Lots happens in the radio industry each week so here’s a summary of the week we just enjoyed.

Here’s what happened

Let’s talk about advertising. Advertising pays the bills in radio a lot of the time, so it’s important to keep an eye on what’s going on in that market. The good news is Radio ad spend was up in 2022, so things are going relatively well.

Spend on radio ads was up 9%, but it’s important to remember we were stuck in a pandemic in 2021. As a result we can assume this is more of a correction than major growth, but still, it’s good to see.

• A total of €158.1 million was spent on radio ads in 2022, that’s up 9%
• We had a 20% boost in spend from retail. Every little helps and all that.
• Ads from the finance category were up 11%. It will be interesting to see what happens in this sector for 2023, with banks closing, will ad spend go down?
• Then we had the return of the industry’s that got hit during the pandemic. entertainment and media was up 53%, and travel made a great comeback, going up 54%.

It’s great to see things getting back to some level of normality, well, normality within reason. Trends have continued to shift, and ad spend on digital audio is continuing to grow at great pace.

• €125.6m came from traditional spot revenue, up 7%
• €27.1 million came from sponsorships and all those kinds of partnerships. OB’s etc
• And digital continues to grow hitting €5.4 million. These numbers don’t include big audio streamers, but it’s good to see this number growing.

That digital revenue needs to grow in the industry going forward, so let’s hope 2023 sees digital services taken more seriously. all the big brands have quality apps now, so 2023 is the time to use them.

It’s fascinating to look at who’s spending ad money and how. Radio looks to be in a good place, so let’s hope these trends keep going.

Read the story here

As we just saw, sponsorship has a huge part to play in the radio industry, and some stations are already off to a strong start for 2023.

Life pharmacy are the new sponsors for Matt Cooper’s the Last Word on Today FM. The deal includes stings and promotions to help promote the 95 pharmacies across Ireland.

meanwhile, Supervalue Insurance have teamed up with 2FM to sponsor Drive It with the 2 Johnnies. We don’t have much detail about the deal but it’s great to see.

It’s deals like this help keep media going, so hopefully the sponsors want to invest more in radio over the next year.

Read more on the Today FM deal here

Check out the tweet from RTÉ Media Sales here

Finally this week, a big congratulations to the team at Christmas FM for another successful year.

The team have a target of raising €1 million over the next 3 years as part of their magic of Christmas campaign. The campaign is a departure from the station’s traditional model of having a single charity partner each year. So what was raised in 2022?

A total of €294,706 was raised which is a massive achievement. Hopefully this will go towards helping those in need over the next year.

Very well done to everyone involved, and best wishes going forward.

Read the story here

Quick Bits

Dee Forbes has said credible media may die out if the government don’t reform the funding model

Did you know that 20% of ads from government agencies must now be in Irish?

Its4Women have been announced as Today FM’s traffic sponsor

RTE are adding to their collection of sports podcasts with a new running podcast

RTE have a problem with rats in the canteen

The head of the BBC has spoken about the cuts at BBC NI

Corks Red FM are hosting transition year students thanks to funding from the BAI

And that’s the summary for this week. Come back to radio land next week for more radio news📻 and be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram for extra stories.

Lots happens in the radio industry each week so here’s a summary of the week we just enjoyed.

Here’s What Happened

RadioCentre Ireland have launched a new ad campaign to promote the RadioPlayer App. the ad is the first of many for Radio Centre in 2023, with the campaign being developed by agency Boys + Girls.

The ad itself was created by audio design company folding waves, and is basically made up of audio clips from different radio stations, that when edited together can describe the RadioPlayer app. It’s all edited nicely as if someone was flicking through radio stations on the FM band.

It’s interesting to see the industry promoting RadioPlayer now when most of the main companies have already built their own audio platforms, but I guess anything that pushes radios digital transition forward is a good thing.

What do you think of the Irish RadioPlayer? Have you ever used it? Let us know on our Instagram story now.

Read the story and hear the ad here

RTE are trying to find a new sponsor for Drivetime time checks. So let’s take a look at what you get and how much it costs.

The spots air 6 times a day, informing the listener of the time at both Breakfast and Drive. This slot has a history of large brand attachments, with the likes of Centra and ExpressWay as previous sponsors. But how much will it cost? Well…

• 3 months come in at a cost of €50,000
• You can be shouting the time for 6 months for just €85,000
• And if you want the full year it will cost you €140,000

Obviously an expensive partnership, but one that might be worth it for a brand trying to reach younger audiences.

It’s always interesting to see how much these deals can cost, so hopefully we’ll see more sponsorship ads like this throughout the year.

