ComScore to Debut First Ad Product Under New CEO

The Wall Street Journal
July 31, 2018
by Alexandra Bruell

Company plans to launch a new tool to measure ad views across platforms in beta this September                     

ComScore Inc. SCOR 1.94% is preparing to launch a new product that measures ad views across platforms like TV and mobile, the first big move by new Chief Executive Bryan Wiener, who has been charged with turning around the beleaguered business.

With the new Campaign Ratings tool, comScore aims to provide advertisers with a more realistic report of who is watching their ads by measuring viewers who see an ad on any device. The product aims to strip out duplication, meaning that it will count a viewer who might watch a video on their TV and phone only once.

• Technical challenges have commonly caused IoT projects to run aground, but today the chances of success are improving. Advances in five key areas promise to increase the value of IoT technology in many industries and make it easier to build a sound business case for investing in an IoT solution.
  

As more people eschew traditional cable packages and TV screens to watch their favorite shows through streaming subscriptions and mobile devices, advertisers and media companies are looking for new ways to capture and measure those viewers, pressuring Nielsen and comScore, the two biggest TV measurement companies, to offer new metrics.

Mr. Wiener joined comScore about two months ago, on the heels of a series of corporate struggles involving accounting irregularities, as well as a management shake-up. While comScore was distracted with those issues, rival Nielsen expanded its portfolio to include more digital and cross-platform measurement products.

The new offering from comScore, best known for its digital ad measurement, signals a move to compete with Nielsen as a bigger player in cross-platform video metrics.
Previously, comScore’s TV and digital measurement tools were “more siloed,” said Mr. Wiener.
“We had the assets,” he said. The problem was that comScore, which “was long on vision and short on strategy,” didn’t combine them. Shortly after he joined, Mr. Wiener had more than 60 meetings with customers to figure out what media buyers and sellers needed. They wanted better cross-platform measurement that eliminated duplication, he said.

The product will launch in beta this September, with support from nearly all media companies and existing customers, including ABC, CBS, Fox, Viacom Inc. and Hulu, among others.
ComScore launched Xmedia a few years ago to measure and deduplicate viewers across screens, but that product didn’t specify how many people saw the actual ads.

Nielsen has similar tools within its “total audience” portfolio, including a product that measures digital ad impressions and views across platforms. Still, Madison Avenue is anxious to have more options and had high hopes for comScore before its problems derailed its momentum.
ComScore, with its digital focus and acquisition of digital measurement company Rentrak a few years ago, should have a product competitive with Nielsen’s, said Ed Gaffney, director of implementation research and marketplace analytics at WPP media agency network GroupM.
“We love the idea of competition that spurs innovation,” he said. “It’s about time.”
New cross-platform measurement resources like comScore’s ratings pilot and tools from OpenAP, a TV ad consortium, “will help to propel the industry’s transformation towards new currencies, products and consumer experiences,” said Bryson Gordon, executive VP of advanced advertising at Viacom.

“The fact that [Mr. Wiener] really recognized, by listening to clients, what has been a pain point and is really trying to solve it is a right step in the right direction,” said Julie DeTraglia, head of research at Hulu. “We’re looking forward to participating and seeing the data.”

