Classical in Houston All Digital

Houston Public Media has sold KUHA to a Christian Broadcaster

This Could Be the End

Moving KUHA's Classical programming to the web where it will be lost among hundreds of other digital services and to HD2 will result in low listenership and low loyalty.

I realize this is an opinion...but how many HD radios are out there? It takes a few 100 thousand listeners to generate enough listening to result in enough members to support a public radio station in a major market. Is the Houston market saturated with HD radios?

Houston Public Media bought KUHA from Rice University in 2010 for about $9 million. Houston Public Media's classical service was moved over to KUHA in hopes that it would be able to support itself as a stand alone service. That did not happen as Houston Public Media struggled to service the debt on the loan used to but KUHA.

Now the college radio audience and the classical audience both lose.

You can read more about the sale here...

Houston Public Media Completes Sale Of Classical Station KUHA 91.7 FM To KSBJ

It's Not There!!!

A Listener's Rant

I went to tune-in to  my local public radio station to listen to a daily news and interview program, but it wasn't there. Because I wasn't able to tune in at the start of the hour...there seemed to be no explanation as to what happened. Not tuning in at the beginning or end of an hour is pretty typical of listeners.

So...I'm left to wonder.

When to comes listener loyalty...that's a bad idea. Loyalty is based on habitual listening habits. When a listener wants Morning Edition, it should be there. When a listener wants to find All Things Considered...it should be where it always is. The same goes for local programming.

Consistency

Consistency leads to listener loyalty. Loyalty is important when it comes to AQH and Share...and membership dollars. Keep messing with the listener and your giving him or her an opportunity to tune away.

The special in it's place was pretty good, but I didn't hear any promos for the program. They're easy to miss. To reach half the audience in a week...optimum effective scheduling is needed. That could be as many as 64 spots in a week. If the special is important enough to bump regular programming, perhaps effective promotion might be in order. At the very least, producers could have created announcements for the breaks with horizontal promotion to the next "Where We Live," or a reassurance that the program would be back.

A daily program that has built an audience should be there well...daily. The best way to build audience and loyalty is by consistently meeting the listener's expectations. It might take a little extra work, but the rewards are worth the effort.

Okay...I'm done.