The Straight Skinny

 

 

Babble On BA

More alternate approaches to music programming

 

 

By Carol Archer

During 15 years at R&R, I interviewed Allen Kepler innumerable times and spent countless hours in other conversations with him. I recall one of many discussions in particular, after BA instituted one-on-one "face offs" with listeners. He found himself repeatedly "humbled and humiliated" and forced to change his mind as a result, when P1s demonstrated more openness to new music than active, griping callers, which resulted in greater receptivity on the part of a handful of programmers. Sometimes face-offs reinforced that BA was doing things right, but if not, he said adjustments were applied in those markets.

 

 Kepler frequently reiterated the fundamental mission of product-testing, and developing and marketing the format, allowing BA to follow the audience and take the station into the future faithfully without taking too many risks, as they must, but also to lead listeners – not in a direction they don't want to go or to get too far out in front of their tastes. These findings afforded further perspective on where the customer was -- right then. But those were the days of diary methodology; PPM is another story altogether. This is a Nordstrom format in today's McDonald's economy.  Last week, I queried Kepler on whether BA had been sitting on its hands, instead of acting on the PPM M-Score data referred to in his letter. His answer: an emphatic "no."

It is great to see actual reactions tracked from meter carriers on a weekly basis; to interpret the data, we are tracking the reactions over several weeks and taking into consideration only songs that are receiving enough airplay to give a statistically stable result.

– Allen Kepler

"PPM M-Score data from RCS has only been available for a few months now, but PDs utilizing the data are seeing a new way to track listener 'tune out' to songs, talk content and even commercials in between research projects. While there is no clear or over-arching pattern established, it has been enlightening to see some new and unfamiliar music actually score better than some of the gold library. The 'hits are the hits' rule still applies for the most part, but it is great to see actual reactions tracked from meter carriers on a weekly basis; to interpret the data, we are tracking the reactions over several weeks and taking into consideration only songs that are receiving enough airplay to give a statistically stable result," he says.