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John Sebastian thinks it can because he says of The Wow Factor. “The Wow Factor will attract multi-generational (family) listening, meaning that listeners both younger and older will find it appealing.” That’s what Sebastian told Richard Wagoner of The Los Angeles Daily News who wrote a column about Sebastian’s idea.
Sebastian tells Wagoner that demo is getting the short end of the stick when and radio stations are missing out on a lot of revenue. “Sure, there are stations that boomers listen to, but that’s more of an accident. Most stations try to attract a younger audience, some go for an older audience, and boomers will tend to listen to those stations because they like radio and it’s the best they have. But no one programs directly to them. And yet they are the group most loyal to radio.”
READ THE REST OF THE STORY HERE AT RadioInk.com
CHEK OUT WAGONER’s COLUMN HERE.
Sounds like an idea similar to the old CHQM-AM which ran for many years (1959 – 1993) with staff-chosen LP’s and singles. That led to produced material under the title, “Memory Music”. The station was eventually sold to Chinese operators and the format was changed to foreign language.
A second attempt at staff-chosen music was made when AM 1040 started in 1993. For a variety of reasons, the music took a back seat to midday talk shows after yet another ownership change. That led to the format’s demise when the station was again re-sold to sports interests and became known as TSN 1040.
Best wishes to John Sebastian and his “Wow” factor.
This sort of sounds like Evanov Media Jewel radio stations. They play a good mix of 60’s-80’s music throughout the day. In the evening they revert to the Lounge with MOR standards, mix in some instrumental and jazz cuts as well.
In the daytime they are much more daring musically than the new “Breeze” formats that sprung up in the US and a few in Canada. They are less repetitive than the Breeze format and handle cancon gold better in my opinion. Just seem to have a much larger playlist overall than Breeze.
Zoomer radio 740 in Toronto would also be a station that would gear itself to the 55-70 demographic and they do pull in decent ratings and definitely have a different assortment of advertisers that you don’t hear on other stations.
This sounds like the reason a 75 year old radio station is swirling the bowl. NWs format and ownership were at the top of the ratings and seemed untouchable. They have always appealed to an older demographic. For some reason (change of ownership, change of direction, loss of common sense) NW decided that leading in the ratings was no longer good enough. They needed to attract the younger target demo. Sadly they didnt bother to research what a younger demo listened to. AM radio had lost the battle with the FM signal and was about to be decimated by the world wide web. They were blind to the fact that the demo that still listens to AM radio is an older crowd (55-72 and older)
Go figure?