Atlanta's Marketing Center

Atlanta's BIG Station - WVEE, V-103

What radio station in the Atlanta area has the larger number of listeners?  That would be V103, the popular urban station owned by CBS Radio.  The station's tagline is "The People's Station" owing to it's large and diverse audience.

The station has evolved over the years.  WVEE as we know the call sign today started out in the 70's as urban contemporary, playing disco for some time.  With the 80's and 90's came R&B and classic soul.  In 2000, the station changed to hip-hop full time to compete with its rivals HOT 107 and KISS 104. 

But each of these stations have their own niches, with KISS 104 serving the slightly older segment with a large percentage of females; HOT 107 with its younger (18-34) males; and V103 with a more mainstream 25-44 male and female distribution.  Adding a couple more stations to the urban "lifegroup" makes the urban segment (hip-hop/rap/r&b/soul) the largest in Atlanta...by far.

The niches help make advertising decisions easier as target markets and audiences are better matched.  And if you're looking to make the biggest splash around, then V103 needs to be on your list.

Excellent Advertising Tracking Tool

If you're smart enough to track your advertising results, then you know how challenging that can be.  About the only way to do it has been to ask the receptionist or whoever has been answering the calls to ask how the prospect heard about you then write it down on a slip of paper or tracking sheet.  Until now.

I recently discovered a tool that can help track all of your advertising and judge the effectiveness of the advertising medium.  Doing so allows you to redirect money, change messages, etc.  In short, it helps reduce the advertising waste that some studies say approach 80% of ad funding.

The company that produces the advertising measurement tool is called AdSymetrix.  The inexpensive tool allows you to track any kind of advertising imaginable...from print ads to website traffic to phone numbers on billboards and so on.  Once you provide some basic information up front, the tool will continually tell you the effectiveness and will assist in making decisions about which media is effective and which ones you need to scrap.

I highly recommend this tool as a means of continually improving your marketing approach.

It's all About Country - "Kicks" 101.5 FM

If you're wanting to reach a large mainstream audience, look no further than the most popular country station in Atlanta, Kicks 101.5 FM.

The station is owned by Citadel Broadcasting, which is ultimately owned by the ABC Broadcasting group.  Since one of the station's biggest competitors, "Eagle 106.7" FM, is also owned by Citadel, this "County Combo" boasts a very strong presence in the market.

The combo ranks a combined 3rd in the total Atlanta market behind V103 (Urban) and News Talk 750 AM (with Clark Howard and others).  The two stations also complement each other well.  Kick's format is contemporary country playing well to females particularly between the ages of 25 and 44.  Eagle's format on the other hand is classic country and does much better with older men (35+).

If you're looking for a very strong presence with a loyal audience in the Atlanta market, then you need to check into this country combo.  But with great ratings, realize that it won't be cheap.  Station headquartered in Marietta.

104.7 FM - The Fish, Contemporary Christian

One of the more popular radio stations in Atlanta is WFSH-FM, better known as "The Fish".  With the tagline of "Safe for the Whole Family", the station format is a combination of Christian pop and clean secular music, with a mainstream feel.  The most popular program is their morning show featuring "Kevin and Taylor".

The station boasts a 100k watt signal from Loganville, GA, 30 miles east of Atlanta. The signal is strong enough to cover metro Atlanta but fades out to the west pretty quickly...with a strong signal to the east which includes Athens and Gainesville.

While the station's listeners cover all demographic groups, the largest concentration is women between the ages of 25 and 54... and even more concentrated between 35-44, with a 6% share of the market.  Because of the station's relative position in the market along with its loyal listener base, they offer a reasonably-priced advertising option.  They are particularly well-suited for up-and-coming advertisers who need mainstream exposure and/or a strong complement to their existing advertising mix.

Contemporary Christian music has blossomed...and "The Fish" has certainly benefited from the rise, being the most popular and in the heart of the South.

2007: The Year in Search Engine Review

It's been quite an interesting year in search engine optimization.  And another fast one as things continue to evolve quickly.  The year saw changes in three distinct areas-

The first was "blended" search.  Instead of just providing the top ten links to HTML home pages for any search, the search engines started to provide links to news stories, blog posts, local business, directories and other things all in an effort to provide the most important information for the term typed in.  The response from searchers has been positive.  All of the "big four" (Google, Yahoo, MSN's Live and Ask) now show blended results.

Pay-per-click (search advertising) incorporated a measure of quality into their ad ranking algorithms.  It's not all about bidding for the better rank anymore.  By improving one's ads and aligning with the target page, an advertiser can be ranked higher than a potentially inferior ad.

Social media also took great strides with the emergence of Facebook, Digg, Duct Tape Marketing's Workbench, and others.  While the popularity continues to rise based on the relationship structure, there's no telling how robust these networks will eventually become.

All in all, it's was a quickly changing seo world this year.  I'll sum up how 2008 will shape up on an upcoming post.