"From Housewife And Mother To Budding Country Star": AP Profiles Ashton Shepherd

Country singers often joke that they're a "10-year-overnight success" because no one really makes it in this business overnight, but some have a faster route to success than others.

About two years ago, Ashton Shepherd was a young housewife and mother from south Alabama who wrote songs and sang them in her backyard shed. The extent of her professional experience was playing bars in a makeshift band with her husband, Roland, and brother-in-law, Adam Cunningham; Shepherd and Roland both played guitar, while Adam played bass.

She won a talent contest and recorded a three-song demo that by fluke landed her an audition with Luke Lewis, chairman of Universal Music Group Nashville, in January 2007.

Where It's All Going

NPR's Fresh Air from WHYY took 25 minutes on March 13 to talk Digital media — including MP3 players, peer-to-peer networks, music websites, and how they are changing how we discover, listen to and share music.

Click to listen to writer Eliot Van Buskirk discuss the new, digital landscape of music, and the resulting changes in the music industry. His outlook for radio hurts to hear, but if as I do you tend to agree with most of his other prognostications you have to take the critical look at our business model seriously too.

Big Research Update: Practicality is HOT, Cashmere Mafia is NOT

Please Mr. Postman…three-quarters of consumers are waiting for government rebate checks to hit their mailboxes this spring, making the Stimulus Package what’s hot this month.

Additionally, consumers find downloading music (69.6%) trendier than buying CDs (37.4%).

March Madness is sporting for the majority of men, while women agree that yellow is IN for this season’s clothing and accessories.

What’s Not? When it comes to TV shows about career women in NYC, viewers would prefer to put a hit out on Cashmere Mafia and brave the Lipstick Jungle.

It May Be An Election Year, But Celebrities Still Top Politicans As Buzz Topics

Top News and Media Content Search Terms (week ending 02/23/08)
News & Media category	Print category
Lunar Eclispe	Jennifer Lopez
Lindsay Lohan	Lindsay Lohan
Jennifer Lopez	Lunar Eclipse
Obama	Flat Belly Diet
Barack Obama	Barack Obama
Dancing With The Stars	Obama
Giant Sea Spiders	Dancing With The Stars
American Idol	Jody Tagaris
Kosovo	Lindsay Lohan Marilyn Monroe
Nevada Earthquake	American Idol
Source: Hitwise sample of 10 million users, March 2008

It's Almost A Wrap On "Beer For My Horses"

Primary photography for Toby Keith's film, "Beer For My Horses," is set to wrap up March 15th. Toby has been working his cinematic tail off since he appears in nearly every major scene of the film. Word is that it's Toby's best work as an actor, and screenwriter with the scenes are coming off as funny as he and Rodney Carrington wrote them to be.

Co-stars Tom Skerritt and Claire Forlani have remarked that they're "completely impressed with Toby's acting and script," say he's "great." Funny man, Carrington, is getting high marks for his comedic acting, as well.

The only downside to the filming in New Mexico is that it's been freezing weather for the past few days.

Written by Neil Haislop

WSOC: March (Country Music) Madness

Check out the women's bracket, the men's bracket, the groups, the wild cards and vote for your favorite artist to help them move on to (your guessed it) "The Final Four."

From "NO Videos" To "Show Us Your Videos"

Remember when concert venues prohibited videos and photos at music events as a result of copyright riders in standard star artist contracts?

Thanks to cell phones, those days are long gone, of course.

Leave it to Starstruck to be the first to make the most of today's reality.

What Happens To ARB In December?

Q: Why is it that AC does so well each December, and why did it do especially well in Fall of 2007?