USTN Sues Entercom

BREAKING NEWS

USTN Sues Entercom

United States Traffic Network has filed suit against Entercom in Harris County District Court in Texas, alleging, among other claims, that Entercom negotiated to purchase USTN, then walked away from the sale and "ended the business relationship between the two companies and informed USTN that it was going to develop a direct competitive business based upon the information gleaned during the due diligence/discovery process." The suit seeks material and punitive damages in excess of $5 million.  The traffic network pulled no punches in the filing stating that Entercom’s scheme was so perverse and all-encompassing that even Vladimir Putin would be left blushing. USTN repeatedly refers to Entercom as a bully and is seeking more than $5 million from the radio company. “Plaintiffs ask this Court to right the wrongs of Defendants and send a message to BULLIES everywhere that honor and integrity still mean something in America, that wrongs can still be righted, and that victims can be compensated for the wrongs of others.” Here are the details. During a conference call with employees Monday night USTN CEO Ivan Shulman said this was a classic case of David vs. Goliath and all about bad corporate behavior. Just a few months ago, it appeared as if Entercom had come along to save the day for United States Traffic Network when it took an equity position in USTN. In a May 3 USTN press release, Entercom CEO David Field stated: “We are pleased to announce our new partnership with USTN. Their new management team has moved quickly to fix their issues and establish a solid business model following the company’s separation from its former corporate parent. We look forward to participating in their future growth as they capitalize on the significant opportunities in this attractive market segment.” That relationship has clearly taken a very bad turn In a lawsuit filed last week USTN says it entered into good faith negotiations with Entercom to facilitate a sale, and Entercom “fraudulently stole data to create a competitive company.” The lawsuit alleges that Entercom entered negotiations with USTN to purchase the company, walked away at the last minute, and informed USTN that it was going to develop a direct competitive business based upon the information gleaned during the due diligence/discovery process. The suit also alleges that Entercom intentionally induced USTN to miss a scheduled debt payment to Entercom under the pretenses that this payment would be unnecessary due to the planned closing of the purchase transaction. “Defendants on July 25th, sent written notification that the $1,300,000 payment had not been made, and that USTN was in default under the April loan agreement. Defendants did this knowing that the deal had not closed on the 24th, knowing that under the terms the loan was to be rescinded, and knowing that they had repeatedly instructed plaintiffs to not seek additional financing, raise additional capital, or even hire an investment banker.”

Car Buyers Are More Pragmatic On Social Media

 

 

Commentary

by Tanya Gazdik , Staff Writer @TanyaGazdik, 31 minutes ago

When it comes to social media related to auto buying, carmakers should not put too much emphasis on “all the feels” as most demographic groups are looking more for facts.

The days of social as an optional marketing channel are over. Now that social has its rightful place at the table, it is vital to understand where in the funnel social efforts should be targeted, according to Spout Social.

Per its 47-page annual social index, the top consumer content preference is for product information (48%), followed by promotions and deals (46%), education content (18%), news (17%), business updates (12%) and entertaining content (9%). Only 8% want to see “inspirational content” and only 4% want to see content including celebrities or other influencers they follow.

 

“Consumers want brand awareness and consideration stage content from brands on social,” according to the report. “But 80% of social marketers are hyper-focused on awareness activities, leaving out the consideration piece of the puzzle.  The social marketer’s No. 1 challenge is still ROI. Return on investment is the top concern for 55% of social marketers. This makes sense for two reasons: They aren’t meeting the full needs of their social audience with both brand awareness and consideration content and they’re defining ROI incorrectly to begin with.

Facebook remains a dominant force in marketing strategies and consumer behavior. A whopping 97% of social marketers list Facebook as their most used and useful social network, and Instagram blows Snapchat out of the water by social marketer usership and consumer adoption. In fact, 83% of marketers use Instagram and 13% use Snapchat; 51% of consumers use Instagram and 30% use Snapchat.

The automotive industry-specific data provides a pulse on effective social media marketing strategies to note for 2018.

“As marketers, we hear about ROI every single day—and social marketers remain anxious about it,” according to the report. “To truly understand what ROI means in the social marketing industry, and how social marketers are aligning with consumer preferences, we asked more than 2,000 social marketers how they approach structure, goals and content. We asked about their priorities and what they need to do their best work. Then we cross-referenced their reports against what consumers actually want. “

Millennials and Gen X differ in that Millennials prefer inspirational and entertaining content and business updates more than Gen X. Gen X prefer product information and news more than Millennials.

A recent Pew Study differentiated between Millennials (ages 22-37) and Generation X (ages 38-53) and their media consumption patterns. Sprout wanted to see how this differentiation translates to social.

As it turns out, Millennials are twice as likely to use Snapchat as Generation X. Millennials want to see only friends’ content on social 52% more than Gen X  Millennials and Gen X prefer the same content from companies: Discounts or sales, posts that showcase products or services and educational posts.

“We found that social is still very much a personal platform,” according to the report. “People spend time on social, first and foremost, to interact with family and friends. As brands put together campaigns and messaging, they must remember that they are guests at dinner, not members of the nuclear family: their role in user feeds is delicate, valuable  and should be treated with great care.:
So how can brands disrupt the user experience in the least intrusive and most relevant way? Data shows the answer: with awareness and consideration stage content. Think long-term, not quick fix. Think relationships, not attribution, per Sprout.

“Where there is alignment (is) customer service,” according to the report. “On the front lines with customers and prospects everyday, an overwhelming majority (88%) of social marketers understand the importance of customer service on social; nearly half (45%)
of consumer respondents have reached out to a company on social.”

