Posted by John on July 15, 2015 at 16:56:09:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Format change coming? posted by Paul on July 15, 2015 at 15:15:43:
I think it's an over-simplification to say sports stations don't care about ratings. Of course they do. There may be a higher tolerance for low ratings given the low cost to program the station (and the eroding value/worth of many of the AM stations running these formats), but if owners think they can improve ratings (and revenue) with a different format, of course they'll flip.
1670 wasn't killing it ratings-wise before the flip to sports, but given all the 0.0 books, I do wonder whether Midwest made more money with the old news/talk format or the current sports format.
iHeart has picked up a couple different FM translators in Madison over the last few years. Not sure why Midwest hasn't made a similar effort to get a translator for 1670 (iHeart's 100.9 is a better Madison FM signal than Midwest's 106.7 out in Mt Horeb). Just seems (from the outside) like a lot of laziness at Midwest. It's a shame.