A: The key to doing well in ratings 11 months a year is listening at work. In diaries, on average, almost 75% of all average quarter hours (and in the PPM in spite of cumes literally doubling, it’s still 50%) come from P-1 heavy users, the people who listen for 100 quarter hours a week or even more. Thus, under normal circumstances, the secret to doing well for country radio is targeting 25-54 non-ethnic individuals who work full time, at least 35 hours a week. Fulltime employed men are the heaviest users of radio. Women who are not employed full time tend to watch TV during the daytime hours and as a result listen to a lot less radio than the average radio user. Given these realities, a successful AC station must get at least 60% of its average quarter hours from ‘at work’ listening. A country station’s ideal profile is 33% of its AQH from at work, 33% from in car and 33% at home and other places. Then, comes the three weeks before Christmas and many listeners take time off work. So, the place where the majority of AQH comes from changes radically. Meanwhile, AC stations become the at home listening choice - especially for adult women - due to their solid Christmas music marketing and images.

That’s why, in PPM data, Arbitron has created a “13th month” which they call the Christmas book. AQH shares (which are of course a percentage of the available AQH audience) literally double for the solid Christmas music stations (B-101 in Philadelpha, for example, had a 25.2% share of adult listening the week before Christmas in the Philadelphia PPM data and then went right back to to 10 share the week after the Holiday).

As Arbitron's Gary Marince told the attendees at A&O's Pre-CRS client seminar, ".. the listening the Christmas stations pick up from the Country statiosn is in the form of 'occassions' and not a loss in cume or average time per occasion of listening."

No doubt, this is also the case in diaries as well, but due to monthly averaging, AC radio carries that December bump into the first two monthlies of the next quarter. It’s not because AC gets more listening in January and February as a result of the December at home AQH, it’s due to the monthly averages. In the face of this reality, to have a good fall book knowing that many of your listeners won’t be at work for a week or two of the survey period which makes it very hard if not impossible to keep your percentage of AQH from at work up to the levels you maintain the rest of the year, a country station needs to have an aggressive strategy to do as well as possible in the workplace during the first and second phases of the fall Arbitron survey and then play enough of your listeners’ favorite Christmas songs they can’t hear anywhere else while also balancing that with their favorite current, recurrent and power gold hits and encouraging the core to listen to you at home more than normal during those weeks away from their normal workplace. It’s a tricky balancing act because as research has shown for the last few years, about half of country’s heaviest users would love it if we played all Christmas music while the other half wouldn’t like that at all.

Next fall: get as many average quarter hours from at work as you can in the first nine weeks of the ARB survey period and then work to keep your partisans listening to you while they prepare for Christmas at home. Meanwhile, tell advertisers the Christmas book story and make sure they know that the distortions in the January and February rolling averages that make AC look stronger than it is are purely statistical and not real. The time to buy AC radio is the two or three weeks before Christmas, not in first quarter of the New Year.

"How Does It Feel?"

For two hours Tuesday night, I went to heaven. Being inducted into the Country Radio Hall Of Fame, simply for doing what I love and have wanted to do for the last 50 years has to be called one of the highlights of my life.

It was especially gratifying to have three generations of my immediate family on hand to witness the love and affection shower on all five of us who were fortunate enough to be given the honor from the almost one thousand radio people and one thousand music business people gathered for the annual Country Radio Seminar at the Nashville Convention Center.

Now, as I walk the halls of the annual meeting, everyone is asking "How did it feel?" and of course the answer is "Reinforcing, wonderful. "

For a couple hours the other night I was given the opportunity to listen as folks said very kind things about me, my career and it was an amazing personal reminder of what a great people business this is in spite of all the negatives that seem to surround us in the daily blog posts.

Radio still reaches more than nine out of ten people over the age of 12 every single week and my fellow honorees Bob Robbins, Bill Cody, Mike Owens, Bobby Kraig, the CRS promotion and humanitarian award winners are a great reminder of the difference we make every day in the lives of our local communities.

I am lucky to have attended some 35 of the 39 Country Radio Seminars and even luckier to have had an employer either pay my way or at least give me the time off without having to take vacation time to do so for more than half of them. But, the other half have been at my own expense, sometimes even using personal vacation days, so I have little patience with people who tell me they can't come to CRS to better themselves personally just because their employer won't pay for it.

