In the words of veteran Boston-area radio programming and marketing pro Clark Smidt, “Speakers become smart when they say the right words or play the best music.
Who’s at the controls? This very question could make the difference between having a consumer call up a personality-free playlist on a streaming audio service, or your radio station’s easily accessible audio stream.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
In May, RBR+TVBR correctly predicted that Allen Media Group would end up purchasing an ABC affiliate that Meredith Local Media had agreed to divest in order for it to complete its $2.825 billion sale to Gray Television.
On Thursday (9/23), the group led by Byron Allen closed on its acquisition of that Meredith property — a move that suggests Gray’s closing on the Meredith properties is on track for a Q4 closing.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
On September 8, its shares, traded on NYSE, reached a record high of $303.62. Today, with shares slightly lower, American Tower Corp. is among the best performers on Wall Street in the broader telecommuncations sector.
Now, the Boston-based company founded by the late Steve Dodge has priced its registered public offering of senior unsecured notes due 2026, 2031 and 2051.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
With a new administration, one would assume that by now, the White House would have nominated its choice for Chairman of the FCC.
It hasn’t happened, and it is nothing less than “a really weird situation,” says Fletcher Heald & Hildreth partner Francisco Montero.
How weird is it? At the Hispanic Radio Conference in Miami on Thursday, Montero suggested that, if the Biden Administration does nothing, the FCC could end up with a Republican majority again.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
On September 21, RBR+TVBR reported that after 33 years in creative and leadership roles at Disney, Gary Marsh will be stepping down as President and Chief Creative Officer of Disney Branded Television at the end of 2021 to launch his own production company.
Two days later, Marsh’s successor as President was revealed by Disney General Entertainment Chairman Peter Rice.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
MIAMI — The endless commercial break. It’s so bad that Radio Ink Editor Ed Ryan’s daughter, 24, won’t even listen to the radio. Is the stopset slog a problem for Hispanic radio? Ryan probed four of the industry’s top executives as the moderator of the Hispanic Radio Executive Leadership Roundtable on Wednesday afternoon at the Hispanic Radio Conference in Miami.
First to tackle the sensitive topic: Otto Padron, President/CEO of Meruelo Media.
Noting that radio is often prone to the “drip and drop” of spots across every commercial break, Padron noted that the key challenge was to try to balance spots with every other way a radio station is able to make money. And, there is always a conflict in try to achieve that balance.
That’s why Padron doesn’t look at advertisements as commercials, but rather as disruptions.
Is there the right balance? No, he admits. At the same time, he holds the belief that radio is not just a music platform. “There is something that the DSPs are not going to be able to provide,” Padron says of digital pure-play audio sources.
Meanwhile, some dayparts will need to balance others, as commercial-free hours take away spots that are, in a way, made up for at other points in a day.
When it came time for Spanish Broadcasting System (SBS) COO Albert Rodriguez to offer his thoughts on the topic, he struck a very reverent tone, one that practically proselytized Radio and its untapped power. That said, it was very clear that having too many commercials isn’t a bad thing.
“We are in a beautiful business when we are completely oversold,” Rodriguez says. “It’s the time to call our clients and tell them we need more! When you tell your clients they can’t have something, they want it more.”
Ryan proved to be a strong moderator, pushing the topic further as Univision Radio President Jesus Lara offered his biggest challenge: attribution. With respect to the spot loads, “it depends on the daypart and on seasonality,” Lara says.
Norsan Media Chairman/CEO Norberto Sanchez, whose stations can be found across the Southeast, noted that at his regional Mexican properties, sales are at 120% of capacity. Could he raise the rates to get that down to 100%? “That’s kind of tough,” Sanchez admits.
The conversation then wound back to Rodriguez, who again waxed poetically about the wonders of Radio and how Hispanic audio, in particular, has a window of opportunity to grow. His words prompted Ryan to remark, “It sounds like an investor phone call for you,” resulting in laughter from the capacity in-person audience at the Intercontinental in Doral.
