Sylvie Courtemanche, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Canadian Association of Broadcasters is pleased to announce the appointment of Andrée Noël as the CBSC’s new National Chair. The appointment is effective as of January 1st, 2012.
“Andrée is well known to the Canadian broadcasting industry. She was, for nine years, the CRTC’s Regional Commissioner for Quebec. She is well acquainted with all aspects of our industry and understands the importance of broadcast standards and the key role the CBSC has played over the last 20 years in the interpretation and application of the CAB’s broadcast codes.”
Read more here.
Today, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission announced that it is restricting the use of musical montages by two Francophone commercial radio stations.
A condition of licence has been imposed on Astral’s station CKTF-FM and Cogeco’s station CKOI-FM limiting their broadcasting of montages to no more than 10% of total programming per week.
A musical montage is a compilation of excerpts from a number of songs played without interruption. Although it may contain excerpts from several songs, a montage is considered a single piece of music for purposes of calculating the levels of Canadian content and French-language vocal music. Used properly, montages allow audiences to sample selections that would not otherwise be broadcast, or to discover new artists.
Read more here.
The CRTC has released a report on the much maligned Do Not Call List (DNCL) for the 12 months from 1 April 2010 to 31 March 2011. In that time 1.2 million numbers have been added to the list which brings the total to 9.5 million registered phone or fax numbers since the DNCL was introduced is 2008.
The CRTC have released their report on Broadband in Canada which shows that virtually all Canadians benefit from the availability of Internet access service, regardless of where they live, whether in urban or rural centres, or remote areas.
The number of Internet subscribers increased from 1.4 million in 2000 to 10.4 million in 2010. Over these years, Internet users have migrated from lower Internet access speeds to broadband speeds, (i.e. download speeds of at least 1.5 Mbps). By year-end 2010, 70% of Canadian households subscribed to Internet access service with broadband speeds.
Most provinces now offer some form of broadband to 98% of the population. Manitoba lagged behind at 89% and Nunavut only offers Broadand to just 27% of their population.
| Province | DSL | Cable modem | Fixed wireless | Mobile1 | All technologies |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| British Columbia | 91% | 87% | 73% | 98% | 99% |
| Alberta | 85% | 76% | 95% | 99% | 100% |
| Saskatchewan | 72% | 61% | 91% | 91% | 98% |
| Manitoba | 80% | 66% | 82% | 60% | 89% |
| Ontario | 89% | 83% | 93% | 99% | 100% |
| Quebec | 87% | 82% | 79% | 98% | 99% |
| New Brunswick | 80% | 71% | 48% | 98% | 100% |
| Prince Edward Island | 77% | 78% | 97% | 99% | 100% |
| Nova Scotia | 75% | 75% | 100% | 98% | 100% |
| Newfoundland and Labrador | 69% | 68% | 23% | 95% | 99% |
| Yukon | 90% | 62% | 0% | 70% | 100% |
| Nunavut | 27% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 27% |
| Northwest Territories | 41% | 60% | 0% | 62% | 89% |
| Canada | 85% | 82% | 82% | 96% | 98% |
Broadcast speeds are also increasing
| Province | 1.5 – 4.9 Mbps | 5 – 9.9 Mbps | 10 – 15.9 Mbps | 16 – 24.9 Mbps | 25-100 Mbps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| British Columbia | 99% | 91% | 90% | 81% | 69% |
| Alberta | 100% | 85% | 84% | 82% | 75% |
| Saskatchewan | 98% | 73% | 63% | 54% | 54% |
| Manitoba | 89% | 80% | 58% | 54% | 54% |
| Ontario | 100% | 89% | 85% | 81% | 72% |
| Quebec | 99% | 84% | 80% | 79% | 73% |
| New Brunswick | 100% | 81% | 72% | 71% | 71% |
| Nova Scotia | 100% | 79% | 71% | 50% | 50% |
| Prince Edward Island | 100% | 71% | 54% | 44% | 44% |
| Newfoundland and Labrador | 99% | 77% | 64% | 40% | 40% |
| Yukon | 100% | 89% | 62% | 62% | 0% |
| Nunavut | 27% | 0% | 0% | 0% | 0% |
| Northwest Territories | 89% | 82% | 52% | 43% | 0% |
You can read the full report here
Sean Luce is a respected Sales Consultant who uses 10 questions to review his daily performance. Sean told me that he actually laminated these and has them on his car’s dashboard and he uses them to critique his performance at the end of each day. As he drives home he mentally plays back the day’s events and asks the following questions:
1. Did I recognize someone today? How about a “Kudo’s” Card?
2. Did I make an impact today? What did I do to increase business?
3. Did I provide a blast of energy, excitement and electricity today?
4. Did I listen today? (Write down what I learned.)
5. Are my reps focused?
6. Is each member of my team meeting or exceeding my expectations?
7. Did I instruct or motivate someone to do his/her best today?
8. How many contacts did I have with my customers today? (None gets you a failing grade.)
9. Did I lead by example today? What specifically did I do?
10. Decide what one thing I’ll do tomorrow to make my team better than they were today.
Here are some reasons I asked myself those questions every night.
