. And it's coverage was much better than Iniquity's "HD"

And the system was not only much cheaper to buy than "HD" -- it was also much, much cheaper to operate, since it could use the same "Class C" finals used in analog-only FM transmitters.



But that system was never aggressively promoted as an alternative to "HD" FM, apparently because of some sort of anti-disparagement clause, or perhaps even an arguably illegal anti-competitive clause, in the licensing agreement between DRE and Iniquity.

I don’t know enough about this situation to comment.  But, delivering IBOC digital radio via already existing subcarriers converted to digital seems logical.  Advocates of DRE’s system says it sounds good but I haven’t seen any independent analysis.

COMMENT TWO: One of the reasons no one will echo your thoughts about HD Radio is the fact that iBiquity has spent a ton of advertising money with industry publications.  Have you seen all of shiny ads in Radio World?  iBiquity must be RW’s largest advertiser.

From what I’ve seen, Radio World’s coverage of iBiquity and HD has not been compromised by the ad buys.  I think the reason you don’t see much new about HD Radio (other than iBiquity press releases) is that very, very few people care about HD Radio.  They’ve moved on and Radio World wants to cover things readers care about.

REGARDING: “CHRISTIAN RADIO: 

ONLY THE CHOIR IS LISTENING”

Q: I was surprised to see that only four of the top ten Christian Contemporary Music [“CCM”] stations are in the South. I thought most Evangelicals live below the Mason-Dixon line.

A: CCM stations perform differently than old-school Christian stations. A large proportion of Christian “teaching” (sermons, talk shows, etc.) and gospel music stations are in the South.  CCM stations seem to perform best in markets with lots of yuppie women – that is who CCM stations target.

Thank you for reading and sending comments.  I love doing this blog and I am always looking for ways to improve it.

Thursday, March 19, 2015

TRIPLE A RADIO BATTLE IS ON IN THE TWIN CITIES

As you know, 89.3 The Current, is one the most-listened-to Triple A music stations in the country.  But with success comes imitators and new competition.  Recently a Minneapolis commercial station decided to challenge The Current.

KTWN – owned by the local Pohlad family – became GO 96.3. It is sort of a Reader’s Digest of The Current.  There was big news recently when The Current dropped host Barb Abney. GO hired her immediately.

The Twin Cities have had influential progressive rock stations since the late 1960s when blues-great Tony Glover hosted a freeform show overnight on KDWB AM.

For your enjoyment, here are the five Triple A station players:


THE NONCOM FAVORITE
THE CURRENT


KCMP 89.3 • NONCOMMERCIAL
Owner: American Public Media

Metro AQH Share: 3.0 • Weekly Cume: 317,400*

Capsule Description: THE CURRENT is one of the most successful Triple A stations in the nation.  It is involved in almost every aspect of the Twin Cities rock music scene. Their heritage hosts are bankable personalities with large individual followings. THE CURRENT is the tallest leprichaun on the block -- thank you David Carr.

Music Ratio:  50% current; 50% gold

Biggest Advantage: Beloved and established music source and cultural curator.  PD Jim McGuinn & company present a tasty choice of current and gold tunes including awesome oh wow oldies.

Biggest Challenge: THE CURRENT is the king of hill and everyone is gunning for them. Some heritage hosts think they are bigger than the station.  Success sometimes leads to atrophy and overconfidence.


THE NEW CHALLENGER
GO 96.3


KTWN 96.3 • COMMERCIAL
Owner: Northern Lights Broadcasting, LLC

Guesstimated Weekly Cume: 260,000

Capsule Description: GO 96.3 is owned by the Pohland family - who also own the Minnesota Twins. KTWN is the flagship for the Twins radio network. In the past three years KTWN has tried several music formats – none worked.

Music Ratio:  70% current; 30% gold

Biggest Advantage: They are new and the sound is very clean. I call them The Current Light.  The hosts are familiar Minneapolis voices.  They don’t play many commercials – now.

Biggest Challenge: As the flagship for Twins baseball coverage, April will bring many hours of play-by-by and boring as dry toast pre-game and post-game shows. Then again, if the Twins are challenging for the pennant they will strike gold.

 
THE HERITAGE MARKET LEADER
CITIES 97



97.3 • COMMERCIAL
Owner: iHeartMedia
Guesstimated Weekly Cume: 750,000

Capsule Description: Cities 97 is a love letter to women ages 35 to 49. This is a heavily researched music station. 
They used to carry the rock n roll flame – The Current carries the flame now.

Music Ratio:  10% current; 90% gold

Biggest Advantage: Well established. Lots of at-work and car listening.  They just had one of their best books in recent history.

Biggest Challenge: They are ACTUALLY a Hot AC station, perhaps in danger of loosing the hip aura.

