Garbage In

Someone recently told me that streaming will surpass AM/FM listening in less than five years.

"Huh?"  "Where in the world did you hear that?" I asked and was told that they saw it online.

I guess that means 'if you saw it online, it must be true?'

So, I put the assertion in my trusty search engine and got back a number of results:

• Stitcher Survey: Consumers Believe Streaming Will Surpass AM/FM ...
  radiomagonline.com
• Stitcher Survey: Consumers Believe Streaming Will Surpass AM/FM ...
  www.radiojobsonline.com 
• Consumers Believe Streaming Will Surpass AM/FM Listening by 2018audiostream.net/?p=101609

Naturally, it hit the social platforms too where it got reTweeted and forwarded:

Twitter / bevilwooding: Consumers Believe Streaming ...

https://twitter.com/bevilwooding/status/336425949740535808‎

Consumers Believe Streaming Will Surpass AM/FM Listening by 2018 says Stitcher Survey.

Just because it's titillating doesn't make something a fact.

Read the study. A&O&B's Mike O'Malley did so and noted:

• The focus of the study is on "archivable media" - tv, movies, etc. 
• Even music is presumably included as archivable. 
• There's no info in the report on live radio talent (we're talking REAL talent) with relevant, entertaining and in the moment content.
• The data points are from 18-34s, not 18+ as the survey says it is. seeing the 18+ would add perspective.  Could there be a reason they didn't include it?  Perhaps it didn't fit the narrative the PR company was hoping to push?

WYCT/Pensacola's "Captain" Chris Clare was also part of our conversation on the report as well and had an important perspective:

To me it's a blurring of the words "on demand". To say that you imply that the user has the ability to program what's next. In no music service medium, not even on an iPod do you control what's next. What's next is what comes up in the rotation. If you don't want to hear a song on your iPod, you skip to the next one. On a radio, Pandora, Slacker...you change stations until you hear a song you like. It's all the same thing.

The only true, on demand radio is the one you get to play and pick in real time. That doesn't exist for a consumer and if it did there aren't a lot of people who will take the time to set it up. It's why satellite radio didn't take off like they thought. Does it give you more choices? Yes. But it's still a lot of skipping around to hear what you want at that minute and it comes at a cost.

The advantage radio has is it's free to skip around on. No iTunes downloads or monthly fees. As long as the playing fields stay even (royalty payments) people will pick the free option most times because it's no different than other choices that make them pay especially since many of them have found you have to sell ads to make ends meet.

People will only pay so much for something that they can get for free.

So, to cap it all off:  the study wasn't even about whether FM goes away anytime soon (i.e., the next 15 years), let alone predicting it will for today's adults.

Caveat lector.

San Diego Jayebitrons Are In And AM-FM Radio Wins By Many Miles

Sometimes multiple data points all appear to converge, calling out for back-of-napkin research.  Your humble correspondent is delighted to do the math for you.

Blogger Jennifer Lane points to an "interesting new study by GroupM Next comparing broadcast and internet radio listeners. (GroupM Next is the “forward thinking, innovation unit” of GroupM, the largest conglomerate of Ad Agencies in the world. The unit studies consumer use of new platforms and provides insight to agencies on usage of such.) 

"The study reveals several positive facts about the Internet radio audience. The average age of an Internet radio listener is 34 years old versus the average age of a broadcast radio listener which is 47 years old. Since the average income was found to be similar in both groups, the Internet radio audience is more affluent given their substantially younger age.

"86% of Internet radio listeners listen to free services and have never paid to listen. They don’t mind ads, and don’t try to avoid them, and are twice as inclined to make a purchase after hearing an ad. In fact, 29% of Internet radio listeners have purchased something they heard advertises, versus 14% of broadcast radio listeners."

Today's Inside Radio reports on a Hivio San Diego presentation by Triton Digital chief strategy officer Patrick Reynolds who said the the entire San Diego market had Average Active Sessions of 5,126 people during the month of May.  The number was about twice that — around 9,500 — during the primetime 6am-8pm daypart.  

That is when I got the napkin out.