Ryan further pushed the question by asking the panelists if it is fair for the No. 7 advertiser in a spotload with 10 commercials to pay the same rates as the first or second advertiser. Padron noted that there is some “pod exclusivity,” but this reflects categories and not the total number of commercials. Furthermore, Padron says, there’s a wholesaler picking up inventory and that creates traffic headaches for Meruelo’s stations.
Lara adds that Univision Radio has “a couple of volume deals” with a couple of third-party players.
Speaking from the audience, noted multicultural media sales strategist Sherman Kizart shared that he’d just spent the last two hours on the phone with Publicis, as its “Once and For All” coalition, comprised of 21 clients and audio activation teams, were “trying to figure out how to spend more money with everybody in the room.”
HispanicAd.com publisher Gene Bryan sparred with Kizart, disputing just how much investment companies other than Procter & Gamble Co. are investing in Hispanic media.
The conversation ended with a question from Dana Cortez, the syndicated radio host. She asked the panel what Radio can do to rebrand itself? The answer from SBS’s Rodriguez? “Don’t be afraid to embrace audio because it enhanced Radio,” he says.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The President and CEO of a family-owned broadcast media company headquartered in Oklahoma has been named to the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Television Board of Directors by Television Board Chair Perry Sook in accordance with NAB by-laws.
The appointment is effective immediately.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
The MSNBC weekend anchor and co-host of the Latina-To-Latina podcast participated via Zoom in an engaging Hispanic Radio Conference interview conducted by SBS EVP/Programming Jesus Salas.
The focus: the power of podcasting targeting Hispanics, and just how personal it can be for those listening to what Alicia Menendez has to say.
Menendez told attendees from New York that she’s been on TV for years, on streaming platforms and even had a radio show on SiriusXM. But, she’s never had the intimacy with the audience than she has with her podcast.
“They give me feedback about their lives, they give me feedback about the show,” she noted. “That’s the reason we do this show. It’s a labor of love. We’re building a community.”
Menendez added that there wasn’t much celebrating when the show was went over 1 million downloads. She said her sights were set on two million downloads, and added, “because that’s how you build an empire.”
Menendez believes she, along with co-host Juleyka Lantigua, who was present in Miami on September 22, have planted the flag as the premiere Latina podcast but also admitted there’s still so much room to grow. Mendendez noed, “Forty four percent of the United States Latina population has never listened to a podcast. There’s a huge opportunity there.”
When Menendez was asked about monetization, she said unfortunately she still has to explain that Latinos are mainstream to some advertisers. “Advertisers do not need a separate marketing budget for our audience.”
The Latina To Latina podcast launched in 2018. Menendez said she learned quickly about the importance of delivering the show consistently and building up a volume of episodes that her audience can go back and listen to.
— With reports from Podcast Business Journal
MIAMI — When it comes to early-morning sessions at a business conference, there’s nothing more enticing than “a riveting dive into some delightful technical details of broadcast regulation” … right?
Based on the strong attendance at the Hispanic Radio Conference in Doral, home to Univision, NBCUniversal’s Telemundo and some of the top Hispanic marketing and advertising leaders in the U.S. today, there could have perhaps been no stronger topic to begin a full day of sessions with.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
Add St. Louis to the market roster of locales where ATSC 3.0-powered NEXTGEN TV is now available to those who have a television set capable of receiving the next-generation broadcast TV signals.
The September 23 launch includes Sinclair Broadcast Group, Meredith Local Media, TEGNA and two Nexstar Media Group stations.
The launch in St. Louis follows a decade of development and months of planning and preparation by the local stations in the market, with Nexstar-owned KPLR-11 serving as the “lighthouse” for sibling KTVI-2, the FOX affiliate; Sinclair’s ABC affiliated KDNL-30, Meredith’s KMOV-4 and TEGNA’s NBC-affiliated KSDK-5.
