The San Diego ratings out earlier this week show K-Love jumping into the Top 10. I don't believe the station it replaced (KPRI, with Triple A format) ever got that high in its final decade. Is anyone else as surprised at me that K-Love has such a large share of listeners in a Top 20 market?
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K-Love jumps into Top 10
- Thread starter Signal Geek
- Start date
Seattle has a similar station that's been on format for probably 40 years. It's been in the top five multiple times!
Not at all. Look at the market history for KTLY Dallas-Ft Worth or KSBJ Houston. For that matter, market 21 St. Louis where KLJY has reached number one a few times in the PPM era. Why shouldn't a K-Love station break the top 10?
No reason why a K-Love could not be in the Top 10. And I didn't know about their success in Seattle and Texas. However, they have never reached the Top 10 in either San Francisco or Los Angeles -- or even come close.
EMF's K-Love is a really new entry in LA, and has to deal with the confusion with the 40-year heritage of K-Love at 107.5 with the same name in the same market. In San Francisco, they have nowhere near full market coverage.
I'd really like to know how K-Love is doing out here in Hartford/New Haven with the monster signal EMF bought at 106.9. It obviously started with zero carryover audience, as WCCC was a hard-driving classic rocker, and was introducing completely unfamiliar music and artists into a market that's largely Catholic and not ultra-religious. San Diego sounds to me like a much more promising market for EMF. But I guess WCCC must be satisfying its donation goals, since no rumors of a format shift or resale have been noticed. Normally, I'd think a station doing something new in a market would be shouting its 12+ number from the rooftops to let everyone know that their friends and neighbors have found an exciting new station to listen to, but I doubt there's anything local at all about K-Love Hartford other than the top-of-the-hour legal ID. Having the piped-in hosts mention it between song sets wouldn't work since that's where they need to do their soft-sell preaching and praise, and the rest of the listeners around the country wouldn't care how well WCCC was making out anyway.
It is already in a tie or beating the 25-54 listening of WTIC!
While the operation is not targeted for sales, the format is pretty definitely a 25-54 play, so they are starting to have an impact in Hartford.
EMF looks at national averages, and they have to be shrewd enough to know that different markets have different potentials. I'd bet that they look at whatever available figures there are about church attendance and even things like faith-based political opinions and voting records.
That looks impressive at first glance, but with WTIC's main programming being conservative talk, local news, UConn sports (in a severe down period except for women's basketball), the Red Sox and the NY Giants, how large can 1080's 25-54 audience be? Can you give me a rough idea of how WCCC is doing in comparison to the music FMs that target 25-54?
K-Love is a music format with jock that air simply jocks, no preaching or anything. A shift is not that different than any other format. Everything is intensely researched like a competitive corporate station. As I understand it, many of the earlier KSBJ (Houston) folks wound up at K-Love/Air One.
They're not going to delve in politics or anything that might create controversy. They survive off listener donations and have that pretty much perfected. Some say they're quite good at it and tend to run lean on expenses.
I would imagine they're sort of like Minnesota Public Radio in that they look at coverage and overall revenue versus just one market. If you look at MPR, their single station revenue outside Minneapolis/St.Paul, it is only about 30% or so of the total,meaning most of those stations likely couldn't stand alone. In Grand Rapids,Minnesota when they requested a main studio waiver, they noted just 194 donors for the market's two translators prior to the full power news/talk format appeared. By my guess,that was about $30,000 in total. Non-network revenue including local Underwriting for their flagships was under $11 million and I think they have 45 or so stations. I'm guessing K-Love/Air One might be similar but on scale to the market size.
They're not going to delve in politics or anything that might create controversy. They survive off listener donations and have that pretty much perfected. Some say they're quite good at it and tend to run lean on expenses.
I would imagine they're sort of like Minnesota Public Radio in that they look at coverage and overall revenue versus just one market. If you look at MPR, their single station revenue outside Minneapolis/St.Paul, it is only about 30% or so of the total,meaning most of those stations likely couldn't stand alone. In Grand Rapids,Minnesota when they requested a main studio waiver, they noted just 194 donors for the market's two translators prior to the full power news/talk format appeared. By my guess,that was about $30,000 in total. Non-network revenue including local Underwriting for their flagships was under $11 million and I think they have 45 or so stations. I'm guessing K-Love/Air One might be similar but on scale to the market size.