1. 25% of good people leave organizations every year because we failed to recognize or reward them. It’s hard enough to get good people in media sales. It’s a shame to lose good people and there is no excuse for it. Sometimes the simplest forms of recognition, like a “kudos” card, can give that rep an added boost and let them know that you appreciate their hard work.
2. When you impact business, you set the example for everyone else to follow. Being a general manager or a sales manager gives you a title and really nothing more. Yet, you can use that title to get in doors where some of your reps can’t go. Use it!
3. When I would walk the sales area, I always would make sure I complemented someone on what they were doing. Sales departments are direct reflections of their managers. If you are lazy and lethargic; so are they. But if you are excited and run around with a mission, then they will take that energy and focus into what they are doing.
4. Click here to read his article on listening.
5. You can tell by the way they work and their desire to hit their sales goals. Are they in the office all day? Your one-on-one meetings every week should give you some indication of whether they are focused or not. In today’s world, we sometimes need to be more than a manager or a leader. If you have 10 reps on your team, inevitably two or three of them are having personal problems. Having a psychology degree would come in handy, but that doesn’t mean you have to baby-sit. The acid test is, do they know what your goals are for the sales department?
6. First of all, do they know what your expectations of them are? In a lot of cases, our reps don’t know. Have you told them what you expect from them? It is simply to hit their sales goals? Or is it more than that? And if it is, what is it? Do they know what the discipline is for non-performance? How long will you allow them to miss their budgets? One month, two, three, six? Expectations are more than just monetary goals in my book.
7. Every day is an opportunity to teach and motivate someone on your staff. Going out in the field to coach my sales reps always has been the best opportunity for me to go one-on-one which is the best forum to teach and coach. It’s just you and the rep in the car, experiencing the call together. If leading by example is one of your tenants for success, then riding with them lets you know you practice what you preach. One-on-one meetings are great and sales meetings are good forums to teach. Coaching a rep in the field is better than 10 sales meetings.
8. If you as a sales manager are not contacting your customers, then what are you doing? Customer contact is vital. If gives you a pulse of what your people are faced with on the streets. It will also tell you what is important to customers. Bottom line, if you’re not making the calls as a manager (and this doesn’t mean you have to carry a list, then your salespeople will not be as motivated to make more than the minimum number of calls to get by. Show them, lead them and have them do as you do!
9. Some general managers and sales managers do have a list or handle national business for their media property. This is a great opportunity to lead by example by getting the highest rates for your company, not the lowest. Somewhere it was taught that managers could cut deals that they would not let their people cut. Remember, if you cut your prices, your reps will follow.
10. Some people take the bus depending on the market size. Regardless, when you are going home, ask this question and you’ll come up with one thing. Overnight, your subconscious has a tendency to work on this one thought so that the first thing you will be committed to doing the next day? Exactly what you thought about during your drive home. I love to drive. Some of my best systems and ideas came from time behind the steering wheel. Focus on that dominating thought and your team will be better because of it.
Sean Luce is the Head National Instructor for the Luce Performance Group and you can reach Sean at sean@luceperformancegroup.com
Radio advertising ranks second on a list of “most truthful” advertising sources, according to a new report commissioned by Advertising Standards Canada.
When it comes to meeting standards for acceptability and truthfulness, Canadians have the most confidence in traditional media – newspapers most of all, and far more than online ads. The majority said TV, radio and print ads are very or somewhat truthful – but just 47% said the same for online ads.
Advertising Media Most Truthful:
Newspapers: 74%
Out-of-home (billboards, etc): 69%
Radio: 69%
Magazines: 65%
TV: 64%
Online: 47%
“Online faces a higher degree of scepticism among consumers,” noted David Herle of the Gandalf Group, presenting the findings to an audience of media and advertising executives in Toronto last week.
The vast majority (79%) of Canadians surveyed said advertising provides them with value. Most Canadians (63%) said advertising is somewhat or very helpful to their consumer decision making versus 80% of Americans. Most Canadians (73%) said they have a favourable impression of advertising. A majority of Canadians (57%) said most advertising they encounter meets acceptable standards of truthfulness and accuracy and is not offensive. Only 19% said advertising provides no value.
When it comes to Politician advertising, almost half of all Canadian do not like attack ads and are turned off by them. Specifically, 48% of Canadians say politicians should never criticize their opponents in advertising and should only promote themselves.