As a result of attending this "annual class reunion" of the best and the smartest in the country radio and music business, I have received considerably more back from the cost in money and time than I put in. This is a wonderful community, as I discovered again this week.

If your company doesn't have the budget for a CRS registration, pay for it yourself (the 2009 meeting is only 51 weeks away). You'll learn, you'll meet artists and you'll build great relationships with an extended family that will remain a part of your life for decades. It's a wonderful, supportive community, and it's constantly inviting you to join it. Do it, even if you have to pay for it yourself and take time off to attend annually. I am living proof of what happens when you do that.

So, how does it feel?

Simply great.

I strongly recommend the experience to you too.

Why An Index Of 80 Or 90 Isn't Good Enough

While it's good to hear that ARB's Pierre Bouvard is back from his vacation fully-refreshed and enthusiastic for the radio ratings giant's sample improvement goals for the coming year (according to Inside Radio): “2008 is the year of 25-34s.”

After suffering through last Summer’s sagging PPM in-tab rates, IR's Frank Saxe reports he got a phone call from Bouvard yesterday, touring that Arbitron is increasingly confident it has solved the problem of how to hit 18-34 targets. Its performance among adults has been steadily improving, taking its biggest steps forward in recent months due to a focus on the 18-24 demo. It’s an effort that’s included higher sampling rates, richer incentives and more interaction between the company and its panelists.

Arbitron president of sales and marketing Pierre Bouvard says “We’re not done, but we have made a lot of progress in four months.” An upgrade to Arbitron’s software allows its research team to begin honing-in on the next target. Bouvard says “We said we were going to go on a jihad on 18-24s and we did. Now it’s onward an upwards -— 2008 is going to be the year of the 25-34s.”

Since last month they’ve done that by applying many of the same strategies and techniques used on 18-24s. Arbitron’s four-month focus on 18-24s has led to a 13% improvement in that Philadelphia demo — and it’s up 113% over one year ago. Bouvard says “It’s nothing short of spectacular. I’m feeling very good about how the panels are shaping up.”

Here's the problem: as you look at day-by-day, hour by hour and even minute by minute data in PPM, the sample is often four times as big as the daypart, day and even diary page sample. That's because so many diarykeepers 'forget' to write down at least half of their actual listening. The laws of statistical replication state that in order to double the accuracy of a probability sample, you must quadruple the sample size, so in one sense the minute by minute cume a daypart in PPM could potentially be more accurate even than weekly daypart data in the diary, which may be why it looks so reasonable and often passes "the gut test" (does it look believable?). ARB's PPM advocate John Snyder has been making this claim lately. He's a very smart guy, who makes very convincing Power Point slide shows.

However, the total panel sample is actually smaller than the random diary sample (to save money, of course) and a panel sample isn't exactly random either. Just because something looks 'right' most of the time doesn't mean that scientifically, statistically it is so.

I am hoping that ARB decides to start guaranteeing 100% of their targets for both PPM and diary markets in this year of the 25-34. No less than 100% accuracy is acceptable at a time when radio needs to convince advertisers that we are worth 100% of the money they spend on us, not 80 ot 90%.

World Trade Center Steel Goes To Sea, Thanks to CDB

Charlie Daniels performed during the christening ceremonies for the USS New York at Northrop Grumman shipyard in Avondale, LA., Saturday, March 1, 2008.

Approximately 7.5 tons of steel recovered from the World Trade Center are cast in the bow stem of the ship. The bow stem is the foremost section of the ship's hull on the water line. The New York will be officially commissioned in New York City in the fall of 2009.

