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Don’t Be Afraid of the Paywall

The advent of in-car smartphone apps and Wi-Fi have given people easy ways to access commercial free alternatives to the advertiser saturated content on the dial.

Ryan Hedrick

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I was talking with a former radio colleague of mine a few months ago. We got into a rather lengthy discussion about online radio listening and on-demand content.

We segued into a discussion about subscription-based services.

“It’s shocking to me why radio operators don’t put their content behind a paywall,” I said.

“Hell no,” he replied. “We could NEVER do that!”

“Why not?” I queried.

“People would never pay to listen to our shows. If we started charging them money to listen to our content, they would just go somewhere else!”

That line gave me a EUREKA moment. What my former colleague said is perhaps the radio industry’s biggest problem- they don’t have enough faith in their own content.  

A someone who spent nearly three decades working for terrestrial radio stations in eight different markets across the country, this pains me. Radio is missing out on a golden opportunity to break open new revenue streams that they desperately need. The solution has been sitting in their studios the entire time.

Radio’s biggest asset is their content. And more operators need to double-down on that. Company to company, market to market and station to station, radio still boasts the biggest portfolio of local and syndicated talent in the country. Yet, they don’t maximize the revenue from this talent. Instead of putting a dollar value on that content, they’d rather give it away for free and make money the way they have for 100 years…spots and dots.

Radio’s efforts to generate new revenue streams have been mixed, at best.  I’ve seen first-hand the dabbling into things like e-commerce, e-mail marketing, SEO and website building.  Eventually every new fad I’ve witnessed championed has, for the most part, fizzled out within a year or two.  Why?  Because nothing they come up with is innovative.  Everything I’ve seen radio get into had already been done by the Groupons, Go Daddy’s, Googles and Amazons of the world…and those companies did (and continue to do it) it far better.  

Radio is using an antiquated revenue model, relying too heavily on selling ads to survive. One problem, spot revenue has been on the decline for well over a decade. Advertisers are seeing higher ROI by investing in more non-traditional campaigns to get their messaging out. 

What’s worse, radio has seen serious listener erosion for a long time. In large part because younger consumers have grown tired of having to soldier through 20+ minutes of commercials in a given hour (or even one of those damn “Kars4Kids” spots).  

Time and time again, consumers (younger ones, in particular) have proved with their wallets that they will pay a few extra bucks for quality commercial free content, on virtually every platform. Hell, its as if they’re conditioned to do so.

Netflix Revenue in 2019 was over $20 billion.

Disney+ managed to gain over 60 million subscribers in less than a year.

Spotify did almost $7.5 billion in revenue in 2019.

SiriusXM is now a $2 billion company and has already swallowed up competitors in Pandora and Stitcher.

Huge multinational corporations like Apple, Sony and Amazon are pouring cash into developing original audio content.

And the list goes on and on.

The advent of in-car smartphone apps and Wi-Fi have given people easy ways to access commercial free alternatives to the advertiser saturated content on the dial.  

Everyone has already left for the party and radio is still in the bathroom fixing their hair. The truth is, they look fine and should have been at the party hours ago.  

There will always be room for ad-supported content in the audio world. But the reliance on it needs to be drastically reduced and a big part of the needed shift should include the building of paywalls to support subscriber-based content.

As I prepared to write this column, I did a little-self exercise. How many commercial-free subscription services do I actually have?  

Here’s my inventory:

You Tube Premium

Amazon Prime Video

Netflix

Hulu

Disney +

CBS All-Access

HBO Go

New York Times

Spotify Premium

The Economist

The Athletic

SiriusXM

TuneIn Premium

NFL Sunday Ticket

Crunchyroll (my husband is a big fan of anime)

DC Universe

Shudder

World of Wonder

That’s a lot. And by the way, as anyone will tell you, I ain’t rich! But what’s an extra $15 dollars a month if I get to see John Oliver and Bill Maher every week? What’s an extra $25 a month if I can listen to Stern?

And to be honest, if my favorite terrestrial radio talent were pushed behind a paywall, the decision for me would be easy.

As a die-hard (and constantly suffering) Detroit Sports fan, I’m an almost daily listener of Mike Valenti’s on 97.1 The Ticket. His Monday shows after Sunday Lions debacles are must-listens. If I can get the Radio.com app to NOT crash on me, I make a point to be logged on to his live stream.

That being said, If Entercom were to tell me that I’d have to pay $5.99 a month to listen to his show online, get commercial free access to his podcasts (and maybe some additional bonus content), I’d sign up without even giving it a second thought. I’m guessing a decent chunk of his nearly 200,000 weekly listeners would do the same.   