 Employee advocacy is the new influencer marketing. Social marketers in 2018 see the value in employee advocacy as a cost-effective, scalable alternative to influencer marketing. Seventy-one percent of social marketers use employees as influencers or advocates today or want to in the future, while only 19% of marketers surveyed had the budget for an influencer program. This shift reflects consumer tastes: 61% of consumers said they would be more likely to research a product or service recommended on social by a friend vs. 36% for influencers/celebrities. 

Are Streaming Services Killing Commercials?

MediaPost

The following is not a method for local-direct businesses. Philip Jay LeNoble, Ph.D. CA

• Sponsor Content by Adstream

Most of us remember the words to a famous jingle from our childhood or a particularly clever commercial that stood out. Today, however, with streaming services more popular than ever, fewer people are consuming commercials on network TV and radio. This begs the question: Are streaming services killing the ad industry? No doubt these services are making a dent, but it’s premature to give Madison Avenue its last rites. After all, capitalism is alive and well, and the ad industry is adapting to the new ways that people consume entertainment.

Quartz Media recently reported: “Spending on TV ads fell for the first time in 2017, and will slip another 0.5% this year to $69.87 billion.” The outlet cited competition from online platforms and an overall reduction in standard TV package subscriptions as the chief culprits. However, Quartz went on to say, “TV ad spending would likely rise again in 2020, when the next US presidential race and Summer Olympics take place.”

Similarly, ID disclosed that in 2016 23% of all households in the United States did not subscribe to pay TV (cable, satellite, telco TV) and anticipates this figure will increase to 29% by 2020. If this occurs, how will brands utilize this more narrow exposure and abbreviated opportunity to reach consumers? Here are a few ways advertisers are finding to circumvent the decrease in exposure via traditional channels.

Addressable TV, VOD and Dynamic Ad Insertion
The IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) published a series of findings on this topic. As defined by them, “Under the umbrella term “Advanced TV” exists the digital off-springs of the broadcast era: Interactive TV (which may appear as digital overlays on top of linear TV commercials), Connected TV (CTV) / Over-the-Top (OTT) and Smart TVs, Linear Addressable TV—where ads targeted to specific households are inserted into live programming (i.e., DirecTV, Dish, Cablevision)—and Video-on-Demand Addressable—where dynamic ads are inserted into cable programs through the cable provider’s set-top box (ex: Comcast’s VOD).”

With Advanced TV comes a new set of challenges and opportunities. Brands can tap into an abundance of data, such as when and how long a viewer watched an ad, which was previously unavailable from traditional Linear TV data models. Advertisers now have, at their fingertips, household data as opposed to the individual data traditionally available in only digital. Once collected, advertisers can use this data for everything from optimizing ad length to displaying ads that align with the viewers favorite shows or political leanings. These new data-enriched homes pose unique advertising opportunities for brands, and agencies can use the data to design cross-device campaigns, interactive campaigns and relevant social contests.

Product Placement
Streaming giants such as Netflix and Amazon already have lured huge audiences away from network TV. And that’s to say nothing of subscription TV channels such as HBO and Showtime their respective OTT apps, and Hulu, which still shows commercials unless you pay for a premium subscription. To combat this problem, advertisers are having to get more creative with incorporating brands into content by utilizing product placement. Although product placement has been around since the invention of network TV, we’re about to see a lot more of it.

Variety noted the prevalence of Eggo waffles in the popular Netflix showStranger Things. Although Kellogg allowed the brand name to be used in the show at no fee, its presence sparked a meaningful conversation about the brand. The outlet quotes a statement by Trinh Le, marketing director for Eggo: “Eggo had more social mentions than over half of the Super Bowl advertisers.”

Variety pointed out that advertisers see a similar opportunities with streaming services. After all, these services appeal to brands’ most coveted consumer segment: young people willing to try a new brand. Seamlessly integrating a product into a piece of content is a win-win. If the producer of a show gets to use a major prop, such as a car, for free, this cuts production costs while helping brands gain a foothold.

Podcasts and Audio Technology
TV is not the only medium whose advertising has been affected by streaming services. So has radio, which could be described rightly as a dying medium. Because subscription-based services bring in a lot more money for recording companies than advertising does, these companies are gravitating more and more toward using only that model. Streaming podcasts, however, represent a huge opportunity for advertisers. Fast Company reported that advertising revenue through podcasts jumped 85 percent between 2016 and 2017. Seventy-five percent of listeners took action on a sponsored ad, 90 percent listened to the entire podcast, and relatively few skipped through the ads. Furthermore, branded podcasts are a new way that advertisers are connecting meaningfully with consumers.