• Say that in an average quarter hour in San Diego roughly 15% of all people are listening to AM-FM radio.  That would be a napkin-calculated average persons of about 354,000.
• Assume that 90% of the total population of San Diego cumes a radio station at least once in an average week.  That would put the total cume persons using AM-FM radio in an average week at 2.1 million.

Five to ten thousand people vs 354,000, let alone 2.1 million????

Is there any wonder why terrestrial radio is only billing 5-7% of its total revenues from interactive?

No wonder online ad rates are so low.  No one's listening, if you believe my trusty napkin.

Hey, you "forward-thinking innovators:"  caveat emptor!
 

Triton Digital chief strategy officer Patrick Reynolds said the San Diego market had Average Active Sessions of 5,126 people during the month of May.  The number was about twice that — around 9,500 — during the primetime 6am-8pm daypart.   Two-thirds of the sessions were for Pandora, with the remaining third divvied up among all other webcasts, including FM/AM streams.  That portion of the pie is cut into extremely narrow slices — Triton says San Diego residents divided their listening up among 4,754 different stations, including many from outside the market. “They’re listening to a lot of local traditional radio stations online,” Reynolds noted, saying server log data shows stations from markets all over the country showing up.
Triton was also able to detect listening on 60 different devices, including smartphones, gaming consoles and desktop units like Sonos.  “It’s kind of complicated but you have to be in all the places that your people are if you want that audience,” Reynolds said.
He also noted that while about 80% of Pandora listening occurs on a mobile device, most radio groups pull in fewer than 50% of their users that way.  It’s why Reynolds thinks Pandora listening levels are so much higher than for everyone else.  “They’re where people are and they’re getting a big audience,” he said.
- See more at: http://www.insideradio.com/Article.asp?id=2667778&spid=32061#.UciFYYXtjJM

Triton Digital chief strategy officer Patrick Reynolds said the San Diego market had Average Active Sessions of 5,126 people during the month of May.  The number was about twice that — around 9,500 — during the primetime 6am-8pm daypart.   Two-thirds of the sessions were for Pandora, with the remaining third divvied up among all other webcasts, including FM/AM streams.  That portion of the pie is cut into extremely narrow slices — Triton says San Diego residents divided their listening up among 4,754 different stations, including many from outside the market. “They’re listening to a lot of local traditional radio stations online,” Reynolds noted, saying server log data shows stations from markets all over the country showing up.
Triton was also able to detect listening on 60 different devices, including smartphones, gaming consoles and desktop units like Sonos.  “It’s kind of complicated but you have to be in all the places that your people are if you want that audience,” Reynolds said.
He also noted that while about 80% of Pandora listening occurs on a mobile device, most radio groups pull in fewer than 50% of their users that way.  It’s why Reynolds thinks Pandora listening levels are so much higher than for everyone else.  “They’re where people are and they’re getting a big audience,” he said.
- See more at: http://www.insideradio.com/Article.asp?id=2667778&spid=32061#.UciFYYXtjJM

The Label Speaks

As you may have heard Monday, Katie Armiger’s website was hacked and over 65,000 emails went out that were offensive and vulgar. Music City Networks has fixed the security breach and hopefully this won’t happen to any other artist.

We know who did it and we have his online confession. Lang Scott, CEO of Music City Networks and Katie are filing charges with the Nashville Police Department today.

The hacker’s email targeted Katie’s fans and did not target country radio. Katie is the world’s biggest sweetheart and wants all of her friends and supporters at country radio to know that she loves and cherishes their outpouring of support and well wishes through this malicious attack.

Pete O'Heeron
President
Cold River Records
Cell: 281-961-0481
www.katiearmiger.com

Everyone's Nightmare

A cautionary tale, in three screen shots:

• Protect your access codes and passwords.
• Change them right now and on a routine basis.
• Be prepared with a plan when this happens to you and me, as - very likely - it will at some point in the future.

Nielsen: Search Slips, Email and Social Networks Rule Mobile Web Uses

A new view of May's “What Americans Do Online” still shows Email to be, by far, the dominant sector in terms of mobile time, although this dominance shrinks by a few delta points to 38.5% from 41.6%. Search is another that nets out with a smaller share, although by less than a percentage point from 7.1% to 6.3%.

