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The Miami-Fort Lauderdale market, with 1.51 million TV homes, is eclectic and diverse. According to BIA Financial Network, 41.5% of the population is Hispanic, with another 20.6% African-American. Given its dense Hispanic population, it should come as no surprise that the No 1 station overall is Univision Communications' owned-and-operated WLTV, which has built a base of loyal viewers during its more than 30-year history in the market. Sunbeam Television's Fox affiliate WSVN was No 1 among the market's English-language stations in adults 25-54 during every newscast, and in prime time with Fox programming in May. Cable penetration in Miami is 70%, slightly above the national average of 67%. Comcast is the dominant cable provider and Comcast Spotlight serves as the interconnect, handling ad sales for itself, Bright House Networks, Adelphia and Atlantic Broadband. The two largest daily newspapers are The Miami Herald and the South Florida SunSentinel. Knight Ridder's Herald is the larger of the two, with a daily circulation of 325,032 as of March 31.
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MEDIA EXECUTIVES IN THE NO. 17 MEDIA MARKET AND HOTLY CONTESTED SWING STATE in this year's race for the presidency say advertising revenue has been robust so far this year, driven largely by political ad spending. Both campaigns and their respective activist supporters and national parties have funneled millions into the coffers of the local media in Florida.
The Miami-Fort Lauderdale market, with 1.51 million TV homes, is eclectic and diverse. According to BIA Financial Network, 41.5 percent of the population is Hispanic, with another 20.6 percent African-American. Given its dense Hispanic population, it should come as no surprise that the No. 1 station overall is Univision Communications' owned-and-operated WLTV, which has built a base of loyal viewers during its more than 30year history in the market. In 2003, WLTV won the NAB Service to America award for its collective work in the field of education.
On the news front, WLTVs Noticias 23 local newscasts ranked first in the May sweeps in all key demographics at 6 and 11 p.m. Univision Network's prime-time programming and Miami-produced programs on WLTV from 4-7 p.m. also lead the market, including El Gordo y La Flaca (The Fat Person and the Skinny One) from 4-5 p.m., which has been No. 1 for the last seven major sweeps, besting all other competitors including The Oprah Wmfi-ey Show on Viacom's CBS O&O WTOR-TV. WLTVs newsmagazine Primer Impacto (First Impact) from 5-6 p.m. also finished ahead of the pack in adults 18-49 and adults 25-54 in May. Sister station WAMI-TV launched as an affiliate of TeleFutura, a 24-hour, general-interest broadcast TV network, in 2001. Previously, WAMI had been the flagship station of Barry Diller's USA Broadcasting Network.
Sunbeam Television's Fox affiliate WSVN was No. 1 among the market's Englishlanguage stations in adults 25-54 during every newscast, and in prime time with Fox programming in May. WSVN put a new main anchor team in place about a year ago. Belkys Nerey was promoted to co-anchor at 5, 6 and 10 p.m. from co-host of Deco Drive, the station's popular, half-hour entertainment show at 7:30 p.m. WSVN entertainment reporter Louis Aguirre was tapped as Nerey's replacement on Deco Drive, which will unveil a new set and graphics next month.
WSVN, which has the market's longesttenured general manager, Robert Leider, with more than 20 years at the helm, has thrived by focusing intently on local news. It now produces 10 hours of local news daily that features an edgy, nontraditional style aimed at younger viewers. It has also been attractive to advertisers. WSVN, in fact, is the market's top biller, taking in an estimated $88.9 million in revenue in 2003, according to BIA.
NBC O&O WTVJ led the market's English-language stations in late news in May in both households and key demos (weekdays). Besides updating its graphics package, the station has made several important changes, such as revamping its morning news show Today in South Florida with weather and traffic updates every 10 minutes. The station's early-evening newscast at 5 o'clock was streamlined from two half-hour broadcasts to one hourlong program. WTVJ also runs The Ellen DeGeneres Show at 4 p.m.
Earlier this year, WTVJ welcomed back two South Florida TV veterans. Michael Williams was named weekend co-anchor at 6 and 11 p.m. He had worked as a national correspondent for NBC News the past two years but had been with WTVJ from 1993-2002. And Yvette Miley was named vp of news. She most recently served as vp of news and director of programming for NBC O&O WVTM in Birmingham, Ala. Miley worked for WTVJ from 1991-2001.
WTVJ is losing the host of one of its locally produced shows, the information/talk program The Rick Sanchez Show. Sanchez told the station last week he is leaving for another opportunity. Sanchez had once worked at WS-VN as an anchor, then left the market for a few years, returning last july to WTVJ. Naturally, the show is being canceled.
Sister NEC-owned Telemundo station WSCV in the May book was the fastestgrowing station in the market in household share, with an increase of 22 percent year over year at 6 p.m. and 29 percent year over year at 11 p.m., Monday-Friday. "As individual stations, we aim to serve our audiences in distinct ways that fulfill their specific needs. Yet, because of the duopoly, we also have a unique opportunity to share resources," says WTVJ president and gm Ardyth Diercks.
CBS O&O WFOR, which runs the four preseason Miami Dolphins National Football League games, is claiming its first late news victory in households Monday-Sunday among the general market stations in May. Michael Colleran, vp/gm of WFOR and sister UPN affiliate WBFS-TV, says WFOR is also seeing improvement in the mornings, where its news grew 60 percent from 5-6.
Last October, WFOR hired new primary male anchor Robb Hanrahan to co-host with Maggie Rodriguez at 5, 6 and 11 p.m. Hanrahan, who had anchored at WABC-TV, ABC's O&O in New York, since 1996, previously had worked at Sunbeam's WSVN. Former main anchor and veteran broadcaster Elliott Rodriguez now serves as noon and 5:30 p.m. co-anchor and host of the station's public affairs show CBS4 Sunday Morning, Colleran says the anchor changes were "an opportunity to showcase our veteran and our new talent in the highest time period available."