COLLEGE ROCK FOR TRUE BELIEVERS
RADIO K



770 AM & 104.5 FM • NONCOMMERCIAL
Owner: University of Minnesota
Guesstimated Weekly Cume: 10,000

Capsule Description: RADIO K is considered one of the best college rock stations in America.  They are like a big club that loves to party. They are the focal point of a dynamic local music scene.

Music Ratio:  90% current; 10% gold

Biggest Advantage: They know their listeners.

Biggest Challenge: RADIO K is mainly funded by student activity fees paid with tuition.  They serve only a small fraction of the student body.

THE BOTTOM FEEDER
ALT 93.3



KFXM-HD2 via xlator W227BF • COMMERCIAL
Owner: iHeartMedia

Metro AQH Share: NA • Weekly Cume: NA

Capsule Description: This is your iPod on shuffle.  You only have 200 tunes in rotation. BUMMER. But,  I love 90s stuff like Oasis Live Forever.

Music Ratio:  10% current; 90% gold

Biggest Advantage: I’ve heard it costs about ten dollars a day to run it.  It soaks up enough younger men to help combo buys with Cities 97.

Biggest Challenge: It’s a who cares operation. These folks aren’t even trying.  Maybe next month they will be playing country.

Wednesday, March 18, 2015

CASE STUDY: HOW TO MAKE MONEY WITH NONCOM RADIO LICENSES


One of the business aspects of noncommercial radio that is not well understood is the sale and transfer of broadcast licenses.  Every year dozens of FM licenses acquire new owners. These transactions seldom make media news headlines like multi-million dollar commercial license sales.

License sales are more permanent than Local Marketing Agreements (“LMA”) because LMA’s can always be changed over time.  Consider KPCC, Pasadena and its very successful LMA with American Public Media (“APM”).  KPCC’s weekly audience has increased five-fold since APM took over. 

However, if Pasadena Community College, owner of the license for KPCC, ever needs cash fast KPCC can probably sell. Though I am certain APM has an iron clad deal, it could happen. So, having licenses means you an owner; an LMA means you are a renter.

Here is today’s case study:

• THE DEAL

NCE station WFLA-FM, Asheville, North Carolina, was sold for $500,000 recently. The terms were $100,000 in cash followed by 40 months of $1,000 payments plus 5% interest.  WFLA operates at 91.3 and blankets the Asheville market (metro population: 400,000).  Sweet deal.



• THE SELLER & BUYER

THE SELLER is Dr. Kenneth Brantley and his wife Janice from Ardmore, Tennessee.  The Brantley’s are Christian fundamentalists.

UPDATE: Thank you to the person who let me know that in an earlier version of this post I mistakenly confused the seller with Dr. Kent Brantley who contracted Ebola while working as a missionary in Africa.

THE BUYER is Radio Training Network, Inc., a player in the Christian Contemporary Music (“CCM”) marketplace. They are based in Greenville, South Carolina.  Radio Training Network owns about a dozen FM licenses and dozens of translators.  All of the stations carry His Radio, a 24/7 music machine that has impressive revenue.

According to Radio Training Network’s IRS 990, the company reported over $16,000,000 in revenue in 2013.  The net assets of this 501c3 as of 2013 exceeded $22,800,000.

2013 expenses were around $13,000,000 leaving a net revenue gain of over $3,000,000.

According to the 990, Radio Training Network reported over $3,000,000 in underwriting revenue and $1,300,000 sponsoring concerts by CCM artists.

Life is easy in Greenville.  The CEO of Radio Training Network, James Campbell made over $300,000 including a $100,000 bonus in 2013.  His wife Ruth, brought in $72,000 working as James' personal secretary.

Interestingly, one of the highest paid people at Radio Training Network doesn’t even work there: Thomas Brown. He was paid over $120,000 in 2013.  It turns out Brown lives in New Hampshire. He hosts The Tom Brown Show, a nightly conservative Christian talk show. The show’s motto is:

We believe that the people of the United States need to know when they are being lied to, especially concerning special interest issues.

• WHAT’S REALLY GOING ON?

This is an “insider deal.”  Radio Training Network has been running WFLA in Asheville vian an LMA for quite a while. They are cashing out the Brantley’s who were probably investors.

One rule-of-thumb to evaluate noncommercial radio sales is to determine the Cost per Potential Listener in the main coverage area.  In this case Radio Training Network paid around $1.25 per person. This is a helluva good deal.  The typical cost per listener is between $3.00 and $5.00.

Tuesday, March 17, 2015

NEW AIR WEBSITE IS ELEGENT, INVITING & VALUABLE


I knew I was that the right place when the first thing I saw on the new Association of Independents in Radio (“AIR”) website (link) is this brand statement:

CELEBRATING AUDIO SOUL IN A MULTIMEDIA WORLD



These few words describe the essence of AIR: Excellence in audio that expresses the human condition via sustainable use of public media platforms.  AIR has been a leader pushing the audio envelope beyond radio – while staying grounded in public radio.

