Wednesday, March 27, 2019

Lund Letter

Wednesday, March 27, 2019

 

This Week in The Lund Letter:  
>   Tomorrow is the big day!
>   Efficient marketing of your station
>   The science of music scheduling
>   
The news desert and other media trends

D-Day is Upon Us!

tomorrow.pngTomorrow is March 28, the first day of the Nielsen spring diary ratings sweep.  It is also the first day of the Nielsen April PPM and the Eastlan spring ratings period.  Does your station sound as good as it should? 

Lund Management Memo: Email Marketing

EmailMarketing.jpgWhen looking at options for spring audience marketing or sales development, direct email marketing is still a top choice according to multiple research surveys.  While “digital” is our new buzz word, this relatively low-tech email marketing campaign is still a top choice with 86% of online marketers.  Why?  It builds awareness, customer retention, conversion, and acquisition.  That’s a formula that works well for advertisers and audience-building.

There’s one newer issue, though.  Almost three-fourths of US internet users check their email on a mobile device.  That means marketing messages should be designed to be read on a smartphone.

Email marketing suggestions:

>   Build a listener database and email them often.

>   Play to your base – by notifying your loyal core of advance notice of contests to increase their involvement.

>   Use your email blasts to gain tune-in to talent benchmarks, interviews, and remotes.

>   Constantly build your database and promote to them – like every online business does.

>   Create an at-work e-mail network.

>   Run small contests where the only way to qualify is by email, then use entries to solicit listening.

>   Every contest entry should ask for the person’s email, and then use this info in your marketing.

>   Create a “request a song” interactive page on your website, and ask for the person’s email.

Email marketing is the least expensive and many believe the most effective for radio.

For more no cost marketing ideas for your station…

NoCostSymbol.pngMarketing builds cume. While essential for your station, it doesn’t have to be costly.  The Lund No-Cost Marketing Guide provides 200+ ways to build audience for no cost…including email marketing tactics.  Stage a no-cost marketing blitz to bring in new cume.  Get the Lund No-Cost Marketing Guide.


Lund Music Room: Song Sequence Hitting Strategy

baseballbatter.gifA baseball manager puts together a team’s line-up card to score runs, and radio programmers maximize ratings by the order songs are scheduled.

We know there is a strategy involved in each team’s line-ups, from deciding who leads off, who bats clean-up, and where to place the designated hitter in the American League.  Baseball managers normally want a speedy lead-off hitter who can get on base; a “two spot” hitter has great bat control who can move the lead-off hitter into scoring position and of course the “clean-up” hitter who has power to hit runners home.  Some managers like to vary right handed hitters with left handed hitters to throw off the pitcher by changing their view of the strike zone.  Others like to stack the line-up with power hitters in the “three spot,” “clean-up” and “five spot” in the order.   With Spring Training completed, it’s time to Play Ball!

Music scheduling is also a science.  When sequencing songs in your music software, apply the strategy of a baseball manager.

+   Like having a lead-off hitter who can get on base, you need to schedule a strong song after your commercial stopset to begin the music momentum.

+   Similar to the National League where the pitcher typically bats ninth, your weakest, most unfamiliar songs should be last in a music set.

+   Like baseball’s “clean-up” hitter, you need to schedule one power song in every quarter hour to draw in cume with one of your listener’s favorite songs.

+   Your sequencing strategy should always have your strongest songs scheduled adjacent to your weakest songs.

+   Like the manager who alternates left-handed hitters with right-handed hitters to give the pitcher a different look, a radio programmer should vary the eras of songs in their sequence to enhance the perception of variety.

Just as a baseball manager designs their batting order to produce runs, apply strategy to your song sequencing in your music software, and increase TSL.

Playing the right songs and using the right software controls are vital to a music station’s success.  With the spring diary and Eastlan sweep starting this week along with the April PPM, get a comprehensive music review and software tune-up.  The Lund Consultants will examine your library, clocks, rotations and rules to get you set.  As a result, your Time Spent Listening increases.  Email John Lund for more information on this easy, cost efficient service.


Lund Case Study

magnifyglass.jpgHow can your station grow its audience and sales?  We view every market as unique in its challenges and potential.  This is especially true in markets with military bases.  In one such market, we designed a format for both the military and civilian audience.  The base was so large that it represented its own buying community.

With many soldiers living off-base along with thousands of retired military, the audience potential was very large.  We designed a format that appealed directly to the broader group of people tied to the base by military service, commerce, and family connections.  The result was a hybrid contemporary format where music changes during some dayparts to reach the largest group of listeners.

Unconventional?  Yes, but it works!  National charts and satellite formats program to a set of averages, yet we know that no market is “average.”  The Lund Consultants don’t believe in one-size-fits-all solutions.  Put us to work for you today.  Email John Lundand let’s talk about your challenges.