PR CONTACTS:
Christy Walker-Watkins - AristoMedia - 615-269-7071 ext. 124 - christy@aristomedia.com
Paula Szeigis - Management - Charlie Daniels Band - 615-443-2112 ext. 123 - paulacdb@aol.com

Why We Shot Down That Satellite

Nashville songwriter Thom Schuyler hasn't blogged for about a year, but his fertile mind is back in action and his first post in too long a time is well worth a read: One Citizen's Conjecture

Meanwhile, if you want to nominate some things you hope were NOT in there, email me.

.. For example: the solution to ARB's PPM and diary sample placement woes?

Trend To Watch: Your Show's Audio On YouTube

Their recent topical and slightly controversial "Osama, Obama and Your Mama" bit gets the BD&B You Tube Site started. Thanks to the boys for keeping me informed on their latest attempt to get their email list fans to put their material on Facebook, MySpace and other social networking sites.

What have you been doing lately? Drop an email to jaye@albrightandomalley.com.

The First Happy Signs Of A Good Spring

In ARB PPM monthly 6+ share trends CBS country KILT-FM ranks #5 and Cox's KKBQ-KTHT combine for a 7.0 share in market #6 Houston while Beasley's WXTU is also #5 6+ in #7 Philadelphia.

The combined shares of the four country stations in the two PPM-currency markets are up 8% from December to January: (December) 11.6- (Holiday) 11.8- (January) 12.5, so it looks like maybe country's soft fall 2007 national averages were indeed (hopefully!) largely due to AC's all Christmas music tactic.

For me, that's an even more optimistic sign of an early, sunny spring than a robin on the lawn.

With I-Tunes, There Is No Bag

Maybe the NAB should just make their new ad contain a photo of a Wal*Mart bag.

Meanwhile, the Nashville buzz is that in the wake of the great traffic generated by Garth's latest repackaging of his hits for a bargain price ($11.88) the massive retailer is telling labels that they will cut back the amount of space for music unless labels cut wholesale prices to the point that the retailer can price albums for under $10.

It would cut further into record label already-shrinking profits, but I bet they decide that when the monster gets hungry the best short term play is to feed the beast.

Longterm, Donnie Snow in the latest TN Business Magazine talks to some of Music City's smartest people:

"If a country music fan in Pittsburgh could buy a custom sequined shirt from Manuel's Exclusive Clothier on Broadway and, via technology heretofore only known in science fiction, have the garment teleported to his or her home instantly (either for a nominal fee or free), the technology would, among many other things, revolutionize the manufacturing industry. And unless it had a stake in the technology, even a billion-dollar behemoth like FedEx would quickly become obsolete. But what is fanciful analogy for FedEx is an all-too-stark reality for the music industry. While it's not Star Trek technology, the Internet represents just as effective a technological dagger into the heart of the current distribution system and business model relied upon by label and listener alike for decades. And make no mistake, it's the distribution model and not piracy that will make or break the current system."

"The future is selling less of more." -- Tim Dubois

...But who's to say how that "more" will be sold? It may be that a major label becomes an umbrella distributor, which probably comes as small comfort to SonyBMG which has owned Napster for years now and has been busier suing itself than working with its competition to make that happen.

PPM = Nielsen Meters For Radio, With The Same Problems?

I think so. The diary measures engagement. The PPM measures behavior. And, they are not the same thing.

Mike Bloxham's Media Post blog today is about TV ratings measurement, but I think you could substitute the letters "PPM" and place "radio" where he says "set top box" and get a view of our future, now that Project Apollo is dead.

Remember these words:

"One thing is certain, however. As complex as the media ecosystem is right now, it is only going to get more complex - and at an ever-increasing pace. What looks challenging and difficult to navigate now will probably look like the land of milk and honey when we look back in ten years’ time. As such, it is equally certain that no one solution is going to provide us with what we need to optimize communications efficiency. We will increasingly go digital in our measurement systems, but we will still need to understand the context of media use that data harvested from devices and meters will never capture."

In a few years, you're going to say Mike had a crystal ball.

Why Have A Blog If You Can't Occasionally Promote Your Personal Fav's?

