(OP-ED) FCC Hear FM Engineering Proposal

7-2-14

Last Tuesday, Carl Haynes of WRTM-FM and I had the tremendous privilege of meeting with FCC Commissioners Mignon Clyburn and Ajit Pai to discuss a pending engineering proposal before the Commission that could allow for hundreds of Class A FM radio stations to double their effective radiated power levels. The plan would also permit certain stations to realize specific service improvements to their signals without interfering with the protected contours of other facilities.

The commissioners, along with their respective chiefs of staff, were presented with a letter of support for the proposal, which was co-signed by 134 broadcasters representing 616 stations (see the letter online at http://www.wyab.com/petition/). The supporters of the plan are quite diverse, including single-station owners and large-group operators alike, NAB board members, LPFM managers, and even stand-alone AM licensees.

It was clear that both commissioners and their staffs are genuinely concerned with the signal reception problems that often plague small broadcasters.

SSR Communications, Inc., licensee of WYAB 103.9 FM in Flora, Mississippi, co-drafted the petition with the Minority Media and Telecommunications Council in 2012, filing the request formally with the FCC in January, 2013 (view the petition in its entirety at http://apps.fcc.gov/ecfs/comment/view?id=6017160905). The Commission has yet to issue a formal Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, despite broad support for the idea.

If adopted in full, the proposal would create an intermediate power class for stations located in Zone II (generally, those licensees located in rural states). Situated in between FM Class A and FM Class C3, the new FM Class C4 allocation would allow eligible stations to specify a maximum effective radiated power level of 12,000 watts from a reference antenna height above average terrain of 100 meters. The petitioners found that approximately one-third of all Zone II Class A FM stations may be eligible to apply for the C4 class, corresponding to many hundreds of upgrade opportunities for small broadcasters.

The petition also asks the Commission to allow operators who propose specific service-area improvements to protect certain under-built neighboring stations to their actual signal contours via Section 73.215, rather than hypothetical maximum contours, provided that the affected under-built station has operated below its class maximum parameters (or equivalent thereof) for the immediate preceding 10-year period.

Given the many hundreds of stations that could improve their service areas, millions of additional potential listeners added without interference to existing stations, the economic benefit of funds allocated to new transmitters, antennas, consultants, FCC attorney fees, and every other positive aspect associated with this proposal, it is time for the Commission to bring this petition out for comment and issue a formal Notice of Proposed Rulemaking without delay.

Matthew Wesolowski is the general manager of WYAB 103.9 FM/Flora, MS.
He can be contacted at: 601-201-2789 / matt@wyab.com

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What Else Is In The Clyburn AM Radio Proposal?

9-18-2013

Up until Cyburn's proposal Wednesday, the Commission had been throwing AM operators a few crumbs.

They were small technical enhancements that had very little impact on how AMs could compete with the sound quality of FM, digital and other forms of clear sounding audio. They simplified licensing procedures and technical requirements -- including allowing ?moment-method? modeling, which can save licensees over $100,000. The Commission also granted experimental authorization for all-digital AM operation and improving protection to AM stations from potential re-radiators and/or pattern disturbances. Nothing on the scale of getting all AMs sounding like a crystal clear FM. Here are the other enhancements Clyburn proposes in her plan to revitalize AM.
-- Relaxing the AM daytime community coverage rule to allow existing AM broadcasters more flexibility to propose antenna site changes.

-- Relaxing the AM nighttime community coverage standards, which will also provide broadcasters, who may have difficulty finding suitable sites, relief for towers, and
directional arrays.

-- Eliminating the AM ?ratchet rule,? which requires an AM station to ?ratchet back? its nighttime signal to reduce interference to certain other AM stations. The rule, while
intended to reduce nighttime AM interference, has instead discouraged service improvements and has apparently resulted in a net loss of interference-free, AM nighttime service.

-- Permitting wider implementation of Modulation Dependent Carrier Level, or ?MDCL? control technologies, which allow broadcasters to reduce power consumption and allowing AM stations to implement MDCL operation by simply notifying the Commission, rather than having to seek experimental authorization or waiver. Modifying AM antenna efficiency standards by reducing minimum effective field strength values by approximately 25 percent, thus allowing the use of shorter AM antennas.

Clyburn did not give specifics on what happens next other than the commission would be taking comments.

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(SALES) The One-Page Proposal Clients Love

8-16-2013

After you?ve thought about the way your client answered your seven-question client needs analysis regarding his advertising and marketing efforts (click here for that article), you?re ready to put your conclusions and recommendations into proposal form.

My favorite proposal format is what I call S.O.S. (Situation, Objective, Strategy), a one- to two-page, easy-to-read summary of what I?ve learned from the client, combined with my recommendations on a creative campaign and a weekly budget. The S.O.S. proposal looks similar to a business plan summary, the short synopsis of the 40-pages-long business plan that you would put together when applying for a business loan.