Planning Your State Broadcast Convention?

fullconf.jpgJohn Lund’s positive, fast-moving presentation, “The Science of Radio Programming,” includes training and coaching guidelines on the basics of attaining higher ratings and more listeners.  Topics include the “basics” of radio programming, America’s top formats: who listens and why, tactics to get more listeners, talent coaching, and how to make voice tracking sound live and local.  This presentation will be customized and expanded to meet your members’ needs.  Email John Lund for availability and info.


Lund’s Top 3:  How To Screen Sales Promotions
Top3B.jpg  
What’s “Value-Added”?


It’s no surprise in today’s business environment that clients demand extra sales promotions. Smart managers use a simple screening process for all proposed sales promotions. Ask these questions
:

1.   What’s the standard package?  Develop criteria of appropriate packages that offer a fixed number of promos based on effectiveness.

2.   How does the sales promotion benefit programming? In addition to making revenue, it should bring in new cume, extend TSL, and/or enhance the image of the station.

3.   What’s the cash value of a promo?  Create a package that sets the value of promos at a healthy percentage of the client’s rate. For example, if the client’s top rate is $40; promos are valued at $32.  35 promos times $32 = $1,120 in added value from promotional mentions.

Next week – more sales promotion screening tips.  Visit www.lundradio.com for more Top 3’s!


Promotion of the Week: TV Show Taping

tvshowstudio.jpgFly listeners to the hottest TV show taping in Hollywood (fall seasons shoot during summer); tie-in with the local affiliate.

Also – Monday is April Fool’s Day.  Has the morning show or station planned a stunt to gain talk, tune-in, and media coverage this first week of the spring sweep?

Contest and Promotions Guide – Limited Time  Special Pricing

50percentoff.jpgGet hundreds of audience-building contests for ratings, seasonal times and holiday events, plus other fun programming and sales promotions.  This recently updated Guide is packed with great contests designed to boost listening and ratings.  Order it here.


Lund Trend Watch:


Never Irrelevant

amfmradio.jpgAccording to Rolling Stone, in 2018 “Radio Still Mattered.”  68.5 million people use streaming audio.  That seems like a lot until you know that 228.5 million listen to AM/FM radio every week.  Radio is also still the top source for discovering new music.  49% of people found new music on the radio while only 27% found new music via online music services (see last week’s Lund Letter for more new music discovery numbers).

Spotify Creeping Up On Pandora

SpotifyPandoralogos.pngPandora is the most popular music streaming service in the US and has been since its launch in 2000.  But Spotify continues to gain steam where Pandora is slowly losing it.  This has caused eMarketer to amend their subscriber forecasts for the two services and announce that Spotify will overtake Pandora by 2021 (a year sooner than previous estimates).  In 2019, Pandora is expected to decrease to 72.4 million users (from 72.7 in 2018) and Spotify will increase to 65.3 million (up from 57.4 million year-over-year).

The News Desert

tumbleweed.gifFacebook has found – through searching for sources for its own local news service – that 40% of Americans live in areas without much local news coverage.  About 1,800 newspapers have closed in the last 15 years, and many others now run on a smaller staff that may not be capable of gathering and reporting all the news of the markets they are in.  Facebook’s service “Today In” currently covers 400 US cities.  In addition to sharing their data with universities doing related studies (Duke, Harvard, Minnesota and North Carolina), Facebook has announced that it will be awarding 100 grants ranging from $5,000 to $25,000 to people with ideas for making more news available everywhere.  That’s in addition to $300 million in grants announced in January.

Leaving the Room

noonewatchingtv.jpgAccording to a study by IPG Media Lab and TVision, 29% of people who watch over-the-air and cable TV leave the room during commercials.  Basically, no one is in the room for at least 2 seconds of each ad that airs.  TV has a viewability problem that is almost as bad as digital video (where 31% of ads are unviewable).



Programmer’s Planner:
calendargif.gif

Tomorrow:  Spring Nielsen diary and Eastlan sweeps begin
Apr 1: April Fool’s Day
Apr 15: Income Tax Day
Apr 21: Easter
Apr 22: Earth Day
May 5: Cinco De Mayo
May 12: Mother’s Day



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The Lund Letter
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About the Lund Media Group:

For over 20 years, the Lund Media Group has provided programming, music consulting, operational guidance, and research to commercial and public broadcaststations throughout North America and overseas. Whether you program all sports, alljclforLL.pngtalk, or all music, the Lund Goal is to help stations get more listeners and keep them listening longer. The Lund Consultants are a multi-format custom programming and management consultancy. 

C
all John Lund for more information about how the Lund Media Group can help your stations achieve more listeners, higher ratings, and more revenue.
Phone: 650-692-7777.
Email john@lundradio.com