Pure greed indeed @jason120au
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I really donât understand why commercial radio is so focused on making money.
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They already play personalised ads in their scheduled breaks at least 3 times for approximately 4 to 5 minutes in each hour which is more than enough. I would say excess and the breaks are too long causing people to change stations. Pre-roll ads are unnecessary. If people are aware that they will receive a Pre-roll ad each time they start the stream and donât necessarily engage with the 3 ads they have on rotation it doesnât engage the listener as much as they think it does.
If you stop and start the stream continuously which used to stop the preroll ad you will see there is only 3 ads on rotation maybe 4 which is completely stupid and is nothing but annoying. Do it properly and have several ads on rotation not just 4, so you are guaranteed a new ad when you start the stream which can be frequently if your connection is unstable.
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SCA and Ace Radio does not have pre-roll ads on their stationsâ live stream yet, but it will be a matter of time before they do.
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so that they can make a bigger profit and a better return to shareholders!
Not rocket science is it?!
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yes, I think he was being sarcastic
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I have had Smooth on in Perth since 6:30 this morning. Iâm impressed. Kate Mac sounds good. The way itâs all been put together sounds like Sydney & Melbourne but Perth.
I might steam Brisbane and Adelaide and see if sounding as schmick too.
Kudos Smooth FM.
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Listening to a bit of Nick Michaelâs in Brisbane yesterday. 3 songs between talk breaks and very brief. Nick sounds professional as always
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I listened yesterday and it wasnât great for me. Perhaps itâll improve with time.
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Yes I think so, but solo breakfast shows hardly win ⌠Depends on what expectations they have.
Will smooth get higher ratings than say BH or BC ???
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Doubt it, if they had a FM frequency in Brisbane theyâd have a better chance. But DAB and online only? Forget it.
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Doesnât smoothfm own rights to just the name smooth?
It seems silly calling it smoothfm in other markets where theyâre not on FM.
Is it to save on voice tracking, marketing & production?
Itâd sound better just to call it smooth.
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Possibly because people have a tendency to associate FM with radio. So they hear FM and think âthatâs a radio stationâ rather than what us enthusiasts would think âit must be on the FM bandâ.
Although I agree itâs usually. Even in Melbourne they could easily drop to FM and just be smooth. Nova seem to manage without FM in the name.
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They tend to ID on air as Smooth Brisbane, or just Smooth. Some sweepers still say Smooth FM.
Mind you it doesnât bother me if they call themselves Smooth FM even though theyâre only on DAB. Iâve been listening to AM and FM almost exclusively via DAB for years.
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12:25am, Smooth is playing Britneyâs Oops! I did it again.
Why? How is this âsmoothâ?
Has the ghost of Novaâs own Wacko Jacko infiltrated the music scheduling?
Followed by The Policeâs Everything little thing she does is magic.
Why?
Smooth is lacking any level of sophistication. Sounds like a one station market, jumping all over the place.
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That reminds me, I think I heard Smooth play Bon Joviâs âLiving On A Prayerâ earlier in the week and thought how âun-smoothâ that song seemed.
Maybe they should change their name to âLumpy FMâ since itâs not so smooth anymore.
In relation to that Britney song, that doesnât seem so bad.
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The Mediacorp stations in Singapore used to do pre-roll ads a few years back. They had realised how dumb the execution is (especially if a stream disconnects/buffers), and has stopped this practice. I havenât heard any pre-roll ads for the past year.
However, they do have the personalised ads in the ad breaks on the internet stream (started around 2020), which seems jarring to me compared to the FM broadcast. The internet ads are not properly aligned with the FM ads (to me, the FM broadcast is the âoriginalâ broadcast). You can hear 1-2 seconds of the beginning/ending of the FM ads before the internet ads kick in.
Also, sometimes they do not have enough spots for the internet ads, which will cause the system to play a generic station promo multiple times instead. The internet stream provided a worse listening experience compared to the FM broadcast, which does not have this nonsense.
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I have to agree - Smooth appear to use Triton Digital (streamtheworld URLâs) and that is possibly where the pre-roll ads originate. I noticed Triton offer personalised ad breaks via their technology as well.
Most of the commercial stations appear to have changed from running their own Shoutcast or Icecast servers to using outfits like Triton which you can run via a plug-in in most radio automation systems - just a modern version of outsourcing your transmitters.
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Indeed, sadly so.
Considering the previous rise in IT employees within stations, another concerning trend downwards in staff knowledge.
First the RF engineers are outsourced or simply not replaced and IT by design facing that fate faster.
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