96.5 AMP WZMP flips to AC As "Today's 96.5"

DOB said:

What 96.5 should do is run quick promos between their songs that are variations of "Hey, aren't you sick of always hearing MORE and MORE commercials and talk on that other station? Make the switch to 96.5 for fewer commercials and a better variety of your music".

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Should they? More FM making on-air references to a station their listeners haven't yet heard of is cute. Today's 96.5 making on-air references to the Goliath they wish to slay would be pretty counter-productive. They might want to just create an on-air product that acts like they're the only Mainstream AC in the market. Just my opinion.

Our Mainstream AC's are slugging it out and the listeners probably don't even notice. (Is this radio's new version of the fun old-time "Top 40 wars?" Heh heh.) Gotta love that the jocks are referring to the station as "Today's 101.1" and pausing before throwing in "More FM" as almost an after-thought.

Also gotta love that it's January 9 and we're talking about the timing of Christmas flips. (BTW: 101.1 HD2 didn't stop the Christmas music until some point yesterday or this morning. Including the HD2 & stream, More FM gave Philly about 83 days of Christmas music this year!)

To add to the holiday speculation: Traditionally, when B101 flipped to Christmas and WOGL didn't, WOGL did not see an increase from B101 listeners who allegedly weren't ready for Christmas. IIRC, it actually appeared to that some of WOGL's listeners headed toward the lights. WOGL's decision to start flipping looked like a way to stave off some of the bleeding.

The fact that WOGL's regular format doesn't get a bump when 101.1 does Christmas would lead one to think that Today's 96.5 (if it's still around in the fourth quarter) will not be flipping to Christmas. After all, when the market's #1 Mainstream AC goes Christmas and the market's Classic Hits station does the same, the market's #2 Mainstream AC stands a better chance of picking up any disenfranchised listeners (if there indeed are any).

richt1014 said:

Between songs I've heard More announced themselves as "Today's 101.1 More FM. Better Variety and fewer commercials." That is the same as Today's 96.5 in which they say "better variety, fewer commercials." Definitely trying to keep the listeners away from 96.5.

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But I just listened to 101.1 for like an hour or something and their stop sets are still insufferably long. I know that in-office listeners aren't usually focused on the music enough to change the station...but how many people in their cars are sitting through 7 or 8 minutes of commercials? (Is it that long? It feels like it is!)

My point is: They can say fewer commercials but if they're preparing for a battle, they might need to actually (gulp!) play fewer commercials. At least for a while, anyway.

96.5 has definitely tweaked their playlist slightly since their sign-on.. pushing a little bit harder on the 80s (at least playing them more than songs from the 90s at the moment.) With the rest of the playlist still trending 2000's to now, I don't see them cannibalizing sister WOGL that much by dropping in some 80s tunes.

This market is heavily saturated with 80's material...More FM, MGK, BEN-FM, WOGL, Mix, WJBR, and now 96.5.

CurtisNEPA said:

This market is heavily saturated with 80's material...More FM, MGK, BEN-FM, WOGL, Mix, WJBR, and now 96.5.

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It feels like that makes sense just based on the fact that the '80s was three decades ago. But by that logic, that would mean it would have been normal for radio in the '80s to have been playing a lot of music from the '50s...which they definitely were not. haha.

The day after the switch the HD3 which used to be talk philly is dead air with a carrier. Could they be thinking of putting Standards on, they do own the Strip, correct which is a great Standards format, heard it in Dallas.

There are a handful of stations that might do a flip within the next five years I would say.

1. Clearly Today's 96.5
2. 95.7 (in terms of re-branding, but I think the current format will stay with light tweaking)
3. 93.7 and/ or 99.5.

I mean come on. 93.7, 99.5, 106.1, 96.5 and 101.1 all play pretty much the same damn songs. There are a few minor differences, but not really. Something's gotta give.

I'll agree with you on 96.5, if they don't gain traction.
I can't say much about the suburban stations (93.7 and 99.5)
Throw in these two that may flip within five years:
103.9: if they don't gain traction, they'd be ripe for whatever Radio One has as their next format of the year. Maybe even a flip to "Radio Now" CHR like in Houston
104.5: I hate to say it, as this is one of my favorite Alternative stations, but how long will iHeart continue to tolerate their low billing numbers? I've wondered if they could bill more as the 2nd Country or AC (missed their shot there) in Philly than as the 1st alt-rock station.

I would not want anything to happen to 104.5, they are the only bright spot on the dial, they sound different from all the other pop, urban, classic hits, sports formats clogging the band. They are the only alternative we have, no rimshots to back down on and they run on a shoestring budget, why blow them up.

radiodx10 said:

There are a handful of stations that might do a flip within the next five years I would say.

1. Clearly Today's 96.5
2. 95.7 (in terms of re-branding, but I think the current format will stay with light tweaking)
3. 93.7 and/ or 99.5.