Even if say, 5% of his audience (10,000) agreed to pay that subscription fee, that’s $60,000 in revenue. How many radio stations would turn down a $60k annual these days?  

All is not lost. There are some operators who are moving in the right direction. No one does digital better than iHeart. Yes, they have the largest scale, but they have also invested more than anyone else in top tier talent as well as the technology to deliver it. In 2019, their podcast revenues alone were about $100M. A big reason for that is because they’ve approached things fearlessly. Sure, they have ad-supported content online. But they also created a space for the paywall as well. iHeart Radio Plus and iHeart Radio All-Access are upgrades to their digital content services that unlock different features such as ad free artist radio. On a smaller scale, Good Karma is starting to do the same as they continue to grow their footprint.   

Radio has, for the most part been far too conservative. They’re the guy at the poker table that gets bluffed easily, may win a few hands, but would rather fold than call. At some point, they’re going to have to push all their chips into the center of the table. Otherwise, like that overly cautious poker player, they’ll continue to slowly hemorrhage money until it’s time to call it a night.

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BNM Writers

Cristina Mendonsa Left Television For Radio When Her Star Was Shining Brightest

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Mozart completed his first piece of music when he was five years-old. Doogie Howser was a licensed doctor at 14 years of age. Cristina Mendonsa was working at a newspaper when she was 15 years-old. Perhaps it’s not as stunning as the other two, but Mendonsa was on a career path early.

“I was a columnist on youth issues for a local paper,” Mendonsa said. “I started working in radio before I was 17 years old.”

Then it was an internship at a television station, where Mendonsa baked a lot of cookies for people who helped her learn how to edit.

“I was a television writer when I was 19 years old. Got my first on-air job when I was 20 at KRCR-TV. I was at the CBS affiliate in Sacramento and then hired for a job at KUSA in Denver before I was 21, and I barely knew where Denver was on a map.”

C’mon, Cristina. Now you’re just showing off.

“Every radio station had some form of newsroom back then. All stations, including rock. Then there became fewer and fewer, especially at music stations. I bounced around in radio for three years.”

It took her a while to finish college, taking a class here and there.

“I started my classes at the same time I was working in broadcasting,” Mendonsa said. “I was moving around in radio, and I had to drop out of school when I made a move for my job. It took me nine years to earn the degree. I was going to school so I could afford to pay tuition.”

Mendonsa believes being a reporter made her a better student. Mendonsa was taking journalism classes with younger students who probably had no idea she was on the air locally. She went to eight different colleges and finished at Sacramento State.

“I earned a masters in communications and leadership at Gonzaga University,” Mendonsa said. “I decided if I was going to have a life after television, more schooling was in order. My choices were between Notre Dame, USC, and Gonzaga. I had dated a guy on the Gonzaga basketball team many years earlier, so I imagine that helped me decide. Gonzaga was a good Jesuit school and had a moral aspect to instruction. Turned out to be a great program.”

In early radio jobs, she had tough editors looking over her copy, brutal with their edits. Brutal in their criticism of Mendonsa’s on-air performance.

“I’ll always have a huge amount of respect for them. They helped me immensely.”

Mendonsa is an anchor on 93.1 KFBK in Sacramento and has been with iHeart nearly five years after serving 27 years as a television anchor.

Born in Oakland, California, her mother raised the family and taught genealogy classes. Mendonsa said her mother was a great writer, compiling books of the family’s history going back generations.

“My father was part of the dignitary protection services in California all the way back to when Ronald Reagan was sworn in as Governor. I spent a lot of time at the Capitol. Dad would have family and friends come and tour the Capitol, usually entering from backdoors.”

She hung out at the Capitol a lot. Listened to political conversations while waiting for her father to get off work.

“Our dinner conversations had a lot to do with classic California politics,” Mendonsa said. “I remember going to a couple of events, standing with my mom on the Capitol steps when Reagan was addressing a crowd. Governor Brown would hold a Christmas party every year. Governor Deukmejian did too.”

When Brown first took office Mendonsa said she was surprised at how austere his office was. Definitely not what you’d expect a higher level politicians’ office to look like.

“That’s what struck me when I was a kid doing homework in Governor Brown’s office.”

Mendonsa’s father had a profound influence on her life, and people who knew him. “I run into people all the time who remember him, his integrity,” she said. “My father had a strong sense of loyalty and justice. He was a good man. Ethical, hard working. I’d like to think I took on some of those traits and passed them on to my children.”