With the introduction of audio home devices such as Google home, Apple HomePod and Alexa, audio ads are going to become more and more prevalent. As of May this year, Google announced it would be offering programmatic audio ads as part of its DoubleClick Bid Manager, (though the platform won’t have access to YouTube or YouTube Music). Google stated that the introduction of audio ads to programmatic is still early, though definitely growing. Recently, global ad delivery and asset management tech firm Adstream wrote about its collaboration with P&G on delivering the first audio-described ads to broadcasters in the U.K. The commercials broke new ground for video to audio delivery in the world of accessible advertising. This type of audio ad has opened the door for those with vision impairments to have the same experience as their sighted peers.

This audio innovation from P&G and Adstream is expected to roll out to other markets in the near future. 
2018 has shown us that the traditional ad models are still the most trusted. Clutch.co reports in a survey of 1,030 people that consumers trust TV the most (61%), followed by print (58%), radio/podcast (45%)  out-of-home (42%) Online (41%) and Social Media (38%). In short, as we have witnessed in the past, the advertising industry isn’t going away anytime soon. It’s just assuming a different form. As advertisers and brands consider the new trends in streaming services, they must stay nimble and agile while relying on integrated forms of ad delivery and distribution.

A report from Adstream helps define audio ads:

Adstream UK achieved an exciting milestone in 2017 delivering the first audio-described commercial to be broadcast in the UK.

 After months of testing, and by partnering with P&G who have been driving the initiative to make their advertising more inclusive for the 2 million people in the UK that are living with vision loss. Adstream helped introduce audio description (AD) into UK commercials with the landmark 30-second spot for P&G’s Fairy Liquid

The commercial broke new ground as an animated baby showed off Fairy Liquid Platinum’s cleaning prowess, while being accompanied by a narrator providing clear, elaborative details, such as the motion and animation taking place on the screen, enabling people with vision loss to ‘see’ the ad for the first time

Adstream worked alongside the Digital Production Partnership (DPP) and their member broadcasters on fully implementing the DPP commercials and sponsorship specification.

The DPP specification for the delivery of HD commercial and sponsorship material was published in Jan 2016 but not until July of this year was the last legal obstacle to supplying and transmitting audio-described commercials overcome by the industry.

The ITV/STV playout provider had completed their upgrade programme earlier in the year making them the first AD-ready broadcaster.

Adstream UK CEO, Lisa Lavender, said: “We’re committed to the introduction of audio description across all commercial content, so we were naturally delighted to work with P&G to help supply the UK’s first AD commercial earlier this month. The weeks and months of testing have all paid off.”
“We worked closely with the DPP on this key development and, by facilitating the delivery of an AD commercial to an AD-ready broadcaster, we played our part in this important and ground-breaking initiative for our industry.”

“We are proud to be in at the beginning of a journey which I hope results in audio description becoming an industry standard.”

P&G’s Inclusive Design Consultant, Sumaira Latif, who has been the driving force behind the initiative said:

“As a company that has many household brands like Fairy, Pampers and Ariel – used by people across the UK every day, its vitally important for us that we reflect the diversity of our audience – both inside and outside P&G. We recognise it’s the everyday interactions that make the biggest difference to making people feel valued and included and it’s also a business opportunity as our message now is expanding to 2 million consumers who have vision loss in the UK with whom we are able to now better communicate. As the Global leader of P&G’s ‘People with Disabilities Network’ and being a Mum with sight loss myself, P&G have harnessed my passion and ideas to help influence change for all people with a vision impairment. We continue on this journey, together with our partners such as RNIB to drive inclusivity within the advertising industry from creative to broadcast.”
Audio description is commentary that describes body language, expressions and movements, making the programme clear through sound. It is an extra narrative that articulates with the commercial’s original soundtrack and fits between the existing dialogue and sound effects to describe the visual action taking place on screen. In the UK, broadcasters are legally required to provide audio description in 10% of their programming, but leading broadcasters generally provide upward of 20%.

