Not a good year for Soft AC

[Tim]

Have always believed AM radio's biggest challenge, as well as FM niche formats, is sales...not audience age or size.

Every station can't be #1, or even in the top 5. But, if your station reaches even 5% of a market's total population cume every week...that's enough consumers to drive business into stores/businesses if they run a reasonable ad schedule over the long haul.

Say your market has 1,000,000 population. That's a nice size medium market. 5% weekly cume is 50,000 listeners. Run 30 to 40 spots a week over a year (even 26 weeks)...and if the commercial is a compelling one (change copy from time to time!)...and it's a decent business selling something the target audience wants/needs...you should be successful.

If a radio station runs 10 spots a day, 3 to 4 days a week, and run the commercials 5:00am-12:00 midnight, and sell them at even as low as $10.00@...that's "only" $300-400 a week. Run one spot per advertiser per hour on this plan.

After a few months, it'll sound like the advertiser is on the radio "all the time". Heck, even run this plan every-OTHER-week for a year...and that cuts the advertiser's cost down to $600-800 per month. Just about any medium-larger local businesses can afford that. This spot scheduling plan is called "vertical saturation". For regular spot-selling, this can work very, very well, if you just try it.

Oh, in case you're wondering...I did this for years at a medium market AM with a 2%-3% share...who's audience was 90%+ over age 55. For those advertisers I convinced to stick with this plan at least 8 months a year...they did very, very well. That's the rub: in a re-set economy, with skiddish consumers and businesses...convincing them.

If you own a small FM station or an AM with an older audience, and follow the plan above, and watch your overhead, you can still make money, and be able to run the format we all love, even though it doesn't reach the 25-54 ad agency beauty contest demo!

Wondering if you are still in radio, bturner? Do you mind saying where, or at least the market? (I'm recently "retired").

[Tim]

In case I was being clear...the 10 spots a day, 3 to 4 days per week is PER advertiser.

[bturner]

Hi,  Yes, still in radio.  I manage a daytime only AM, KYND in Houston.  We do brokered time.  I've been getting a paychecck from radio for 34 years come July 15, 2012.  Houston and Bryan/College Station were the only 'rated' markets I worked, but plenty of small market stations.  I'm still loving it.

[willdav713]

Hi,  Yes, still in radio.  I manage a daytime only AM, KYND in Houston.  We do brokered time.  I've been getting a paychecck from radio for 34 years come July 15, 2012.  Houston and Bryan/College Station were the only 'rated' markets I worked, but plenty of small market stations.  I'm still loving it.

I still have a tape of KYND-FM out of Houston.  I think it is from 1981.  One of the commercials was for Texas Commerce Bank downtown.

If I upload it, can you tell me the airdate of it?

[bturner]

Actually the calls, KYND, were for a popular beautiful music station in Houston that became a station known as 93Q.   In the early 1990s when the 1520 AM station appeared, the guy that had the station requested the KYND calls mainly because he had been a fan of the beautiful music station. 

[umfan]

You'd think Detroit would rate at least one real Soft AC.

WMGC, 105.1, seemed to be trending that way early this year but is now heading towards a Hot AC/CHR playlist.

[vchimpanzee]

I'm actually relieved the WDUV-type formats aren't succeeding. I don't want anything to replace the Dial Global approach.