She said as a television anchorwoman in her late 40s, she considered herself an endangered species in television.

“I started to think about some options, considered teaching,” Mendonsa explained. “I was impressed with the concept of leadership and entrepreneurship, but I also knew I had to up my skill sets.”

Sacramento is her hometown and a place she said is beautiful. Mendonsa said a lot of places call themselves the ‘City of Trees,’ but Saramento certainly lives up to that.

“We have two rivers that come together, the American River and the Sacramento River. That’s also why we have similar flooding risks of New Orleans. People describe Sacramento as the Midwest of California. We have very friendly people.”

Mendonsa said it was an idyllic place to grow up, but Sacramento does have its issues. She said Sacramento has more homeless people than San Francisco.

“I remember taking a helicopter tour over the river and was stunned at how many there were. There’s a lot of pressure from businesses to get things straightened out. California has 30 percent of the homeless in the country. We’ve thrown a ton of money at it, and they’ll throw more. It doesn’t seem to make much of a dent.”

She said Sacramento simply doesn’t have enough housing.

“A small percentage of the homeless work regular jobs but live in their car. The majority of homeless have mental health issues or are drug abusers. It’s easier to be homeless in California because there are so many assistance programs.

Mendonsa once spoke to an advocate who said when someone has mental illness it doesn’t mean they are violent. If someone is a drug abuser, it doesn’t mean they are violent. But when you get a mentally ill person who is also a drug addict, you’ll see some serious problems.

‘It’s harder for cities to find police officers all over the country,” Mendonsa explained. “We’re constantly trying to train more. People don’t want to be police officers any more.”

Mendonsa said she was talking with her co-anchor and discussed a poll citing Donald Trump’s popularity has gone up in the past few days.

“Our station is news/talk, and we love political stories like that,” she said. “Trump has his ardent followers. He has tapped into a discontent and for many people, they believe his first presidency was a better time for them and the country, so they’re sticking with him”.

Mendonsa also knows people who feel betrayed by Trump. Abandoned by the ex-president.

“They are tired of his mean tweets. Trump is at his best when he’s focused on other people. He’s at his worst when he’s complaining how the world is against him. I swear if he ever gets arrested, he’s going to make T-shirts with his mugshot and sell them. They’ll do great.”

As a kid she’d help her mom when she researched at libraries. She loved writing and talking.

“I was always bending my mother’s ear,” Mendonsa explained. “She’d say to me, ‘You talk so much I think you should get a job where you could do that for a living.”

Message received.

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BNM Writers

Leading Local Is Convenient, Except For When It’s Not

Everybody comes from somewhere and everyone certainly has people in other places. Calamity and misfortune happen everywhere.

Bill Zito

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ABC’s World News Tonight obviously had other plans in place for the evening newscast Monday. David Muir had the tornado devastated Mississippi city of Rolling Fork in the background as the show began, an umbrella lead later there was a switch and toss to the latest in the nation’s school shooting tragedies.

The shuffling of course was successful because the networks have a different focus and generally possess the ability to overcome the challenges of breaking and shifting national topics.

For the local markets there is often a tug of war between news operations and administrations over the push to lead local. The tried, true, and often tired philosophy of giving the neighborhood’s news first in favor of the broader national interest because — once again — people behind desks are sure they know what the audience wants.

For the radio folk, there is the often-available luxury of leading with the network newscast at the top of the hour — and the bottom as well, in desperate times — which leaves the responsibility for national news to someone else.

A community devastated by a weather event like an EF4 tornado in Mississippi or horrific violence like the Nashville school shooting are already all consumed by the tragedies. It is a local story that has become national by its sheer magnitude.

In other words, there is no justification needed to bring it to the top of the news block nationally so why are there even discussions about doing the same outside of where it happened. Community is community, there is no requirement that it happen here first for us to care, to be engaged.

I’ve encountered an arrogance often associated with local content that seems to set aside or even ignore the degree of those happenings outside the individual broadcast area. As if for some reason, our targets were not going to care about Russia and Ukraine until the local hook could be identified. Storms and shootings have pretty much happened everywhere so how hard is it to relate, even be transfixed when we’re given the particulars on something that’s not unfolding in our backyard?

Looking back at that arrogance I referred to, I think it also could link it to a level of insecurity, even in ignorance, in programming and direction. Not knowing or caring about what your followers think or want.

On the ignorance front, is it a simple lack of familiarity? Perhaps.

Get a room of journalists together in a room — I’m talking about members of the press, all platforms — with no caveats, no consequences.