Shorter TV Spots Rising On Linear TV

 

 It would be interesting to see if the research below would also pertain to local-direct businesses trying to capture consumers who match their industry's purchase history behavior. Philip Jay LeNoble, Ph.D. CA 

• by Wayne Friedman , July 13, 2018

Short-form TV commercials, moved in part by shorter-length digital media messaging and better recall compared to 30-second commercials, are becoming more popular.

A recent survey says five-second and six-second TV commercials are up more than 10 times versus a year ago, according to MediaRadar, an advertising research company.

Looking at the broader picture -- including standard 15-second commercials (as well as shorter-form commercials) -- there is a 16% rise in the number of shorter commercials. MediaRadar says the average length of national TV commercials are 5% shorter this year than a year ago.

The study looked over 6,000 brands purchasing national TV ads from the first quarter 2017 to first quarter 2018.

TV marketers are increasingly pushed to do more with shorter messaging, in part due to the success and growth from digital video platforms using short-form TV video commercials.

An ARF/TVision Insights study of 50 advertiser,s from November 1, 2017 to April 30, 2018, looked at 100,000 unique TV commercial airings, and found 3,300 of those commercials were short-form, six-second TV commercials.

In addition, of those marketers in the survey, 69% of their TV commercials were 15-seconds long; 25% 30-seconds in length; and 3% 60-seconds in duration.

The study revealed short-form six-second commercials captured 8% to 11% more attention per second than 30-second and 15-second commercials.

These results came from a panel of 2,000 TV homes, representing 7,000 persons aged 2+ and using technology measuring respondents eyes fixated on the TV screen. 

Strong U.S. retail sales lift second-quarter GDP estimates

July 16, 2018

Lucia Mutikani

5 Min Read

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. retail sales rose solidly in June as households boosted purchases of automobiles and a range of other goods, cementing expectations for robust economic growth in the second quarter.

Signs of a strengthening economy, together with a tightening labor market and firming inflation, likely will keep the Federal Reserve on track to continue raising interest rates this year.
Fed Chairman Jerome Powell offered an upbeat assessment of the economy last Friday, telling lawmakers that “over the first half of this year, overall economic activity appears to have expanded at a solid pace.” The U.S. central bank raised interest rates in June for the second time this year and has forecast two more rate hikes by the end of 2018.

“This puts the economy in a very, very good position as it starts its 10th year of forward movement in July,” said Chris Rupkey, chief economist at MUFG in New York. “This strengthening economy gives the Federal Reserve the green light to raise rates a third time this year at their September meeting.”
 
The Commerce Department said on Monday retail sales increased 0.5 percent last month. Data for May was revised to show sales rising 1.3 percent, the largest since September 2017, instead of the previously reported 0.8 percent gain.

System 21 for Local Direct should be strong the rest of the year...Philip Jay LeNoble, Ph.D. CA

Home  News  Headlines  How Does Radio Perform With Black And Hispanic Listeners

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How Does Radio Perform With Black And Hispanic Listeners

July 11, 2018

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Very well according to Nielsen. The ratings firm says Black and Hispanic consumers make up a third of American radio listeners. And, Nielsen says radio is America’s top weekly reach platform, both overall and with Black and Hispanic consumers — 75 million of whom tune in each week.

According to Nielsen’s just-released July Audio Today report, in each of the past five years more than 30 million Black consumers and 40 million Hispanic consumers have tuned in to their radios. And looking at the overall radio audience, the national radio audience is approximately 14% Black and 17% Hispanic.

The report also looked at specific listening characteristics of Black and Hispanic radio audiences. More than 30 million Black consumers, age 12 and older, tune into radio each week. Forty-seven percent are male and 53% are female, and the most popular time of day to listen is Monday-Friday during afternoon drive. Urban Adult Contemporary is the top format among Black listeners, with nearly one-third of all radio usage going to stations in the Urban AC format. The Hispanic listening audience is 53% male and 47% female. Mexican regional is the No. 1 format overall, and the most popular time of day for radio occurs during midday.

Nielsen also says that Black and Hispanic consumers are very interested in smart speakers and audio streaming services. Nineteen percent of Black consumers and 21% of Hispanic consumers have a smart-speaker device in their household. And 52% of Black consumers and 45% of Hispanic consumers use streaming services for music, radio, and podcasts.