NEW YORK — Hearst Television has officially turned on the lights at Hearst Audience Marketplace, described as “a data-driven audience-targeting feature enabling marketers to use connected TV (CTV), over-the-top (OTT) and programmatic display/video platforms more easily to reach the most specific category of consumer down to zip-code level.”
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
NEW YORK — The Video Advertising Bureau (VAB) has released an in-depth custom analysis of the marketing and media investment strategies of some of the fastest-growing DTC brands.
VAB analyzed the following 30 brands, which the groups says “are each embracing a total audience marketing strategy to successfully fuel business outcomes.”
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
In March, Gray Television announced that it was leading a $40 million investment round for Envy Gaming, an eSports and entertainment company based in Dallas. It was noteworthy, as the broadcast TV station owner became the first company among its peers to follow the radio industry’s lead by investing in the growing gaming industry.
Now, The E.W. Scripps Co. is following Gray’s lead by dropping its dollars into a Boca Raton, Fla.-based gaming group.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
NEW YORK — The independent TV measurement and analytics firm known as 605 has expanded its partnership with data and technology provider PlaceIQ, a relationship that brings “always on” planning, measurement and attribution to the television marketplace.
How so?
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
A Class B FM serving the capital city of Ohio with rock ‘n’ roll programming, along with its “Jack FM” Class A sibling and “Easy” AM with a FM translator, are getting a little bit of an ownership twist.
Not to worry, listeners: North American Broadcasting Company isn’t making any changes to the station’s programming.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
As Angie Balderas, the SVP of Entravision Communications’ Sacramento, Stockton and Modesto, Calif., radio stations sees it, the pandemic hit the Spanish-language radio industry in the U.S. “probably harder than any other traditional media.”
Why? Stay-at-home ordinances and remote work mandates eliminated the daily commute. As a result, from her perspective, in-car radio listening and ad revenue “plummeted” during the early months of the global COVID-19 2020 shutdown.
Now, dollars are surging, she says.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
Podcast Business Journal
eMarketer is reporting that while Spotify continues to expand its podcast listenership in the US, Apple Podcasts’ has stagnated. eMarketer is forecasting that Spotify will surpass Apple in listenership by the end of this year.
eMarketer projects that Spotify will have 28.2 million monthly podcast listeners over Apple’s 28.0 million, and they predict that number will increase in the years ahead.
eMarketer also reports that overall listenership to podcasts will slow down for the next few years. “Despite this overall deceleration, Spotify’s growth among that listener base will continue to increase through the end of our forecast period in 2025.”
As has been reported by Streamline Publishing’s Radio Ink, radio stations that are clients of Marketron have been impacted by a weekend incident that saw Russian hackers invade the ad scheduling software business, crippling operations.
Among those impacted: Hall Communications. And, the stations’ Executive VP and Burlington, Vt., General Manager went to Gray Television-owned WCAX-3 to share how the Marketron troubles directly impacted their operation.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
It’s no secret that the COVID-19 pandemic greatly impacted radio broadcasting companies across the latter half of 2020. For Hispanic-targeted AMs and FMs, the pandemic significantly altered the advertising landscape.
But, by how much? That was the first topic for discussion as the Hispanic Radio Conference kicked off Wednesday afternoon in Miami — making it the first broadcast media industry event held for a national audience since NATPE MIAMI in January 2020.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
WASHINGTON, D.C. — An executive of The E.W. Scripps Co. who serves as Associate Dean of the Broadcast Leadership Training (BLT) program, has signed on to a letter co-signed by the program’s two other associate deans and the program’s dean that asks the House Speaker and Senate Majority Leader to throw their support behind a reinstatement of the FCC’s Minority Tax Certificate program.
Please Login to view this premium content. (Not a member? Join Today!)
Please show your support by using the Ko-Fi link at the bottom of the page. Thank you for supporting REC's efforts!
