Marketing a new classical music station

Here is the third article in our series adapted from contributions to the Association of Music Personnel in Public Radio’s e-mail list. In this installment, General Manager Douglas Evans and Marketing Manager Jason Hughes discuss their promotional campaign for a brand-new all-classical station — Miami’s Classical South Florida.

In October 2007, American Public Media officially started broadcasting on WKCP 89.7 in Miami/Fort Lauderdale and on 101.9 in the Palm Beaches. Since the demise of commercial station WTMI, South Florida had been without a radio station devoted to classical music. While there are two other public radio stations in the South Florida market, only WKCP broadcasts classical music 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Moving into the 12th-largest market in the United States was a bold move made just before the economy began to deteriorate. South Florida is one of the three hardest-hit areas in the United States. The purchase was finally approved in March of 2008, which is when the staff of Classical South Florida moved into the station’s original offices. Prior to that, General Manager Doug Evans was responsible for reviewing the business and marketing plan, securing real estate for the new studios and hiring staff necessary to ramp up the operations of Florida’s newest public radio station.

One of the largest challenges was to build awareness of our station in what is a very large and Balkanized area. It is a fact that residents in South Florida don’t generally leave their area to attend events in other parts of the region unless it is a performance that will not in the near future come to their local community. This is further reinforced by the fact that most communities either have their own performing arts centers or one is currently under construction. While these centers are of various sizes, there are three large centers that serve most of the population. One of them, the Broward Center for the Performing Arts, is one of the busiest in the United States. Another complicating factor was the issue of reaching the “snowbirds” (seasonal residents) and “snowflakes” (residents who come and go throughout the winter) before they left around May 1.

So the first question was how to reach our potential core listeners on a cost-effective basis. This led to strategic partnerships that required little to no cash coupled with targeted media buys. The first purchased media started in March 2008 in the Playbills of the three large venues with ads that would run for the final three months of season prior to the “snowbirds” and “snowflakes” leaving the area. I also identified some performances in the region of classical music groups where we could not only sponsor the events but have a high-profile presence via curtain speeches by me or one of my colleagues. We also secured any chance we could to distribute our program guides. Prior to this, the only way anyone knew we were on the air was to find us accidentally on the radio or by word of mouth.

The good news was that, using these guerilla tactics, we raised our cume from 121,600 in March to 127,800 by June. And once we began our full-blown marketing campaign in September 2008, our cume would eventually hit close to 190,000 by the end of the following season. Here is how we did it.

From a marketing perspective, we believe our messaging, branding and visual experience has to reflect a progressive classical music station in a community with varied backgrounds, interests and ages. This is not your grandmother’s classical music station. We are vibrant, exciting, inclusive and multi-generational. Therefore, our marketing vehicles must adapt to target a tri-county, multilingual and active community.

We present ourselves and our brand visually through the “It’s Alive” campaign. The messaging is clear — we are here, we are alive, and we are all-classical. The verbiage “It’s Alive” captures the energy and excitement of having classical music back on the airwaves in South Florida. The artwork and ad campaign showcases the quality, beauty and creativity of the product offering while localizing and personalizing the brand experience for new listeners and members. Capturing nuances of climate, the way of life, ethnic diversity and specific reflections on the South Florida lifestyle further enhances and solidifies our foundation within this large community.

For the launch of CSF in early 2008, the station relied primarily on word-of-mouth advertising tactics, a one-hit acquisition campaign, targeted print buys in arts and culture publications, local papers, and regional magazines.

In September 2008, CSF began our first major marketing push with targeted media buys in South Florida including print, television, outdoor and Internet. This push was repeated for six weeks in January 2009 in order to maximize limited resources and the fluctuating local snowbird population. Reaching out and meeting our audience and potential listeners was key to ensuring that the community knew we were here to stay. Classical South Florida participated in and sponsored more than 30 events in South Florida including the Miami International Film Festival, Delray Beach Arts Festival, Winterfest 2009 and Festival Miami. More than 25,000 program guides were distributed, and more than 30 advertisements appeared in various programs through trade opportunities. 450,000 pieces of targeted direct mail were sent to hot Zip codes throughout South Florida. Our staff has spoken at numerous corporate and community events representing CSF, and various articles have appeared in South Florida media in print and online.

In September 2009, CSF will build on our record-setting cume by expanding our reach into other local markets while continuing to reach out to the core arts and cultural communities in South Florida. We will be geo-targeting small pockets of engaged communities through targeted community advertising. Local magazines have committed to cover stories reaching 25,000 direct-to-home deliveries of their respective publications. Our belief in out-of-home advertising is supported by an active “driver-friendly” population that is always on the go.

Mass marketing on commercial television continues with our exclusive radio/TV severe-weather partnership with ABC Local News 10 (WPLG) and other arrangements with public and private television broadcasters. CSF plans to attend and/or sponsor more than 40 events in the community this coming year including more targeted niche events. Our co-marketing relationships continue with New World Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, The Playground Theatre, Broward Center for the Performing Arts and the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, to name only a few. By combining existing partnerships, leveraged media buys and event-based marketing, Classical South Florida is well-positioned for another successful year with an overall increase in listeners, members and underwriters.