THE LITTLE RADIO STATION THAT COULD Chris Byrnes There is a radio station in Texas that must be feeling 500 feet tall these days. But, in the Spring of 2000 they had slipped to a 2.9% share of the market, with no marketable demos, and trends that were all heading in the wrong direction, and a for sale sign on the door.
If I may indulge you for a few moments I'd like to share the tale of how this station climbed the ratings mountain. KLTG known as The Beach 96.5 is located in Corpus Christi on the Gulf of Mexico. The market has a high Hispanic population with lots of blue collar workers who toil away on oil rigs or associated industries.
This CHR station was positioned as the "Hot Hit New Music Station" but could not manage a #10 position in any single age demo. New owners decided they needed help to fix the product, so they went looking for a consulting company. After interviewing several companies they employed ByrnesMedia in September of 2001.
We arrived in the market one week before the Arbitron started to conduct a market monitor and to see if there was an opportunity to better position the product to attract the "money demos." Using PD Advantage from Arbitron, we were able to drill into the data and establish exactly what was going on with each radio station. There was no time for a research study, but after pouring over the numbers and listening to all the stations in market, it appeared there might be a Hot A/C gap we could bulldoze our way into and expand out. Without giving away all our secrets for free, I thought you might be interested in some of the processes we go through.
Strategy - We always start by talking to the owners, general manager and program director to get a thorough understanding of the market history and station history before we establish clear programming and rating goals. Only then do we develop a strategy and timeline for success. We ask the client to complete a detailed questionnaire that we've fine tuned over the years. Then together we talk, plan and develop the road map, because we believe that if the management and staff do not clearly understand the goals, the station is already handicapped and less likely to be successful.
Music - Music makes up 80% of any hour, so unless the music is perfect, victory will always be a long way off. I'm a great believer that this is one time when size does matter, and frankly smaller is better. What you don't play won’t hurt you. I was already consulting a number of Hot A/C stations so had a good idea of the basic library universe. But we never walk into a market with a "magic list." We always study the market, the region and the State looking for the local hits. In Texas local bands like Fastball and Lisa Loeb test stronger than in other parts of the USA, so we built a focused music universe that would work best in Corpus Christi.
Building cume was important, so the list was tight to start, and we setup the music software to create the variety needed to generate audience growth. Every time someone punched 96.5 we wanted them to hear one of their favorite songs. We built the clocks, fine tuned the rules, checked the song coding and modified the rotations with this goal in mind.
I must stress that I found I was lucky enough to be working with a talented team eager to roll up their sleeves and get to work. They all wanted to win so badly, and with new owners and access to the resources of a broadcast consulting company these people were on fire. The PD is a great leader whose radio DNA is very good so he was excited about the opportunity to rebuild a radio station and take the fight to some well established competitors who by this time were on the air with their survey promotions, and had all their external marketing in place.
Information - Next we turned our attention to the information elements. We shared our news philosophy and target listener profile with the news director. We knew from other research projects and focus group studies that a high story count was important to this target audience. Listeners want to know a little about a lot, so they never find themselves left out of the "water cooler" conversation at work. We wanted news written to answer the question "How does this affect the target listener living in Corpus Christi?" Electronic news today is as much about the writing and delivery as it is about content. Next we focused the other information elements to match the interests of the target audience.
Personality - With the music and the information areas largely on track (there is only so much that can be achieved in a market visit without frying the staff!), it was time to work with the air talent. This station had some solid talent who had lost their way a little, partly because of the time lag from when a station goes up for sale and the new owners get the keys to the door. While this process is quicker than the "go slow CRTC Canadian model," it still has a negative impact on staff. We took the air staff out to a local restaurant and talked about what needed to be done. For perhaps the first time ever they clearly understood the goals, and who the target listener was. Together we developed a plan of how the talent would truly communicate with the target listener. We exposed them to our show prep systems and shared some of the ideas we've proved to work all over the world. Show prep and talent who know how to develop and deliver interesting local perishable information that truly connects with the target are some of the keys to winning and these guys got it.
Imaging - Now it was time to work on the messages we needed to communicate. I always encourage stations to operate from the point of view that we need to improve the quality of the spots for the radio station's biggest client. That client of course is the radio station. If you had to write a cheque and actually purchase the time on your station for all your station imaging, I'll wager that your imaging and promos would sound a lot better than they do today. The station already had a great imaging voice, so it was a matter of locking ourselves in the conference room and rewriting the complete package. This is always a challenge to modify the copy to be less "attribute rich" and more "listener benefit rich." "Playing the most music" is an attribute, but the radio station that can create and communicate a clear listener benefit via promos and imaging makes a better connection with the audience and increases the chances of getting a tick in a diary. The voice parts were emailed back and that evening the PD, who by the way is also the AM drive talent, set to work creating the basic imaging package and it was on the air before I left for the airport.
Marketing/Promotions - You will note that marketing is mentioned last in this process. I'm a great believer in getting the product right before marketing it. Too often I see radio stations spend thousands of dollars promoting a product that is not right. In Marketing 101 we learn that spending money to tell people you have a bad product simply accelerates the demise of that product. We put together a solid direct mail piece which went out to all the businesses in the market. We also had some TV booked so created a spot that communicated a clear listener benefit to tune to 96.5. Then we developed a plan to have our promotional team everywhere our target listeners were likely to be, we built a listener database and started the frequent e-mail newsletter.
The Results - KLTG jumped from #14 to #7 all people 12+ in that first book. In the Spring '02 book it returned it's best numbers ever and is a solid #4 all people 12+ with #1 day-parts and some #1 target demo numbers. In just one year this little radio station has literally gone from nowhere to top #4, and now makes it onto most agency buys in the market. Last week they were nominated for Billboard Station of the Year, secondary market. This is proof that creating a solid game plan, encouraging the staff to over perform and getting some outside objective advice is part of the magic formula that works. This is a radio station that is having fun and making money, in my mind the ultimate test for any work environment where we all spend most of our adult lives. Congratulations to Paul Danizt, Bert Clark and his team. It is a true pleasure to work with you. |