What would they say? Leadership, management, or corporate philosophy come to mind?

There is of course a natural development to the equation, which supersedes pretty much everything. Impact.

Will Tacoma’s new downtown parking regulations top an earthquake and typhoon in Indonesia?

Don’t be so quick to answer.

What happens in Jerusalem, Gaza, and Tel Aviv carries a hell of a lot of weight in New York, L.A., and Miami. Span Texas to Southern California and they’re caring about more than just border crossings.

Everybody comes from somewhere and everyone certainly has people in other places. Calamity and misfortune happen everywhere.

And most people don’t care about where and when they see your sweeps story or your 5-part series on Parks Department Overtime when humanity is crashing someplace else.

Tease it, promote it, and move it down to the B-block.

Leading local is a reasonable coverage plan, except when it’s not.

Your brand-new News Director who just arrived from Cincinnati may not know that yet.

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BNM Writers

Tucker Carlson Sees Ratings Surge With January 6th Videos

The Mar. 7th edition (4.165 million) topped all cable telecasts in total viewers that week.

Doug Pucci

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Fox News Channel’s Tucker Carlson Tonight has featured the host’s many polarizing claims. The ones made on the Mar. 6th and 7th editions of his show could be labeled as among the most controversial.

Republican House Speaker Kevin McCarthy had granted Carlson exclusive access to over 40,000 hours of January 6th security camera footage. On his FNC show across those two aforementioned evenings, Carlson denied an insurrection had taken place at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021; instead, it was “mostly peaceful chaos”, most who were there were mere “sightseers”, and that the footage provided “conclusive” evidence “proving” Democrats “lied” about the events of that day.

On the Senate floor on the morning of Mar. 7, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called Carlson’s Mar. 6th show “one of the most shameful hours we have ever seen on cable television.”

The immense reach that Carlson’s rhetoric regularly attracts justified the high concern and swiftness of the condemnation and backlash. One glance at the ranks of the week’s top cable news programs at the end of this article, or any of this site’s past weekly news ratings items, can glean how highly popular Carlson is in, not only the cable news world, but also, the entire television landscape.

According to Nielsen Media Research, the Mar. 7th edition (4.165 million) topped all cable telecasts in total viewers that week and matched the live plus same-day total viewing figures for the 17th-ranked broadcast network show of the week ending Mar. 12, the CBS procedural East New York.

Carlson also took the week’s No. 2 and No. 3 spots on cable in total viewers; within the key 25-54 demographic, its Mar. 6th and 7th editions were tops for non-sports cable programs (it ranked 17th and 18th, respectively, in the demo with sports included, mostly from men’s college basketball conference tournament coverage on various outlets).

For Mar. 6-10, Tucker Carlson Tonight averaged 3.568 million total viewers, 469,000 with adults 25-54 and 312,000 with adults 18-49 — the program’s highest-rated week in all metrics since the week of the 2022 midterm elections (Nov. 7-11, 2022).

As a backdrop to all of this, it was revealed on Mar. 7 — due to the legal filings made public as part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News — that Carlson privately messaged colleagues he loathed Donald Trump and his presidency. (The release of that communication received no coverage at FNC.)

Cable news averages for March 6-12, 2023:

Total Day (Mar. 6-12 @ 6 a.m.-5:59 a.m.)

  • Fox News Channel: 1.359 million viewers; 172,000 adults 25-54
  • MSNBC: 0.673 million viewers; 71,000 adults 25-54
  • CNN: 0.408 million viewers; 81,000 adults 25-54
  • HLN: 0.155 million viewers; 41,000 adults 25-54
  • CNBC: 0.111 million viewers; 27,000 adults 25-54
  • Fox Business Network: 0.104 million viewers; 12,000 adults 25-54
  • The Weather Channel: 0.101 million viewers; 18,000 adults 25-54
  • Newsmax: 0.083 million viewers; 7,000 adults 25-54

Prime Time (Mar. 6-11 @ 8-11 p.m.; Mar. 12 @ 7-11 p.m.)

