[BC] Two Commercial Free Hours,On WABC

[Rich Wood]

------ At 08:21 AM 12/23/2005, Mike McCarthy wrote: -------

>Real simple.  It builds the TSL of the station.
>
>Clear Channel found out that 14-16 minutes an hour were just plain 
>bad for business.  Hence their "Less is More" campaign.  I've heard 
>though that they're still trying to carry 16 spots an hour. Just 
>sell them as 30's at 90% of a 60's cost.  Small markets have known 
>for YEARS that 30's work just as well as 60's in most 
>cases.  They're also not as annoying so that if someone hates a 
>spot, they may NOT tune away because they know the spot is short.

All markets have known for years that it's the number of elements, 
not their length that's irritating. Listeners perceive clutter. 
Anything that stops the music or interrupts a talk segment is 
clutter. Listeners subconsciously don't differentiate between spots, 
jingles or promos. It's all clutter. Worse, clutter offers no benefit 
in the ears of the listener. If I'm in the market for a car and hear 
a car dealer spot, that offers benefit. If I'm not in the market, it's clutter.

>I don't why major market stations air only 60's.

30's are usually 80% of the price of a 60. If you're running 18 
minutes, that's 36 spots an hour. That's a significant increase in 
billing over 60's. It's deadly for programming, since every one is an 
element. The fewer elements in an hour, the less perceived clutter.

In the early FM days stations would run commercial free hours. Ad 
agencies didn't appreciate stations fouling their own nests. 
Commercials are our livelihood. Badmouthing them does no good. The 
agencies stopped placing buys on stations that did anything 
"commercial free." You could do something positive like an "XTRA 
Music Hour" that didn't disparage commercials. They had no problem with that.

It's interesting to me that WABC would think listeners would perceive 
them as a source for news in a market with three full-time news 
stations. Especially since WINS is the most listened-to station 
(cume) in the industry. I believe this is a ploy not to be a news 
leader but to capture some of the Stern losses and get ready for 
another talk station in the market. It leaves them with a minimum of 
36 spots a day that have to be run (at lower rates) throughout the 
day. To recover the income they'll have to run even more.

It's like the "less is more" philosophy. If there's less money, it ain't more."

Rich


Rich Wood
Rich Wood Multimedia
Phone: 413-303-9084
FAX: 413-480-0010