TV Advertising's Future Will Focus On What We Actually DO With Data

COMMENTARY

• by Dave Morgan , Featured Contributor, 4 hours ago

Data is not going to define the future of successful TV advertising, any more than it has defined digital advertising. I know that’s not what you hear at most conferences, but as someone who has worked at the center of data-driven advertising for the past 25 years, I can say this with certainty.

Data is not the new oil. I know you hear that phrase about data being “the new oil” all the time at cocktail parties and conference keynotes. You see it on cool-looking slide presentations in conference rooms. You read it in business publications. You even see it on magazine covers. But that doesn’t make it true.

Oil is valuable not just because it can be directly converted into harnessable energy, but because it is finite and scarce, expensive to extract, refine and transport.

Data has none of those qualities.  It is not scarce, but the opposite: plentiful, and becoming more plentiful every day, growing exponentially as more digital systems interact with more people and more systems, creating more “data exhaust.”  

Further, data does not produce value independently. You can’t just refine data and burn it as you can oil. Not only does most data need to be refined and cleaned, it also needs to be combined with other data, normalized, analyzed -- and most importantly, inserted into an algorithm and applied to some other process before its value can be fully realized.

Algorithms and processes matter more than data. Don't get me wrong. Data can create value, but its relative contribution to most situations, particularly in the world of advertising, is much less valuable than the algorithms or processes with which it interacts.

People were searching for things on the web for years in the mid- and late 1990s, but until Larry Page and Sergey Brin created the page rank algorithm and launched Google, users’ searches were not particularly fulfilling, despite the fact that what they were looking for -- as well as the data of the web -- was all in existence and quite accessible.

Likewise, until Bill Gross and his team created the bid-based cost-per-click monetization model at GoTo.com (Overture), search was not a very valuable or salable advertising platform. Today, thanks to those algorithms and processes, search advertising is expected to reach $95 billion globally this year, according to Zenith.

We’re pretty mediocre at leveraging data in digital display. How will we do with TV? Data is not the future of TV advertising. However, what we do with data will be TV advertising’s future.

There’s no question that the TV advertising experience today leaves much to be desired. Viewers get too many redundant and irrelevant ads. Advertisers have campaigns that reach way too many of the wrong people and contain incredible amounts of wasted frequency. As Erwin Ephron famously told us years ago, “Frequency is crabgrass.”

So, if we want to know how data is likely to be used in TV advertising, looking at how folks have used it in digital display is probably a good place to start. My assessment: Data-driven improvement in the digital display ad world today is mediocre at best. Fundamentally, from a user perspective, we’re not much more evolved than highly scaled e-commerce retargeting: the famous pair of shoes that follow you around.

Incredibly, our industry started doing that kind of retargeting 20 years ago, and built industrialized systems to do it in the mid-‘00s. We haven’t yet seen holistic solutions that collectively consider the user, the advertiser and the publisher, leveraging available data and truly delivering fewer, more relevant ads that not only yield better for advertisers and publishers, but truly delight users by providing offers, information or entertainment.

All this will happen someday, but that lag is not caused by  lack of data.

Today, lots of folks are talking about building and deploying industrial systems to leverage “massive pools of data” to make TV advertising work like digital. I am hopeful, but I also hope we don’t think it’s really just about the data. It will be about what we do with the data.

For sure, we need to do much better than we’ve done with digital display. Television and its massive loyal audiences and advertisers are too precious to squander. Let’s make sure to get the algorithms and processes right.

What do you think?

The Cold Dose of Radio Reality

Posted on July 11, 2018 by Jason Barrett in BSM Writers, The Barrett Blogs // 4 Comments

It’s hard sometimes not to become jaded if you work in the radio business. The more time you spend time in it, the more you discover that it’s not just about watching and talking about sports. The newspapers and industry trades at times paint a gloomy picture of what’s happening, leaving you to wonder about the stability of your career. Then as you improve at your craft and command more respect and warrant higher compensation, you learn why the word ‘business’ is included in your industry’s profile description.

One of the most common mistakes people make in radio is believing that their contributions to a company entitles them to something greater. Managers believe the brands they run are ‘their radio stations’ and the hosts, producers and contributing members all feel their presence and value to a brand is vital and difficult to replace. Their contributions certainly do matter, especially to those they work with, but in the grand scheme of everything, we’re all still replaceable parts. Some may have greater value, but none of us are irreplaceable.

How many times have you heard someone who’s young and on the way up in their career complain about the money, long hours, and lack of attention they receive from their employer? There’s this belief that their hard work should be recognized, radio should reward its people better, and more TLC should be provided by bosses.