The share held by Social Networking remains very similar but News & Current Events comes out much stronger using the site-level analysis at a 7.2% share of time compared to 4.4% of time using the category-level analysis.

Share of time on Portals shows something more dramatic, with a change from 11.6% to 4.6% share of time, but this doesn’t mean that people are spending any less time on Portal sites, it's just that they are spending a lot more time now on email and social nets, checking out the buzz topics and their friends' status.

"We Used To Do That"

Looking today at the bats flying over the Halloween-themed branding on the website of Vancouver's new Shore 104 FM, I was reminded back when the internet was a new thing and we all had fresh, topical, clever screen-savers and wallpaper available for downloading to listeners' at work desk-tops.

Whatever happened to that idea? It's a little like giving your at work listeners Post-its with your brand on them. Yes, in many ways, so "yesterday," and yet who doesn't need an extra pad of Post-It's today and a screen saver?

I say these words at least once every day: "The epitaph on the tombstone of many a dead radio station is 'we used to do that.'"

Pew: Generations Online in 2009

Over half of the adult internet population is between 18 and 44 years old. But larger percentages of older generations are online now than in the past, and they are doing more activities online, according to surveys taken from 2006-2008.

View PDF of Report

Contrary to the image of Generation Y as the "Net Generation," internet users in their 20s do not dominate every aspect of online life. Generation X is the most likely group to bank, shop, and look for health information online. Boomers are just as likely as Generation Y to make travel reservations online. And even Silent Generation internet users are competitive when it comes to email (although teens might point out that this is proof that email is for old people).

The UnHappiest Day Of The Year

The percentage of Americans experiencing a lot of happiness or enjoyment without a lot of stress or worry fell to a new low of 35% on Thursday, Dec. 11, the same day the U.S. Labor Department announced that new jobless claims jumped to a 26-year high and the auto bailout bill failed in the Senate.

And, the unhappiest person may be the news director who hasn't yet figured out that the future is moving info content from on air to online: Gallup's update on Americans' go-to news sources reveals little encouragement for these media. Among daily news sources, only cable and Internet news have shown significant gains in popularity since 2006, while all other media are stable or declining.

ABC News/USA Today's "Match O Matic"

Try this very clever web game/poll to see who you are for in November.

Everyone's A Critic (Including Me)

This isn't about KFKF or WYCD, it's about all of us these days and the things we think we need to do to get our share of web revenues. In fact, I single out these two stations because in many ways their websites are loads better than most radio station home pages.

High marks: the KFKF loyal listeners signup form right at the top of the page and the fact KFKF puts its image and branding in the top of the frame so that the first impression you get is about the station you came to visit, not an ad.

Low marks: if first impressions are lasting ones, the fact that almost half of the page is advertising may tell a first time viewer that the station carries almost as many ads as programming on the air too.

High marks: WYCD puts its "listen live" button right at the top and that the amount of ad real estate on the page is about the same percentage of space as the music to commercials percentages on the air.

Low marks: let's find a way to show advertisers that our websites are worth the money and will get results without having to use irritating, flashing banners above our own image and usage-building on our main page.

Hats off to WYCD for making sure that the very prominent rotating banners are all about ME, their listener and invite me to get more-deeply engaged with the inside pages. Nice to see "listen online" at the top of KFKF's menu bars.

Tip for both: where are the podcasts of today's best material? That's where I'd put the ads, inside the content listeners expect when they come to our home pages.

Compare your station's home page to www.google.com. Is your web presence as clean, simple and easy to immediately figure out what you're there for so I can get what I want as fast as possible without having to think?

If you know of a radio website which achieves that, I'd love to learn about it.

Surprise! Who’s Watching What Video Online, And Where

Sonny Melendrez hosts San Antonio's first all-Internet radio station and I have blogged about the fact that his compelling site and email blasts give him a larger audience than he ever had when he was on the FM dial in either Texas or California, but now it's time to pay attention to his success in online video too.

Check out what he's been doing. Try it on for size. Will you really need a transmitter and antenna some day?

Q: Why Am I So Smart? A: (smile!!)

I just started a new occasional blog feature which I called "A&O Q&A." You'd think perhaps I had seen this research or something...