  • Fox News Channel: 2.237 million viewers; 274,000 adults 25-54
  • MSNBC: 1.088 million viewers; 108,000 adults 25-54
  • CNN: 0.443 million viewers; 95,000 adults 25-54
  • HLN: 0.199 million viewers; 53,000 adults 25-54
  • CNBC: 0.145 million viewers; 36,000 adults 25-54
  • The Weather Channel: 0.131 million viewers; 21,000 adults 25-54
  • Newsmax: 0.094 million viewers; 11,000 adults 25-54
  • NewsNation: 0.087 million viewers; 15,000 adults 25-54
  • Fox Business Network: 0.058 million viewers; 10,000 adults 25-54

Top 10 most-watched cable news programs (and the top programs of other outlets with their respective associated ranks) in total viewers:

1. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Tue. 3/7/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 4.136 million viewers

2. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Mon. 3/6/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.695 million viewers

3. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Wed. 3/8/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.622 million viewers

4. The Five (FOXNC, Tue. 3/7/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.300 million viewers

5. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Thu. 3/9/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.289 million viewers

6. The Five (FOXNC, Wed. 3/8/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.187 million viewers

7. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Fri. 3/10/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.099 million viewers

8. The Five (FOXNC, Mon. 3/6/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 3.004 million viewers

9. The Five (FOXNC, Thu. 3/9/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 2.982 million viewers

10. The Five (FOXNC, Fri. 3/10/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 2.911 million viewers

24. Rachel Maddow Show (MSNBC, Mon. 3/6/2023 9:00 PM, 60 min.) 2.253 million viewers

170. Real Time With Bill Maher (HBO, Fri. 3/10/2023 10:01 PM, 58 min.) 0.765 million viewers

178. Erin Burnett Outfront (CNN, Tue. 3/7/2023 7:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.698 million viewers

334. The Daily Show “Mar 8, 23 – Marlon Wayans” (CMDY, Wed. 3/8/2023 11:00 PM, 30 min.) 0.408 viewers

359. Last Week Tonight (HBO, Sun. 3/12/2023 11:05 PM, 34 min.) 0.348 million viewers 

388. Varney & Company (FBN, Fri. 3/10/2023 10:00 AM, 60 min.) 0.297 million viewers

392. Forensic Files (HLN, late Fri. 3/10/2023 12:30 AM, 30 min.) 0.290 million viewers

441. Fast Money Halftime Report (CNBC, Mon. 3/6/2023 12:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.241 million viewers

478. Heavy Rescue: 401 “(511) No Other Choice” (TWC, Sat. 3/11/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.221 million viewers

492. Newsnation: Rush Hour (NWSN, Mon. 3/6/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.215 million viewers

Top 10 cable news programs (and the top  programs of other outlets with their respective associated ranks) among adults 25-54:

1. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Mon. 3/6/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.565 million adults 25-54

2. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Tue. 3/7/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.556 million adults 25-54

3. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Wed. 3/8/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.467 million adults 25-54

4. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Thu. 3/9/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.395 million adults 25-54

5. Tucker Carlson Tonight (FOXNC, Fri. 3/10/2023 8:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.365 million adults 25-54

6. The Five (FOXNC, Tue. 3/7/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.363 million adults 25-54

7. Hannity (FOXNC, Tue. 3/7/2023 9:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.361 million adults 25-54

8. The Five (FOXNC, Thu. 3/9/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.341 million adults 25-54

9. The Five (FOXNC, Wed. 3/8/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.340 million adults 25-54

10. Gutfeld! (FOXNC, Tue. 3/7/2023 11:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.330 million adults 25-54

39. Rachel Maddow Show (MSNBC, Mon. 3/6/2023 9:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.219 million adults 25-54

74. The Daily Show “Mar 8, 23 – Marlon Wayans” (CMDY, Wed. 3/8/2023 11:00 PM, 30 min.) 0.179 million adults 25-54

102. Low Country: Murdaugh Dynasty “2. Something In The Road” (CNN, Sat. 3/11/2023 9:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.152 million adults 25-54

165. Real Time With Bill Maher (HBO, Fri. 3/10/2023 10:01 PM, 58 min.) 0.115 million adults 25-54

195. Forensic Files (HLN, late Fri. 3/10/2023 1:00 AM, 30 min.) 0.105 million adults 25-54

222. Last Week Tonight (HBO, Sun. 3/12/2023 11:05 PM, 34 min.) 0.097 million adults 25-54

344. Shark Tank “Shark Tank 1102” (CNBC, Mon. 3/6/2023 9:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.070 million adults 25-54

498. Heavy Rescue: 401 “(508) This Aint Gonna Be Pretty” (TWC, Sat. 3/11/2023 5:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.047 million adults 25-54

505. Kudlow (FBN, Fri. 3/10/2023 4:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.045 million adults 25-54

552. Newsnation Prime (NWSN, Sun. 3/12/2023 7:00 PM, 60 min.) 0.039 million adults 25-54

Source: Live+Same Day data, Nielsen Media Research

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