Thanks to Seattle P-I Music Critic Gene Stout for giving me a chance to say some nice things about a guy I first heard with Ichabod Caine and the Crew on KMPS, Vince Mira:

"Nashville is always looking for creative, new, exciting artists. This talent to sound like Johnny Cash is certainly a great thing for a 15-year-old, it's amazing. And I'm sure it's going to get a big 'Oh, wow' from people. But the real key is, can he then carry that forward with some songs that establish an identity of his own?"

(PS: He can.)

Americans' Major Concern Right Now: Debt

· 42.7% say their debt is too high…64% say their savings are too low.
· 68.6% strongly disagree or disagree with the statement: “The U.S. government is looking out for my financial interests.”
· 66.2% believe the media can stimulate a recession.
· 45.6% believe the U.S. is already in a recession…39.1% say the U.S. is not currently in a recession but will soon be in one.
· 50.2% would rather have Congress and the president work out long-term solutions to current economic challenges than get a rebate check.
· 60.7% blame problems in the housing market for the sluggish economy.
· 50.8% say they live paycheck to paycheck.

If those factoids aren't enough to give you ideas to use as you plan station promotions, get the whole report.

Contacts: BIGresearch: Chrissy Wissinger - chrissy@bigresearch.com (614.846.0146) or SSI: Jason Kannon - jasonk@keiler.com (860.674.3861)

Roadmap 2008: Sample Size WAY Up; Satisfaction STRONG But Down Fractionally

Nearly 17,000 heavy users of country radio across the U.S. and Canada took at least 20 minutes each to respond to an internet questionnaire over the past month and - according to the results of our “Roadmap ‘08” report - country’s vital signs remain very strong when compared to a year ago.

However, there is some evidence of loss of passion, especially among the younger side of country’s target.

Overall “satisfaction” with “your current favorite country station” fell slightly from 70% a year ago to 66.6% this year.

“To have two thirds of your core audience state that they are highly satisfied is a very compelling statistic,” says A&O partner Jaye Albright.

Fewer than 1% say they are very dissatisfied, but the number of folks who report being only ‘somewhat satisifed’ increased from 25.7% last year to 26.4% in 2008.

The changes are very small, but due to the huge sample size, they are statistically-significant.

There was a 68% increase in sample size from 10,062 in (between 1/20 and 2/18) 2007 to 16,712 (between 1/26 and 2/24) in 2008.

“There’s plenty of specific information in this data to help us understand what may be happening which drives these changes and to shore up our weaknesses now, before the next book begins,” adds A&O partner Michael O’Malley. “The mere fact that so many of our listeners were willing to take the time to give their suggestions and opinions to make countr radio better is a very healthy sign.”

Based on changes in the sample, it’s possible to hypothesize that our core is slipping 18 to 44 and growing 45+.

Demo composition (% of total sample) changes:

2007-2008 (change)
12-17: 1.8-1.8 = 0%
18-24: 8.2-8.1 = -1.2%
25-34: 20.7-17.8% = -14%
35-44: 28.1-26.6 - = -5.3%
45-54: 27.5-29.3 = +6.5%
55-64: 11.5-13.8 = +20%
65-74: .1- .2.3 = is this increase by a factor of 22 due to more internet use by this demo this year? Or, more usage?

The changes in demo composition of these P-1’s may be what is driving the music genre preference trends.

This sample, since it comes from A&O client station email databases, is 68.2% people who listen to country music radio more than two hours per day.

24.9% of the respondents listen between an hour and two hours per day.

6.9% reported listening less than an hour per day, so these stats reflect the preferences of country radio’s heaviest users in our client markets, but also include 1,155 light users as well.

Each A&O client station which had 200 or more of their listeners complete the survey will receive reports on both the national averages and also their local data in the next 14 days.