Here is an example of the S.O.S. proposal:

Situation: Locally owned Cutler?s Nursery is steadily losing business to national and regional box stores The Home Depot and Lowe?s. Cutler?s strategy up to this point has been newspaper and Yellow Pages price couponing but that is proving to become unsustainable. Cutler?s gross margin of profit is 60 percent after the cost of merchandise: plants, pots, fertilizers, soils, gardening supplies. Average sale is around $60 but the average customer comes in two or three times per season. So the average customer is worth $60 x 2.5 = $150 per year.

Objective: Cutler?s goal is to gain a minimum of 17 new customers per $1,000 per week spent in advertising ($60 average sale x 2.5 visits per new customer = $150. 40 percent (client?s cost of merchandise) of $150 = $60. $1,000 divided by $60 = about 17.

Cutler?s would like to get out of the price war with the box stores and would like to begin selling value over price.

Strategy:  We at WXYZ recommend implementing a long-term broadcast strategy we call ?To Tell the Truth.? We will make unscripted commercials based on the things Mrs. Cutler and her loyal customers have to say on why it?s in the best interest of Southwestern Michigan consumers to do business with her store instead of the box stores. These commercials will include the following talking points:

1. The soil in our area is highly acidic and many common plants don?t survive here. Cutler?s doesn?t sell plants that don?t grow well in our area. Store employees are all schooled in what grows here and what doesn?t. Who knows what the box stores are selling, and how well educated their employees are?

2. The Michigan unemployment situation is dire. Mrs. Cutler says, whenever possible, she only buys from Michigan growers so that jobs stay here in Michigan. The box stores are known for buying plants from out of state.

3. Cutler?s has plenty of parking at the doorstep and Cutler?s employees help you load your vehicle with your purchases. At the box stores, you usually have to park a block away and you load up your purchases yourself.

4. Cutler?s prices really aren?t that much different from those in the box stores.

5. Cutler?s contributes money to local charities like Safe House for abused women.

Besides these talking points, Cutler?s now has the bully pulpit to discuss virtually any topic in a natural, unscripted tone of voice, the same way they would talk to customers in the store. Topics would include, for example, teaching consumers what plants grow best in shade and which ones grow best in full or partial sun. Or, what plants use the least amount of water. Or, how to properly prepare planting beds in our region.

This campaign is designed to do several things at one time:

? Educate consumers. Educated people buy more than uneducated people. When people are educated, they perceive greater value and are willing to pay more.
? Catch fish now. People will shop for gardening supplies this week. They may already have the box store in mind. We believe our creative strategy will persuade many of them to come to Cutler?s instead.
? Branding. There are those not ready to buy this week or this month. But when they are ready, they should already know to go to Cutler?s instead of automatically going to the box store.
? Controlling public dialog. As far as our audience is concerned, Cutler?s people are the experts. The campaign raises the bar on how a gardening store should operate.

These vignettes of natural conversation will be edited. Complete recordings can be done with an i-Phone, transferred to YouTube, and linked to her website.

Cutler?s telephone number is currently 451-6509. But 37 PLANT (377-5268) is available as a redirect and 377plant.com is also available from godaddy.com for $11.99 per year. It?s easier to remember and easier to type than cutlerspotsandplants.com. ?Call us at 37 PLANT or just go to 37plant.com.? Every time they mention the website in ads they further reinforce the phone number and vice-versa. We will help get the number and the new URL and our tech person will set up the redirects.

Schedule. We recommend that Cutler?s owns their category on the station, with 10 commercials per day Wed.-Sun. as discussed.

Cost per week-$XXXXXXXXXX.

There you go. A nice proposal that shows that you?ve put original effort into a better plan for their success than the plan they were previously using. It will serve as your notes during your presentation, so you?ll sound better organized. The S.O.S. keeps you on topic. ?He with the agenda controls the meeting.? Most importantly, the proposal is designed to help you draw out any objections the client may have.

Many of my friends in sales management love this approach to proposal writing because the S.O.S. provides a window into precisely what their salespeople are actually pitching, or not pitching, to local, direct decision-makers.

Management can also use S.O.S. to turn chronic whiners into creative problem-solvers. Instead of solving every problem for every employee who walks into your office, you could say, ?Hmmm?Do me a favor and write me up an S.O.S. on that and then we?ll talk about it.? Hahaha! Now you?ve got them solving their own problems. If that?s not better than a slap across the belly with a wet fish, I don?t know what is.

Paul Weyland is a broadcast sales trainer, author, and hired gun. Budget to bring Paul to your market. You can reach Paul at 512-236-1222, www.paulweyland.com or at paul@paulweyland.com 

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