I mean come on. 93.7, 99.5, 106.1, 96.5 and 101.1 all play pretty much the same damn songs. There are a few minor differences, but not really. Something's gotta give.

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I'm not sure WSTW or WJBR will do any format changes in the near (or distant) future. Remember, they are not looking for Philly advertisers or listeners. They are blessed to have great signals in Philly and NJ, but they are shooting for Delaware and Delaware County businesses. They market also includes some MD, but when I worked in that market, there was little in terms of advertising from that area.

WSTW and WJBR are consistently--and by leaps and bounds--the highest rated stations in their market. WSTW may continue playing with the line between Top 40 and Hot AC but that would be about the only change I could conceive of between those two stations. Delmarva and Beasley, respectively, would be nuts to blow them up.

On my hd readout it says WTDY so I guess they changed calls TDY = today.

Gunsmoke said:

On my hd readout it says WTDY so I guess they changed calls TDY = today.

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I believe it officially changed over Sunday or Monday. It doesn't mean much of anything to the average joe, but it's cool to us nerds.

Honest opinions: How many people do you think are OK with hearing "Uma Thurman" by Fall Out Boy, "I Melt With You" by Modern English, "I Love You Always Forever" by Donna Lewis, "Renegades" by X Ambassadors, "Every Rose Has Its Thorn" by Poison, and "A Thousand Miles" by Vanessa Carlton on the same station--let alone in the same hour?

I get that women from the 20's to 40's age group are down with newer hits like from artists like Fall Out Boy, Justin Bieber, and Sia. But aren't a lot of the younger end reaching for the dial (heh-heh, remember when there were dials?) when Modern English or Poison comes on? I think that 96.5 spiking in '90s hits is a great idea but some of these '80s titles really leaves me scratching my head.

Miguelito said:

Honest opinions: How many people do you think are OK with hearing "Uma Thurman" by Fall Out Boy, "I Melt With You" by Modern English, "I Love You Always Forever" by Donna Lewis, "Renegades" by X Ambassadors, "Every Rose Has Its Thorn" by Poison, and "A Thousand Miles" by Vanessa Carlton on the same station--let alone in the same hour?

I get that women from the 20's to 40's age group are down with newer hits like from artists like Fall Out Boy, Justin Bieber, and Sia. But aren't a lot of the younger end reaching for the dial (heh-heh, remember when there were dials?) when Modern English or Poison comes on? I think that 96.5 spiking in '90s hits is a great idea but some of these '80s titles really leaves me scratching my head.

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I'm trying to dig up the article, but I read a while back that the average age of a Mainstream AC listener is right around 45 years old.

That would mean they were born in 1972. They grew up with the music of the 80s, but still like today's music, or want to feel like they're hip to today's music. The playlist is indicative of today's average AC listener.

Plus, CBS doesn't seem as interested in the "younger end" of the demographic, since they flipped away from CHR to AC.

atthestars said:

I'm trying to dig up the article, but I read a while back that the average age of a Mainstream AC listener is right around 45 years old.

That would mean they were born in 1972. They grew up with the music of the 80s, but still like today's music, or want to feel like they're hip to today's music. The playlist is indicative of today's average AC listener.

Plus, CBS doesn't seem as interested in the "younger end" of the demographic, since they flipped away from CHR to AC.

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Then my wish would be for a Soft AC station. Even though I was way too young to be in the target, I loved Sunny 104.5 (the 2000's version). But I digress. If CBS isn't interested in the younger end, why not drop the Fall Out Boy, Justin Bieber, & Sia stuff and stick with the Modern English, Donna Lewis, Vanessa Carlton stuff? At least it would help them point out that they're aiming at a different demo than More FM. (Not sure whether they think younger or older has been dying to hear Poison but, again, I digress.)

Miguelito said:

Then my wish would be for a Soft AC station. Even though I was way too young to be in the target, I loved Sunny 104.5 (the 2000's version). But I digress. If CBS isn't interested in the younger end, why not drop the Fall Out Boy, Justin Bieber, & Sia stuff and stick with the Modern English, Donna Lewis, Vanessa Carlton stuff? At least it would help them point out that they're aiming at a different demo than More FM. (Not sure whether they think younger or older has been dying to hear Poison but, again, I digress.)

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Because their research shows that even the older end of the demo wants to hear Fall Out Boy and Justin Bieber. If they stuck with just Gold based music, they'd be targeting more of the demographic of Ben FM or WOGL, which isn't their intention with the station.

Was thinking the exact same thing--the data. I know people who fit into what I would project the demo to be--and the upper end of that for the most part--and yes, they would likely be perfectly fine with that type of song (maybe individually a specific song isn't their cup of tea, but that's true of songs in the gold library as well--it's that they enjoy the, um, mix of eras).

BTW: I'm just ruminating. For the most part, I think the playlist on 96.5 is almost-great. If there were slightly more '90s and slightly less '80s, I'd take off the "almost" part.

I still can't believe they named it "Today's 96.5."