Highlights of the national data will be presented at the Albright & O’Malley Pre-CRS client seminar on Tuesday, March 4 from 2:00 to 5:30 pm in the Country Music Hall Of Fame’s Ford Theatre. Admission is free, but by invitation only.

“That’s Great! .. BUT...”

“How did they do it?” a client PD asked me last week.

“Do what?” I innocently inquired.

“How did those folks at WAXX, Eau Claire, get more than 600 of their listeners to do the questionnaire and we’re a bigger market but we only had just over 300.”

A&O client stations are competitive. I suppose that’s one reason why they hire us.

They want to have the latest intelligence and access to cutting-edge strategies and tactics. They love winning.

Rarely, however, do they have a chance to compete with each other and have every other client see the ‘score.’

And, I didn’t even know that this was a competition!

So far, more than 17,000 listeners across the U.S. and Canada have completed the “Roadmap ’08” national perceptual study (highlights of which will be unveiled at our Pre-CRS client seminar) a preliminary report on the results of the study went out to all of the stations who participated the other day.

It includes P-1 listener tracking data on more than 40 areas, from music style and genre preferences, content, information, new media usage, overall satisfaction and HD radio.

I was surprised to find that almost everyone who received it turned past the product and usage-related responses to the pages which detailed the sample sizes for each market which will allow us to break local data for out every station with at least 200 respondents. Everyone seemed to want to see how many of their listeners completed the 20 minute questionnaire compared to other cities of similar size.

The PD who made the statement’s station ranks #1 12+ and 25-54 in a situation where an aggressive direct format competitor ranks #5 in the Fall ARB survey, so I have long considered this programmer a winner and a big success I often point with pride to.

But, in his mind, he still needs to do better.

“We do contests and they do well for us, but then I see how the great Lincoln Financial Media team at KSON, San Diego, made “Double Your Paycheck” more than just a contest. They turned it into a statement of values the station stands for,” he started.

“Then, Pattison’s CJJR, Vancouver, “Tripled Your Pay” last Fall and had a terrific BBM.

“We also do a St. Jude’s Radiothon and raised lots of money for the great cause again this year, but then I saw how the Bonneville/Cincinnati crew at B-105 had their listeners pledge $415,361,” he continued.

“I look at loyalty rewards marketing stars like Larche Media/Barrie’s KICX, Morris Radio’s WIBW-FM, Topeka and Astral’s CFQX, Winnipeg driving thousands of new database signups. We, of course, do a similar program, yet I seem to run into the same 40 people who come to every remote broadcast for their ‘word on the street.’

“CBS Radio’s KMPS, Seattle, continues to dominate their market by innovating. I love their new “Yes.com” social network where they invite listeners to vote for their favorite songs and network with other listeners. How did they do that?”

Sensing that this very competitive programmer didn’t just want me to pat him on the back and say “hey, you’re #1, you’re clearly aware of those things other clients are doing and that’s a good thing, perhaps a bit of healthy sibling rivalry.

“You’re holding yourself to too high a standard, take it easy on yourself. You are really, really good at lots of things, but you can’t possibly be the absolute best at everything..,” so instead, I decided to simply remind him of the “Seven Magic Words,” which by the very questions he’s been asking me, whether he knows it or not, already show that he’s living them.

Being competitive myself, I wish I could say that they were my invention, but Mike O’Malley coined this useful seven word phrase years ago, when we did our first air personality seminar on the Boardwalk in Atlanta City. We called that session “Barnumizing Your Radio Station And Your Show.”

We taught attendees and still encourage our client stations to use the principles of P. T. Barnum. Never forget we’re in show business. Whatever you do, don’t just amplify it.

Explode it.

Plan each community service event, prep each content break, build each promotion, create each stunt, communicate each strategy and just when you feel that it’s your best, before finalizing it use the Seven Magic Words and see how far you can go with whatever you’re doing.

The words?

“Great! .. but what else could we do?”

Use them the next time your team brainstorms. Pretty soon, you’ll be the envy of your siblings too.