SO. Do you have Q&A on your brand's site? If I was as smart as it seems, I'd recommend you do so.

Sonny's Dolly Tribute

Sonny Melendrez is a radio legend in Texas and Los Angeles who constantly impresses me with his creative output and understanding of the new media universe, making use of all the new tools to continue to provide great content, audio and video, to the big list of people who have listened to him on the radio over the years.

He just added value in a breath-taking way to Dolly Parton's latest release. (Click to watch it.)

Be Like Blair

Take a lesson in creating an interactive experience for your 'user' community from Blair Garner:

"Our research shows that listeners want to give input into the design of this show by going to our show blog and letting Blair know what they want – text alerts, video clips, artist info, requests, etc. Blair provides your listeners multiple ways to win – e-mailing and texting vs. just a call-in."

Do You Want YouTube's Logo On Your Web Videos??

Even more troubling, do you want THEIR ten second ad to run before your web videos?

Ron Chatman, the guy who crafted CBS Radio/Detroit's web presence for many years is now available to all of us. I recommend you bookmark his new blog, where he will be posting a listing of dirt cheap video hosting options in the next few days. Here's why you will want them:

Here's a heads up on a change at YouTube that may impact how you place videos on your website in the future. YouTube's owner, Google, has indicated that they are going to start adding advertising to all video streamed from their site. Videos streamed from the site will have an ad graphic splashed across the bottom edge of the frame, not unlike your local news station or a network news story.

While many stations were willing to accept the "YouTube bug" in the corner, not everyone will be happy with this latest turn of events. Google contends that the ads are not annoying because audiences are used to seeing ads like this on TV. For your web visitors it may seem a bit like a double dip, especially if your video page is ad heavy.

You may want to take this opportunity to move your videos over to a service where you have better control and can monetize them by placing your own advertising on them. YouTube has been an easy out for shows wanting to bypass the webmaster or smaller stations looking to avoid paying for bandwidth and hosting. There are plenty of solutions available now that are much easier to use and a LOT cheaper than before.

Here's a link to more information on what Google is doing with YouTube ads.

Ron's new business position statement: "...webmaster tools and twisted web based prep, tailored for DJ-proof use on your website and on the air..." gives more than a clue that he has been there, DONE that!

Greater Media Stations Will Be Silent Tuesday, Will YOU?

.. and, Jerry DelColliano makes a convincing case for all of radio to do it too. I wonder, however, if depriving the 1-2% of our total audience that ARB says listens to us from streaming audio service for a day will really prove anything to the people who are responsible for these fees.

Go silent, if you want, I'd say. But, whether you do it on not (and I would not), please, please, please REALLY ramp up the announcements on your stream about what will be lost of these ourageous fees are not reversed.

"We already pay and we'll provide this service as long as possible, but we can't do it if the costs are exorbitant," would be my message during every break on Tuesday, but also today, tomorrow and always.

We need to be lobbying hard in Washington, not depriving our audience of the service they value, in my opinion. That's punishing the listener, who won't understand why we're not there when they need us.

A&O Gets Served A Piece Of Humble Pie By "The Internet"

A big helping of 'thank you' to the many folks who have written to let me know that our old website (radioconsult.com) and all of the email addresses associated with it are KAPUT.

Sadly, I must confess: we know. (sigh) And, it involves a long story and a great lesson on how naive we were in 1995 when we first set up the original domain.

Just a few weeks ago, on a Friday evening, it became obvious that our site registration had expired quite suddenly and in spite of frantic efforts to salvage it through Network Solutions, our trusty webmaster and our current web provider, the protections built into the system which are designed to prevent someone maliciously stealing your internet address were going to mean that we have to wait 90 days to gain access to the web addresses we have been using for more than eleven years.

The lesson we learned: be sure YOU own your domain name and not a middle man/reseller.

Due to our ignorance when we created radioconsult.com in 1995, we allowed the first web designer we hired back then to register the domain for us. He went out of business several years ago, leaving no trace of his whereabouts.

Under construction now: www.albrightandomalley.com. It's not quite ready for viewing and emailing to jaye@albrightandomalley.com or mike@albrightandomalley.com, but it will be very soon.

We'll let you know as soon as we have something to "show."