Smart Speakers an Increasing Radio Focus, and Should Be Even More So, NAB Hears
LAS VEGAS -- Amid "disruption" by technology, owners of radio and TV stations and newspapers are eyeing overcoming challenges with smart speakers and new management strategies, executives told the NAB Show. Cox Media Group and Hubbard Radio are focusing on content for smart speakers, their executives said Monday. That people can listen to radio stations on smart speakers at home is helping the medium's return to households, those executives said. A day later, Edison Research Vice President Megan Lazovick recommended radio be more aggressive in such efforts.
Sign up for a free preview to unlock the rest of this article
Export Compliance Daily combines U.S. export control news, foreign border import regulation and policy developments into a single daily information service that reliably informs its trade professional readers about important current issues affecting their operations.
"It's no longer one to many, it's go where they are," said Cox Executive Vice President-Digital Strategy and Research Marian Pittman of radio audiences. "It is really radio's re-emergence into the home," she said of smart speakers. Hubbard CEO Ginny Morris said, "You needed a skill," such as for Amazon's Alexa, to "put radios back in the home," in the places they used to be -- kitchens, bathrooms, kitchens and such. If listeners can hear a station while doing other activities, "it's making it easy once again for the consumer to access you in their home," she said. "The numbers are really small, but they're growing."
Radio shouldn't be complacent about smart speakers, said Edison's Lazovick in a presentation Tuesday. Seventy-one percent of smart speaker owners listen to more audio after buying one and 64 percent of smart speaker owners said they would like that functionality in their car. Smart speaker listeners get used to the interactive nature of the devices and “are aching” to have that sort of interface in other places “once they get in the habit,” Lazovick said. That focus on interactivity means it isn't enough for radio stations to have their stations simply streaming on a smart speaker, she said. “The speaker has to react.” Radio stations could provide metadata to smart speaker providers so listeners could ask their speakers for song identification information while streaming, Lazovick suggested. “Radio should be creating smart speaker executions.”
Tech disruption in broadcasting, which panelists said is facing plenty compared with other industries, makes it harder to measure audiences, train staff and link brands like radio stations or newspapers to the content those media organizations produce. Cox and Hubbard are having younger, tech-savvy staff educate radio veterans in things like podcasting and social media. "There's a lot of reverse mentoring," Pittman said. "Our workforce has been tremendously disrupted by injecting new talent that doesn't do the traditional platform."
Over the top "is really disrupting us, in many ways" because of changes in how the company distributes content and links it to brands, the EVP said. It's "concerning, a little upsetting, when you can't get your full measurement" of audiences with new tech, she said. Morris said, "We've all come to terms that we have to meet the listeners where they are." She said "prioritization is really hard" in deciding what's "really critical to moving the business forward" versus "noise."
In other NAB Show news Tuesday, on ATSC 3.0: 1804100048; and on wireless mics: 1804100028.