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  • Breakfast Is the Most Important Meal (and Daypart) of the Day?

    • 03/02/2020
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country radio programming, Country ratings, Nielsen ratings
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    Many of us were brought up hearing this from our parents, grandparents, or a TV commercial: “Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.” While this may or may not be medically accurate, it is absolutely on the money (literally) for fast food restaurants. And it should be for radio too . So perhaps

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  • 20 Quotes, Paraphrases and Take-Aways from CRS 2020

    • 02/24/2020
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country radio, country radio programming, Talent
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    I pitch attending CRS all year. That’s because in my opinion, the Country Radio Seminar is the radio industry’s premiere learning convention. It doesn’t matter what your format is. But if you’re in country radio, you can quadruple the benefits. If I’ve counted correctly, this year was my 38th consecutive year in attendance. Apparently I was

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  • Formats with the Most Momentum Entering 2020 and why Country is Poised to Increase

    • 01/07/2020
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country radio, country radio programming, Country ratings, radio, radio programming, Radio Ratings
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    Each year since 2016 I’ve posted a piece about formats with the most “share momentum” entering the New Year. That is, formats that are seeing consistent growth and formats that are not. The data source is Nielsen’s Tops of 2019: Radio summary which reports leading formats (AQH share) in PPM markets from January to November.

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  • A&O&B’s Year End Music Rewind: 2019 Ends with Cautious Optimism

    • 12/22/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country music, country radio programming, radio programming
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    Each December for the past 26 years, A&O&B has released our Year End Music Rewind which includes music trends, our list of the Best Testing Songs of the Year and advice going forward. In last year’s report we predicted that 2019 would be the “set up” year for a musically stronger 2020.  Our Year End

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  • Christmas Music: How Much Do You Need? (Hint: Not a Lot)

    • 11/14/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: Christmas, country radio programming, Country ratings, Nielsen ratings, radio programming
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    Christmas music on the radio means it’s the least wonderful time of the year… for country ratings that is. Diary market Decembers are hit and miss for Country shares (often miss) while in PPM markets the Holiday Book are ALWAYS the lowest ratings periods of the year for country. How much lower? Using PPM data

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  • A Great Country Song Makes You Feel – Are You “Feeling” Ken Burns’ “Country Music?”

    • 09/23/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country music, country radio, country radio programming
    2 Comments

    As I write this there are four episodes yet to air. But even at the halfway point, it has been hard to watch “Country Music” and not feel something. But that’s how a show about country music should be, right? Because a great country song makes you feel. The Feel Sometimes a great country song

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  • 7 Showmanship Lessons from Blake Shelton

    • 09/18/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: Blake Shelton, country music, country radio programming, DJs, radio programming
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    We learn by watching and imitating. From perfecting a dance move to watching a YouTube DIY video, the process of observation and modeling is powerful. This struck me at a recent Blake Shelton show. Here was a master showman plying his craft so deftly that I was compelled to make notes. I shared 15 of

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  • #ChickenWars: Y’all Capitalizing?

    • 08/26/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: advertising, branding, country radio programming, marketing, radio programming
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    As your’e reading this, #ChickenWars is delivering the ultimate marketing fantasy. Imagine that your brand is being seen and talked about by hundreds of thousands of people. And that this social talk/exposure has not just raised awareness of your product but it has simultaneously and instantaneously resulted in a dramatic spike in your product’s consumption.

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  • 21 Things that Can Help or Hurt Your Time Spent Listening

    • 08/08/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country radio programming, Nielsen ratings, radio programming, Radio Ratings
    No Comments

    Spring 2019 ratings data from Eastlan and Numeris are out now and the last of the Nielsen diary reports hit desks next week. The three metrics most programmers will go to first are Share, Cume and TSL. It’s the latter that often generates the most conversation and sometimes the most controversy. That’s because there are

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  • Shark Week: A ‘Finny’ Thing Happened on the Way to the Marketing and Promotions Meeting

    • 07/29/2019
    • Posted by: Mike O'Malley
    • Category: country radio programming, marketing, Nielsen ratings, radio programming
    2 Comments

    Sunday, July 28th marks the beginning of the 31st annual Shark Week on the Discovery Channel. 31 years. Yes. I know. But strong ratings (39.4 million viewers last year good for 4th among 18-49 according to Nielsen) and a decade of buzz worthiness qualifies Shark Week as an actual “thing.” In fact it’s enough of

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