TV vs Radio

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I was going to post this as a comment on the Aly and AJ thread but I thought I'd give it its own post. I have to admit this is founded not at all in any kind of fact! Anyway here is my theory:

If yr a radio playlister or researcher your main desire is to stop people switching over: a lot of people stick to a single radio station and don't channel hop much so if someone switches over or off you might not get them back for a while. Video channels are far more accepting of switching, because TV users channel hop more.

So imagine songs being scored on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 meaning "awful, would switch off/over", 5 meaning "terrific, would stop channel-hopping if I found it", and 2-4 being various degrees of like/dislike which cause no immediate behavioural reaction. Obviously you want the songs on your playlist to have as high an average score among your listeners as possible. But on radio you want to minimise the 1-scorers, and on video channels you want to maximise the 5 scorers. If a song like Aly and AJ has 2/3 "5" and 1/3 "1" reactions, it will have a higher average score than a song with all "3"s but will be a much bigger risk for a radio station.

And I think Aly & AJ IS that kind of song - the way it starts so breathlessly, it's in-yr-face with its poppiness and if you dislike teenpop in general I'd guess you'll find that less palatable than "Gimme More" or "About You Now". So even beyond the demographics there's a reason why it might hit on video and not radio.

Speaking of demographics, I guess Radio 1 and other stations must have a very firm idea about what age people start listening to radio regularly, and I would imagine that average age is getting nearer and nearer to the age they start driving. I get the impression that Radio 1 has basically given up on yr actual kids, which makes them much less likely to take a chance on something with kid appeal.

Comments

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

I played PBS when DJing with Keith in a bar in August and the hipster friend of the guy who booked us ran over and said 'wow this is great I only just downloaded it last night'. i.e. the audience for Aly & AJ in UK = people like us and not the people we think it is aimed at.

Incidentally both times we DJed I was able to play sets which ran together female-fronted new-wave guitar teenpop and indie seamlessly (e.g. Pink, The Sounds, Hilary and Haylee Duff doing 'Our Lips are Sealed', Sahara Hotnights, Kelly C, Love Is All, Paris). This confused various folk as they recognised e.g. Pink, but could not place it once recontextualised.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Well the current audience for Aly & AJ is people like us, obviously! But unlike, say, Annie or Roisin, where the wider audience is a hoped-for potential*, Aly & AJ have (or had) a more proven audience in the US who are "people we think it is aimed at".

*though, you know, Robyn at #1, there IS still a big market for pop but pop that plays it cool rather than bounces about, maybe?

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

yeah if robyn proves anything it's that the smart pop people are playing it indie with their image.

aly & aj are at the furthest possible point from what is cool at the mo, wrt image. that's all it is :-/

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

am trying to think of a reliably successful pop act without a credible 'image' right now who ISN'T a veteran a la Britney/GA, and all I can come up with is Fergie (who hasn't ever really had r&b/hip-hop credibility unlike Amerie, Ciara et al) (but who is more successful than either!)

[koganbot]

JoJo

[koganbot]

[retype]

aly & aj are at the furthest possible point from what is cool at the mo, wrt image.

Are you sure? Why are they the ones (in comparison to others I've been incessantly championing such as Ashlee and Taylor and Kelly C.) who are hitting a chord with poptimists?

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

I suspect Alang is right. What slightly baffles me therefore about the A&A marketing campaign in the UK is that the record company didn't hedge its bets and aim to appeal to the pre-teen market, and in particular kids who bought Hannah Montana / HSM, as well as mainstream pop fans. It seems such an obvious thing to do to me. This is probably why I don't work in marketing :)

On a similar theme I was surprised that Woolworths weren't even stocking their single this past week. (They did have the 'Samanda' single, even though that hadn't charted yet.) Surely you'd want Woolies to be all over this song like a rash.

[koganbot]

Did Phil Of The Future, the show where Aly was a supporting character, have any success in Britain? Without such a hit, how does one aim for the pre-teen market? (And the campaign may well be going after those kids. I'm not in position to know. Why do you think it's not?)

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Never heard of that show! (Which doesn't mean it's not a success on one of the satellite channels)

In Britain you would get yr song on the video channels and you might well just advertise - I've noticed a lot more adverts for records lately (the wretched Newton Faulkner for instance)

[koganbot]

Well, PBUS has gotten onto the video channels, right? Hence this thread?

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Yeah - this was why I advanced the HSM-as-problem argument above. PBUS is on the right places but not finding an audience - one reason might be that the audience now demands the kind of context HSM gives them as an ingredient in their pop, and PBUS as an independent object can't compete.

[koganbot]

But another way to look at this is that despite lack of either a Disney or a grownup context, PBUS is nonetheless getting attention, perhaps on its musical merits! (Compare to the almost-as-good "He Said, She Said," by Ashley Tisdale, who does have HSM context but isn't breaking into the UK market at all, and so far except on TRL isn't breaking into the U.S. market either, though in both instances the marketing may be just getting underway. The Tisdale album went mostly unnoticed back in February but is getting a "deluxe" version rerelease now, with Tisdale releasing three new videos [including the reshot vid for "He Said, She Said"].)

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Yes, at no point (I think!) have I said "oh, #22 for Aly and AJ is disappointing" - it's a lot better than I thought it would do, if you'd asked me a few months ago. I'm just exploring Lex's original question, as to why it hasn't been a bigger hit.

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

I suppose we shouldn't rule out the possibility that it hasn't peaked yet! I know most singles peak at their chart position in the first week of physical sales but if it's finding an audience in spite of a lack of promotion in the "right" places, maybe it will do even better as word of mouth spreads. [/optimist]

I am disappointed that R1 hasn't playlisted it though. You'd think they would be curious as to who's put the song at #22.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I think the Feist single now in the top 10 was physically released in August! though of course she had an advert to boost sales.

Looking peaky

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

I watched approx 4 hours of Hits!TV yesterday and saw 1 (one) advert saying 'Potential Break-up Song on sale NOW!' (if it makes any difference this was during a McFly pop music marathon top 100 countdown: plenty of Kylie, Britney, Rick Astley, Take That, Spice Girls - er which is why I was watching but ANYWAY). The other 'buy this music' ads were generally repeated every single ad break (Orson, Jack Penate, David Jordan, Roisin Murphy).

But yes - peaks and troughs. Climbers in the charts this week: Rihanna, Fedde Le Grand, Plain White Ts, Gnash, Mark Ronson, Babyshambles, Enrique, Girls Aloud, J-Lo, will.i.am. There's still hope.

Re: Looking peaky

[mcarratala.livejournal.com]

On Thursday PBuS was on The Hits daily rundown as the 8th most played song.

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

So I probably shouldn't have said "but not finding an audience" - it's not finding an HSM size audience.

[koganbot]

But on the other other hand (I'm probably up to four by now), we don't really know who's in that audience. It might be all kids. (Btw, my not paying attention to places like iTunes, is it easy or difficult for Brits to download legally download stuff that's only available in the U.S.? I'm wondering if the fact that PBUS has been available in the U.S. for a while means that enough people already have it to suppress its first-week dl "bounce." Also, are British airplay figures available online?)

[jeff-worrell.livejournal.com]

To answer Frank's question in parentheses: I can't be sure it's not, but have seen scant evidence of this. There was one Breakfast TV appearance I'm aware of, which would attract an audience of mixed ages. The other bit of promo I know about was supporting Sugababes at a G.A.Y. (http://www.g-a-y.co.uk/) club night the other week.

The tie-in movie in the US ('Super Sweet 16', which includes Like Whoa and PBUS on the soundtrack) hasn't been screened in the UK yet.