ARN spent more money on its content and marketing this year than ever before and plans no let up in 2015, with the “battleground” switching to Melbourne.
That said, content director Duncan Campbell said the company would react to whatever SCA sprung to re-invigorate the 2Day network, particularly in Sydney. Campbell was speaking as the latest GfK ratings put the broadcaster on track for its strongest ever year. He said the correlation between investment and audience was becoming more apparent.
As well as spending heavily on marketing in 2014, plus the big play for Kyle and Jackie O, Campbell said investment in music remained a core focus for next year.
“People don't talk about the music so much. The talent is important but music is fundamental.”
While rivals may talk up digital diversification and white labeling services, Campbell said that ARN had no major plans for the latter, and was getting on quietly with the latter.
“We are developing our digital platforms behind the scenes and we've seen strong digital growth this year. But the reality is that advertisers first and foremost demand strong audience numbers and we will see the benefit of our position this uear in both revenue and profit,” he said.
“Advertisers want to know their messages will reach big audiences. We could create spin around digital, but the fact remains it is a volume game.”
Cambell added that the “goal is to maintain spend levels going forward” and predicted that this year's trends would carry on into 2015.
“Australian radio is a tough market and next year is only going to get more competitive.”
SCA: A simple plan
Southern Cross Austero chief content officer Guy Dobson would not be drawn on what it might have in the locker for the 2Day network, but said the company was happy with the way the Sydney show sounded, if not the ratings. That made the plan for next year “simple”, he suggested, “to get those stations pumping”.
He said SCA's diversification plan was on track, and that its digital platforms are “lightyears ahead” of anyone else in the market, a result of investment in its digital department over several years.
“Clients increasingly want more than just spots and dots. They want some social solutions, they want brand integration that we can provide for them a so that they have eyeballs as well as ears,” Dobson said. “We actually compare ourselves to publishing companies like Yahoo,” he added.
Dobson hinted at some “big ticket deals” in the offing for the new B2B whitelabel streaming product, Songl Solutions, that SCA is touting to workplaces, but would not be drawn on detail.
Overall, he said it was an "uneventful" survey with no major winners or losers.
Nova: Baby boomers swinging smoothly in Sydney and Melbourne
Despite Nova's SmoothFM experiencing a drop off overall in both Sydney and Melbourne, losing -0.5 and -0.2 percentage points respectively, Nova Entertainment, group program director, Paul Jackson remains bullish about the newest station in its stable.
“This is the first book of the year where we've seen a 0.2 decline, that's almost margin of error stuff,” Jackson said.
“It's still very much up there in people minds, as a business it's going brilliantly. In Sydney, where I live, I hear it all the time, in shops, in cafes, so we do feel like it's going great. It's ahead of many of its key competitors, in Sydney it's got double the audience of 2Day FM.”
In the tale of two cities, SmoothFM in Sydney saw the demographic 55-64 tuning into the station with the age group experiencing a 2.2 percentage point increase, while in the 10-17 age bracket there was a drop of 2.8 percentage points.
However Melbourne saw the exact opposite, teens were turning on Smooth, with the 10-17 age bracket increasing 1.5 percentage points, while the 55-64's lost 3.1 percentage points.
Jackson didn't think it was a trend. “These two stations are always out of [kilter] with each other by one book,” he said.
“We've never had both doing the same thing at the same time going the same way, I guess the only thing to say to that is market dynamics, I suppose. I don't think there’s a rhythm or reason between one city and the next. When we look at the big picture, broadly it's stable.”
When it comes to Sydney, Jackson said that there's no reason why its breakfast show featuring Fitzy and Wippa can't take it to the likes of KIISFM in the future.
“The breakfast show is back to exactly where we think it should be, I think it's a seven share plus breakfast show and it's great to see it back to that,” he said.
“We've seen this play out time and time again. Sometimes you move forward and then you get drawn back a bit and so on, when your only three years into a show like that you're still establishing them amongst the other shows.”
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