Read more details here

Finally this week, radio presenter Dermot Whelan is going on tour with a new show to help people take care of their mind. Dermot turned to mindfulness after experiencing a panic attack a number of years ago, and now he’s teaching some of the science behind that as part of a stand up comedy show.

Mindfulness is one of these things people either love or hate, but it’s really cool to see a radio presenter creating a stage show that’s trying to do good

Dermot has spoken about his experience in the article linked below. If mindfulness is for you it might be of interest.

Best of luck to Dermot on the new show from us at Radio Land

Read the story here

Quick Bits

Michaela Hayes is taking over daytimes on Spin

Limerick City community radio is back for another 100 days

Corks Red FM is celebrating 21 years on air

RnaG has a new series on the way about the Irish State

Mairead Ronan is starting a new podcast with Jenny Kelly

Applications for Irish Music month have started showing up ahead of March

A radio presenter from Northern Ireland is taking over hosting Countdown on Channel 4

And that’s the summary for this week. Come back to radio land next week for more radio news📻 and be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram for extra stories.

Lots happens in the radio industry each week so here’s a summary of the week we just enjoyed.

Here’s what happened

This week was budget week. There wasn’t a massive amount for independent radio stations, but let’s look at some of the stuff that was announced for the wider media industry.

• The BAI has been allocated €7.5 million in order to fund the transition to the new media regulator, Coimisiún na Meán
• €6 million is available for a new courts reporting scheme. It seems media organisations can apply for this much like Sound And Vision funding, but it will be available on a platform neutral basis, so not just radio and TV.
• RTE is getting €15 million in recognition of the increase in over 70s who don’t pay for a tv licence, as well as the recommendations from the Future of Media Commission
• TG4 has got its biggest ever budget increase of €7.3 million. This will help fund a new Irish language kids TV Channel that they plan to launch in 2023.
• Finally the big one, Zero VAT on newspapers (physical and digital). From a radio point of view it will be interesting to see if News brands invest in podcasts more now that they have a more stable funding stream. We’ll need to wait and see.

So overall not too bad, of course one could always want more, but at the same time this was fairly okay as budgets go.

The increase in the budget for RTÉ will hopefully give a boost to their radio stations, and the fact that we are getting a new kids TV channel can only be good news.

It will be interesting to see if someday we get zero vat on radio ads, we can dream.

Let us know what you thought of the budget by tweeting @RadioLandIRL on Twitter

Read the details here

Everyone knows that movies and musicals have some great music, but often that music is never heard on radio. Movies & Musicals with Aedín Gormley on Lyric FM is an exception though, and it’s now available for sponsorship. So how much does it cost?

Well, the show is 3 hours each Saturday, and has an audience of 64,000 people. If a brand wants to be a part of that, they will have to pay…

• €11,000 for 3 months, a relatively low price for a brand wanting to find its feet in Radio sponsorship
• €18,000 for 6 months, that’s just 3 grand a month.
• €30,000 for the year. Really not bad value considering the listenership

The sponsorship also includes some promos across the station which will give the brand further reach.

This really is the perfect sponsorship for a streaming service or cinima chain. Your hitting a hard to reach audience without paying an insane price.

I look forward to seeing who the next sponsor for the show will be, I’d imagine this could be sold fast given the shows niche.

Read the story here

As we mentioned earlier, the BAI will soon be replaced by a new regulator, Coimisiún na Meán. The Irish Examiner had an article this week questioning how the complaints process might work for this new commission.

As of now the BAI is responsible for regulating Irish radio and TV broadcasters, but the new regulator will also be responsible for online platforms such as social media.

Could giving the public the ability to report content directly to Coimisiún na Meán result in an avalanche of complaints two big to handel? And how would this impact the regulation of traditional media organisations?

It’s an interesting thought, we are likely about to see a lot of changes in how media is regulated and funded in ireland, so it’s going to be a really interesting time ahead.

I’d recommend reading the article linked below. We’ll need to wait and see where all this lands in the next few months and years.

Read the article here

Quick Bits

A community station in County Clare returned to FM Broadcasting

96FM and Live95 presenter Shane Bucks has got engaged

Today FM are giving away shopping at Lidl

A new radio documentary on Dundalk FC aired its first episode on Dundalk FM this morning

The BBC have launched a podcast telling the story of a Dublin murderer

The Irish Times had a very detailed interview with the 2 Johnnies

And that’s the summary for this week. Come back to radio land next week for more radio news📻 and be sure to follow us on Twitter and Instagram for extra stories.