But advertising deemed unacceptable has serious consequences: 89% of Canadians will stop buying from a company if its ads are unacceptable, according to the survey.
When consumers find advertising unacceptable, the most cited reason is misleading advertising (32%). The next-highest reason was advertising deemed offensive in some way, including sexist, sensational, degrading, vulgar, or stereotypical (22%).
What can we learn from this study?
The Gandalf Group undertook the study for ASC, polling 1,378 Canadians and 800 Americans for attitudes towards advertising. Advertising Standards Canada is the industry body that maintains the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards. The full press release on the new study, entitled Canadian Perspectives on Advertising, can be found here.
I have read two interesting books this month, one being the biography of Steve Jobs written by Walter Isaacson. I intend to share my observations about Jobs in the coming weeks, but I came across an interesting article written by Mel Taylor who hypothesised about what would happen if Steve Jobs ran your broadcast station. Mel 10’s suggestions are worth reading and you can find them here.
By the way if you have the opportunity to read the Steve Jobs book I encourage you to do so, as we can all learn not only from what Steve did well, but also the many things that he did not well.
OTTAWA-GATINEAU, November 15, 2011 — Today, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) introduced a new way for large telephone and cable companies to charge independent Internet service providers (ISPs) for the use of their networks. This wholesale billing model, which is based on capacity, will give independent ISPs added flexibility in offering competitive and innovative services to Canadians.
After receiving more than 2,600 written submissions from the public, and a public hearing held in July , the CRTC has selected two billing models that will give independent ISPs the flexibility to develop innovative business models.
a) Capacity-based model – which contains three separate components:
b) Flat-rate model – which contains two separate components:
“The net effect of it is that there will be no caps, no limitations, no metering of use for retail customers as a result fo this CRTC decision” said CRTC chairman Konrad von Finckenstein.
It appears that the CRTC focused their decision on the wholesale pricing ISP’s pay for network use, and not the monthly retail rates these ISP’s can charge customers.
What does this all mean? We think it means Canadian consumers will soon be paying more for basic internet services as the big phone and cable companies pass along access fees and usage fees. Canada already has some of the most expensive cell phone fees in the world, and soon we will be paying some of the highest fees in the world to access the internet. This will impact consumers who have switched to services such as Netflix to watch movies and TV shows. These services consume large amounts of bandwidth and this decsion today will allow ISP’s to charge consumers higher fees for using more bandwidth than they have purchased. We are hearing that this overage will cost anywhere between $1.90 and $2.35 per gig. To put that into content one Netflix movie will use over a gig of bandwidth.
Read the full CRTC decision here
At 2pm Eastern time yesterday (10 November) the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the FCC conducted a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System known as EAS. This meant that 14,000 plus radio stations, 10,000 or more cable television stations and the various satellite services were required to broadcast a 30 second test emergency message.
The EAS ssystem is a direct descendant of CONELRAD (Control of Electromagnetic Radiation), a military alert system created in 1951 because of the threat of a nuclear attack. Back then the US Government decided it needed a last resort means for the president to address the country in a national emergency. Then in 1963, after the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Emergency Broadcast System (EBS) was created by expanding the military system to include state and local governments. Finally, the system was upgraded and automated in the 1990s, and its name was changed to the Emergency Alert System.
But it is hard to believe that in 60 years this system has never once been tested and never been used. Even during 911 when the USA suffered its largest attack ever on home soil the EAS system was not deployed.
By all accounts yesterday’s test did not go well and many radio stations either did not get the tone, or got a message that cut out or was so distorted that it could not be heard. The EAS system uses a “daisy chain” approach in which a few dozen television and radio stations relay their signals to secondary stations, which in turn relay their signals to others. It appears that there were audio delays so by the time many of the smaller stations on the end of the feed got the signal they recived only a few seconds of the message or no message at all.
One broadcaster commented “Actually in the event of an emergency, local radio will step up and do a great job themselves, without the EAS or Government assistance. We did that on 9/11.”
FEMA report that the test was a success because it pointed out the failure points in the system. They also say there is a new system on the way, and they have plans to develop a redundant multi-platform alerting system. The agency’s ultimate goal is to have an integrated public alert and warning system that uses multiple communications technologies that can also send alerts over the Internet and directly to cell phones, as well as radio, television, cable and satellite.
Newcap have reported third-quarter revenue rising 12% to C$31.9 million, attributed to same-station revenue growth. Profit jumped 48% to C$4.3 million. The broadcasting division saw a 12% revenue increase to C$30.6 million, led by the Ottawa and Sudbury clusters.
“Double-digit revenue growth continued into the third quarter. This has translated into significant increases in EBITDA”, said President/CEO Rob Steele “Maximizing audience share combined with a great sales effort have been the drivers of these results and we expect positive performance to continue into the fourth quarter.”
