Brindle Media

This week, Donnie Simpson ended his career on broadcast after a 41 year career, 32 of those in Washington, DC radio. Donnie’s not the first nor the latest major morning show talent to leave the industry over the past few years. As the competition for advertising dollars becomes more fierce and the slices of the pie become increasingly smaller, traditional radio broadcasters have been looking for ways to cut costs.The introduction of Arbitron’s people meter and its real-time PPM ratings have influenced how management thinks about morning show talent. People smarter than me including Larry Rosin, Mark Ramsey, Alan Mason, Fred Jacobs and Jerry Del Colliano have commented on radio management’s interpretation of those PPM results and I’d encourage you to read their always insightful blogs.

The net result, however, is that talented personalities like Donnie Simpson will no longer be available on traditional radio. However, I suspect that this situation will actually work in their favor. These personalities are well-liked and trusted by their listeners. They are brands unto themselves. With a relatively small investment, they can work out of their home and create their own daily podcasts which their followers (Seth Godin would refer to Donnie’s listeners as his “tribe”) can access and listen to at their convenience. Businesses which achieved a positive return-on-investment (ROI) by advertising on Donnie’s show can cost-effectively target that audience by supporting his podcast. And he doesn’t have to share the revenue because he’s eliminated the corporate middleman.

A model for this approach is already in operation in Grand Rapids, MI. Dave Jagger and Geri Jarvis’s morning show was canceled in 2008. They launched their daily podcast last summer with financial support from a local bank that had been an advertiser on their radio show. It’s been reported that they’re getting 35,000 hits on their podcast download and over 18,000 daily visits for Dave & Geri On-Demand. It’s estimated that they’ll gross $ 100,000 for their first year. And, of course, they won’t have to share that income with station owners.

In the not-too-distant future, internet access will become ubiquitous on car dashboards. As happened when homes became cable-connected, during the next 10 years the playing field for broadcast radio, internet radio stations and podcasters will be leveled.

A study sponsored by the Association for Downloadable Media and presented this week by Edison Research’s Tom Webster shows that podcast listeners tend to be educated, affluent and receptive to sponsorship messages from trusted podcasters even though they hate advertising on commercial radio and TV.

Smells like opportunity to me.

(Thanks to Rit Ranger for suggesting this blog)

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