It might be a wise thing to do if you want to retain good employees, but does an employer owe you that? They do not. A company’s primary responsibility is to make sure your check clears every two weeks, and provide you with access to the building to showcase your talent either on-air or behind the scenes during the hours you’re assigned to work.

If you’re smart, you’ll appreciate and take advantage of every single rep because experience benefits you no matter where you go in the future. As we all know, the only thing guaranteed in radio is that something will eventually change. Many people desire to work in this industry, so there’s always going to be someone standing behind you wanting what you have and willing to accept the position at a fraction of the cost.

Too often I hear complaints about the way companies operate. A host may not like what they’re being asked to focus on from a content standpoint or they may feel restricted from using specific words or tackling certain stories. Producers bitch about the pay, demands of the job, and hours involved to tackle each task. Programmers become frustrated when companies push self-serving initiatives on them, market managers meddle with their product, and corporate folks limit their ability to hire or retain good people.

In many cases I’ve agreed with their concerns, but whether I think they’re right or not, it’s still about convincing those above you to reevaluate a situation because they ultimately have the final say. There is no Mr. Cumulus, Mr. Entercom or Mr. iHeart standing in your way. There are people tasked with representing each company and looking out for its business interests, even if it means halting your plans and complicating your situation.

I’ve been fortunate in my career to work with some really great people but I’ve also dealt with some shady characters too. Over the past ten years I’m not sure our industry has improved the way it treats its own people. I see too many instances where people perform higher than expected and still lose their jobs over money.

There have also been instances that I’ve experienced firsthand as an entrepreneur which leave a sour taste in my mouth. I’ve done favors for market managers and executives only to have emails ignored afterwards. I’ve witnessed programmers act in cowardly fashion, threatening employees over contributing a piece of content to the BSM website. I’ve had hosts reveal serious issues, only to ignore the advice, and not address it with their employers, and then complain again months later when the same issue pops up.

What you need to remember if you’re working as a host or behind the scenes employee is that your employer is paying you to harness your talent, connect with an audience, sell their advertiser’s products, and extend your resume. By doing so, they’re giving you the chance to increase the viability of your personal brand, and place yourself in position to benefit from the experience you’ve accrued. Maybe it will be with the same radio company. Maybe it won’t.

For those involved on the managing end, there’s a different message that needs to be understood. The station you manage may be part of your identity, and you may love it dearly, but it is not your property. The company owns the brand, you simply operate it. The day you leave, the show goes on. You may not like the direction of where the ship sails next, but it’s no longer your ship to steer when you take your hands off the wheel.

Executives sometimes get caught up in the moves a station makes after they’ve left, and they forget that the choices they made while in control aren’t guaranteed to remain permanent. I’ve gone thru it myself a few times. You can feel differently about the way an operation is being run, and want to rescue what you perceive as ‘your brand’, but all that matters in the end are the results, and how the people involved respond to the new path forward.

If there’s one thing I’ve learned over time it’s that there are many different paths and styles to enjoy success. You may have to change a few parts to fit a new vision, but a good brand with good people serving a good audience will always find a way to remain relevant and successful.

Because so many people involved in the radio business have passion and love for the work they do, they struggle to cut the cord. The station and staff become part of your heart and soul, and although you may care more about what happens to them than a CEO sitting in a boardroom examining the brand’s profitability, it’s not your choice to make. They made the financial investment in the station, you didn’t. That gives them the right to run it however they see fit.

The point behind this column isn’t to cast a black cloud over the industry, it’s to provide you with a cold dose of reality. Radio is a business, but the line of work you do is special. The people around you share a similar enthusiasm for sports, and it’s a common bond which brings us all together to distract us from the pressures we face each day in life. Yes it’s a job, but it’s a rewarding one whether you’re making $8 an hour or seven figures.

We all have opinions about the pros and cons of this business. The industry will never satisfy 100% of us. Some operators will do things to make employees feel essential to their success. Others may not. You can waste a lot of energy worrying about everything under the sun or ask yourself two questions: “Do I feel a connection to the job in my heart, mind and soul?” and “Is it a career worth investing myself in for the long haul?”

If the answer is yes, then that should be plenty enough reason to continue doing it. If you’re still unfulfilled and feel you need more control, then there’s a solution – buy a radio station. Then, and only then, is the station and each decision truly yours.