A sad part of all this is I think smooth has made its mark in Melbourne and I’m sure the majority of listeners will not be switching from 91.5FM to 1377AM.
… but I am quietly hopeful that some listeners realise the smooth of today is not the same smooth that launched in the market …
Having sampled 3MP’s format yesterday, I found that personally it was not my cup of tea and I would pick Smooth ahead of 3MP. However that does not mean it is a bad format - duplicating another station’s format seems a rather pointless exercise to me.
To me the tough bit for 3MP will be creating awareness beyond mediaspy and industry news websites. Given the go local feel of 3MP and ACE’s limited budget, I suspect initial advertising, if any, will billboards along the Mornington Peninsular. No matter the quality of the product, if no-one knows its there, it will be hard to get listeners.
ACE no doubt has a long standing agreement with 3AW given the content provision for ACE’s heritage regional stations. On a sales front, I would assume that ACE’s St Kilda Rd offices have some sales staff based there attempting to obtain network sales on behalf of all ACE stations. Presumably these sales staff occassionally came across a potential Melbourne only client that would have been informally referred to 3AW in the past - maybe the 3MP advertisers are some of these. Pure speculation.
I’m loving the format I listen online from Dunedin, New-Zealand I dip in & out so not to get hung up about same songs etc
I am proud that a heritage callsign can make a comeback in 2020 a real feel good story imo
Magic and 3MP both revived in recent months. Who would have thought.
Agreed. Their biggest challenge is spreading the word beyond what we all know.
With social posts like this, they’re definitely hitting the right people… so long as the right people eventually see it!
ABC producer James Findlay has found a likeness between the new 3MP logo and that of ABC Classic 
Nothing alike.
What page is it on?
Thanks for the creative template @Radioistillluoveyou
Page 18
Its great they advertise!
If only 2sm would and 2ue did the same a bit (especially UE given they own papers and TV) . Have some more exposure.
Had a listen to the 3MP Breakfast show thing morning. Observations were:
Jon and Julie are somewhat live - or at least pre-recorded this afternoon - there were references to lockdown events that happened over the weekend. They had a single 2 minute break in the 5:30 half hour (which could have been prerecorded last week - they simply introduced themselves), with 4 breaks in the other hours (total time of 5-7 mins per hour).
Most of the content was pretty vanilla, promoting the other announcers and ways to listen, but they did have a call to Jon’s father (veteran broadcasters John Vertigan) and the owner of Peninsula Curtains and Blinds (3MP’s first advertiser in both 1976 and 2020).
They made references to being in the same studio, but as far as I can tell Jon lives in Warnambool and Julie in Traralgon. It would be hard for most listeners to tell, but it did sound like they could have been in different studios - it just seemed to lack that speed that comes with announcers being in the same room.
No listener interaction, besides a couple of references to people commenting on Facebook. The studio phone number that was listed on the website on Friday has now been removed.
As expected, the list of advertisers is still quite small. Peninsula Curtains and Blinds, CARAC Caravans in Dandenong, David Barke Appliances in Rosebud and Tobin Brothers Funerals are the main advertisers - all located on or near the Peninsula. Anytime Fitness, 7-Eleven, Coles and Nissan had sponsor spots around the news and weather. A few other advertisers with less frequent ads - all with a presence on the Peninsula - including a couple of retirement villages.
The connection to the Mornington Peninsula is strong - lots of references to the Mornington Peninsula’s 3MP. It actually sounded weird hearing traffic for the whole of Melbourne.
News is taken from 3AW, using the live satellite feed. There was small glitch before 7 which meant Zetta was playing everything 2 seconds too late until it reset at 9am - which mean the news intro overplayed the start of the news. The 7AM bulletin also failed, giving about 20 seconds of dead air until some instrumental music played until they got back on track with the weather at the correct time. It sounds like the weather is read by someone at ACE, not 3AW. (As a side note, David Armstrong was reading the news for 3AW - gee he’s so slow at times it’s painful to listen to!)
Lots of promos for how to listen on a smart speak - at least 2 per hour.
True, but 3MP’s not a Full On Commercial Station for Melbourne outside the Mornington Peninsula & South-Eastern Suburbs as Listeners in the CBD, Northern & Western Suburbs and even Geelong would’nt pick up the 1377 Frequency as it will clash with 3CW on 1341 and there’s a lot of Drippy Ballads that would’ve worked well as a Radio Format back in the 90’s, but it’s 2020 & an Easy Listening Format Like That covering just the Mornington Peninsula would’nt cut it for them Anymore.
There’s Smooth Relax on DAB+
and how many of the grey brigade have digital radios?
ACE Radio needs to learn from Nova Entertainment’s Smooth FM. Mike and Jen work well together. Mike Perso has good listen Interaction. He tells people to ring in onto 13 59 50 for smooth favourates and stuff.
Percentage wise probably a lot more than teenagers. All of my friends who are 50 to 70+ have a digital radio.
Ugh no mention of DAB. I don’t get it…