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I think 102.9 also briefly used the "K-Love" branding at some point, correct?
Although I'm sure expenses to run KKLQ in LA are insane, especially considering the marketing spend they've been doing in the market, EMF just needs a small slice of the pie in the market to make it worth while. It's a different ballgame with 11 million potential donors.
Although I'm sure expenses to run KKLQ in LA are insane, especially considering the marketing spend they've been doing in the market, EMF just needs a small slice of the pie in the market to make it worth while. It's a different ballgame with 11 million potential donors.
From sign on in 1999 as KLQV, the station ws K-Love, with a Spanish AC format like that at KLVE in LA. When the AC format did not work as well as the one at sister station K-Lve in LA, it was changed to Viva, with a much more pop an d rhythmic format, which ended when HBC decided to roll out the Recuerdo format from KRCD in lA in a dozen markets under PD Amalia González.
You see what might have been an inferior signal playing that devil music is going to work just fine for K-Love, sicne they're broadcasting with a 'higher power'.
Actually, I was referring to "plain" WTIC. It's the #3 or #4 biller in the market with lower 25-54 ratings.
I really don't understand the Christian Contemporary format, in that I wouldn't want to listen to a radio station where all the songs can only deal with one subject. Even within a format like AC where most of the songs are about romantic love, some are about meeting someone new, some are about break ups, etc.
That said, you would think that CCM would work in some markets like Dallas where the Protestant Evangelical population is high. But San Diego?
Other CCM stations that do well in the ratings are for the most part locally programmed with local DJs. Dallas, Orlando, Seattle, Atlanta all have CCM stations that are quite successful, but are not satellite delivered. In San Diego, listeners are hearing DJs who I believe are in Indianapolis. And as far as I know, there's nobody in the local station to even do a weather forecast or run a traffic report. And KPRI is competing with itself, since 96.1 KYDO Campo is also owned by EMF, running the Air 1 format. I know Air 1 is supposed to be a bit more uptempo and rock-oriented but I really don't hear the difference.
That said, you would think that CCM would work in some markets like Dallas where the Protestant Evangelical population is high. But San Diego?
Other CCM stations that do well in the ratings are for the most part locally programmed with local DJs. Dallas, Orlando, Seattle, Atlanta all have CCM stations that are quite successful, but are not satellite delivered. In San Diego, listeners are hearing DJs who I believe are in Indianapolis. And as far as I know, there's nobody in the local station to even do a weather forecast or run a traffic report. And KPRI is competing with itself, since 96.1 KYDO Campo is also owned by EMF, running the Air 1 format. I know Air 1 is supposed to be a bit more uptempo and rock-oriented but I really don't hear the difference.
Then again, it's a subject that some people feel is very important. Life-changing even. And it's presented in a very comfortable, non-threatening, non-preachy kind of way. And given all the bad news being pumped out, and all the divisiveness being spread, it can be very reassuring.
The songs on CC formats are about life. Not only do they deal with faith, but also with living the faith in a Christian way. For those who feel that they go through life accompanied by, comforted by and guided by God and His Son and the prophets, that's a wide subject range.
You really do not have to be a "bible thumping" Christian to find more spiritual lyrics comforting and enjoyable. Note that many CC stations play secular music that holds the same values as upheld by their faith. Isn't "Unanswered Prayers" really a song of faith?
KLVJ is 11th in 12+ in San Diego. The Average Quarter Hour listening is 6,000 persons. That's out of roughly 2,500,000 persons who listen to the radio at some point each week. While the rank is good, we are not talking about a huge percentage of people listening at any given time. The cume is just over 200,000. That is around 7% of the market population, a relatively small group but one that listens a lot.
K-Love broadcasts its shows from a variety of locations; the HQ is in Rocklin, CA, outside Sacramento. The morning show comes from Indianapolis, but has been broadcast from other cities in the past.
The format does not seem to benefit from weather and traffic; people go to the K-Love stations because they are nice to listen too. After all, many of us in programming are questioning the need for traffic and weather at all since most listeners have apps for that that are more complete and more timely and geographically specific.
As to Air-1, EMF has researched the variants of CC, and they find that the two formats they do definitely reach different audiences. They are working with outside contributors to do a Spanish language version (and as a reference, the CC station in Puerto Rico was, before the hurricane, often top 10 on the whole Island despite only covering about 40% of the ratings metro).
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