Here are just a few of the things I love about the new AIR site:

• LARGE, EASY TO READ TYPOGRAPHY & LAYOUT

As some of you know, I have been loosing my vision over the past few years. I can read every bit of the verbiage on the site.  There is no “fine print” in both the visual and legal sense. I appreciate that the site creators kept it simple and clean.  Navigation is smooth.  Every page has been written for maximum clarity.

• INDIVIDUAL PAGES ARE LOGICAL

There is no need to guess where to go to get what you want. OPPORTUNITIES and RESOURCES are valuable because they focus on the needs of members.  The RESOURCES section has a helpful, concise submenu.  There are no dead links or out-of-date entries.

• THE TALENT DIRECTORY SHOWCASES MEMBER SKILLS FOR THE WIDER WORLD

Sustainability is a core value of AIR.  They want members to grow in their craft while making a living (or sometimes just paying expenses).  The TALENT DIRECTORY is searchable by tasks and experiences – two key criteria for folks looking to add to their projects.

Plus, I want to say congratulations to Bec Feldhaus Adams and Betsy O’Donovan for the excellent introductory webinar.  The emphasis was on clarity and maximum takeaway.  The supporting media, such as a video from Vimeo, adds to impact. Click here thesee the video.
 

Monday, March 16, 2015

KPCC, KUOW, KKJZ LEAD PPM GAINERS; WQXR TOPS DECLINERS


KPCC’s gain of 158,000 weekly listeners from November 2014 to January 2015 was the biggest noncom increase in audience.  Jazz KKJZ, KUOW, WHYY and KPLU also posted strong gains in listening.

Classical WQXR had the biggest decline in weekly listening from November 2014 to January 2015. ‘QXR lost 144,000 weekly cume listeners – almost a quarter of its audience.

FORMAT TRENDS

Contemporary Christian Music stations gained the most listening, followed by NPR News stations. Jazz and Triple A stayed about the same. Classical stations appear to be loosing the most listening.

ALL NONCOMMERCIAL STATIONS: JANUARY PPM
RANKED BY WEEKLY CUME LISTENERS

NIELSEN AUDIO PPM JANUARY 2015
Compared to November 2014
Survey Period: 1/1/15 – 1/28/15
Top-Line Estimates as of 2/13/15
Monday – Sunday 6am – Midnight, Persons 6+

GREEN = BIGGEST GAINERS
RED = BIGGEST DECLINERS
JAN
2015
NOV
2014
CALLS
NIELSEN AUDIO MARKET
Mark
Rank
AQH %
WEEKLY CUME
FORMAT
1
2
KSBJ
Houston
6
5.6
842,000
CCM*
2
5
KPCC
Los Angeles

2
2.5
773,900
NPR News
3
1
WNYC-FM
New York
1
2.7
746,200
NPR News
4
3
KQED
San Francisco
4
4.6
708,200
NPR News
5
4
KUSC
Los Angeles
2
1.8
701,300
Classical
6
7
WAMU
Washington DC
7
7.9
608,300
NPR News
7
9
KCRW
Los Angeles
2
1.7
507,400
NPR News & Triple A
8
8
WBEZ
Chicago
3
2.3
494,300
NPR News
9
11
KTIS
Minneapolis/
St. Paul
16
5.7
456,900
CCM
10
6
WQXR
New York
1
1.0
456,200
Classical
11
16
KKJZ
Los Angeles
2
0.8
411,700
Jazz
12
12
WGTS
Washington DC
7
3.4
395,300
CCM
13
10
WBUR
Boston
10
4.5
392,900
NPR News
14
14
WETA
Washington DC
7
4.5
379,000
Classical
15
15
WABE
Atlanta
9
3.2
352,900
NPR News & Classical
16
17
KDFC
San Francisco
4
2.8
348,000
Classical
17
20
KLJY
St. Louis
22
6.5
342,100
CCM
18
13
WFUV
New York
1
0.6
341,000
Triple A
19
25
WHYY
Philadelphia
8
3.3
337,900
NPR News
20
--
KUOW
Seattle/
Tacoma
13
5.2
335,900
NPR News
21
18
KNOW
Minneapolis/
St. Paul
16
5.0
333,100
NPR News
22
--
KPLU
Seattle/
Tacoma
13
3.2
321,000
NPR News & Jazz
23
18
KLDV
Denver
20
4.5
317,800
CCM
24
22
KERA
Dallas
5
2.3
315,300
NPR News
25
--
WGBH
Boston
10
2.9
311,000
NPR News
*CCM = Contemporary Christian Music
DATA © NIELSON AUDIO
Provided by RRC, Inc. for use by subscribers only
© Radio Research Consortium, Inc. // www.RRConline.org // RRC@RRConline.org
Format designations are the sole responsibility of Ken Mills Agency, LLC. Contact us publicradio@hotmail.com