As for programming, The Larry Elder Show, The Insider, Dance 360, Life er Style and The Pat Croce Show will launch this fall on WFOR, along with reruns of Girlfriends and Fear Factor.
WBFS entered the 10 p.m. news race with a half-hour show in October 2001, then expanded it to a full hour in January 2003. Last week WBFS also picked up music entertainment show The Roof from Telemundo's cable network Mun2. The show will air Saturdays at 10:30 p.m. Besides news and entertainment programming, WBFS also has sports, including rebroadcasts of the Dolphins games.
Post-Newsweek's ABC affiliate WPLG welcomed new vp/gm Dave Boylan in june 2003. Boylan had served as vp/gm of News Corp.'s Los Angeles duopoly KTTV (Fox) and KCOP (UPN), and Fox Sports Net West. Also last year, WPLG introduced a new 5:30 p.m. anchor team, promoting Will Manso from sports reporter to news co-anchor.
WPLG is hoping for a winner in The Jane Pauley Show, which it snared despite there being an NBC O&O in the market. NBC Enterprises, the syndication arm of NBC, is producing Pauley, which launches Aug. 30. Also, WPLG in September will premiere The Tony Danza Show at 10 a.m.
Tribune Broadcasting's WB affiliate WBZL also underwent a leadership change, with Rich Engberg being promoted in March to vp/gm from director of sales. Ally DiPalma, previously national sales manager, was promoted to fill Engberg's post as director of sales.
Engberg says WBZL works closely with the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, another Tribune property. WBZL's half-hour 10 p.m. news has been produced by WTVL since it went on the air in 1996. This fall, WBZL will air Malcolm in the Middle and Home Delivery.
Fox Sports Net Florida is producing all 150 televised Major League Baseball games of the 2003 World Champion Florida Marlins this season, although 55 of those games will appear on Paxson Communications' WPXM.
Besides baseball, the cable sports network also carries the National Hockey League Florida Panthers and covers the University of Miami and the University of South Florida, among other area schools. Sunshine Network carries the National Basketball Association's Miami Heat and the University of Florida.
Cable penetration in Miami is 70 percent, slightly above the national average of 67 percent. Comcast is the dominant cable provider and Comcast Spotlight serves as the interconnect, handling ad sales for itself, Bright House Networks, Adelphia and Atlantic Broadband. The latter purchased Charter's system in the South Beach area this year. The interconnect serves 1.05 million subscribers-800,000 of which are Comcast subs-and inserts ads on 40 nets.
The two largest daily newspapers are The Miami Herald and the South Florida SunSentinel. Knight Ridder's Herald is the larger of the two, with a daily circulation of 325,032 as of March 31, down nearly 1 percent compared to the period ended a year earlier. The paper's Sunday circ rose slightly, to 447,326. Sister paper and joint-operating-agreement partner, the Spanish-language newspaper El Nuevo Herald, had a daily circulation of 90,480 and a Sunday circ of 99,618, both flat year over year. Executives at the Herald did not return phone calls for comment.
The Sun-Sentinel's Monday-Wednesday circulation in March increased 1.9 percent to 253,598; Thursday-Saturday circ was flat at 282,996, while Sunday circ was also essentially flat at 376,551 .While the Herald is strongest in its backyard of Miami-Dade County, the Sun-Sentinel dominates in its home base of Broward County (where Fort Lauderdale is located) and southern Palm Beach County (where it competes with the Palm. Beach Post).
The Sun-Sentinel prints a Broward County edition as well as a Palm Beach County edition. Kevin Courtney, Sun-Sentinel communications manager, says given the growth in Palm Beach County and the success of that edition, the Sun-Sentinel decided in April to capitalize on the future growth potential by investing additional coverage and staffing for that edition. Courtney stressed that the increased resources devoted to Palm Beach County would not detract from the Broward County edition.
The Sun-Sentinel has also been busy with its numerous multimedia cross-promotion and news partnerships, including its pact with its sister property WBZL and WTVJ. The paper teamed up with WFTL-AM, a 50,000watt All-News station in West Palm Beach, at die end of last year to further extend its brand.
The Sun-Sentinel decided to compete with the Herald on the Spanish-language front as well, launching the free weekly el Sentinel in 2002. The paper began with an initial distribution of 60,000 copies in Broward County. Now el Sentinel prints 95,000 copies, most of which are home-delivered. In April, the paper expanded into Palm Beach County.
The local radio scene, like the broadcastTV landscape, is highly competitive. One genre that has become even more crowded over the past year is Hip-Hop. On New Year's Eve 2002, Clear Channel flipped its Jammin' Oldies WMIB-FM to Hip-Hop and rolled out its on-air lineup in March 2003. The station shot to eighth place in die Winter 2003 Arbitron survey (it had been No. 20 before the format flip). WMIB is competing against frontrunners Cox Radio's heritage Urban station WEDR-FM and Beasley Broadcast Group's Rhythmic CHR WPOW-FM for young Urban listeners.
In late February, Clear Channel took the aggressive move to suspend Howard Stern from all six of its stations that carried him, including Classic Rock WBGG-FM in Fort Lauderdale. Although Infinity Broadcastinghas since picked up Stern's show on 45 outlets, none of them are in this market. It will launch on Alternative WPBZ-FM in West Palm Beach on July 19.
The No. 1 station overall (among listeners 12-plus) in the nation's No. 12 radio market is Miami-based Spanish Broadcasting System's Spanish/Dance/Oldies station WCMQ-FM. The station has seen its share increase steadily over the past two years. Most recently, it increased a full share point to a 6.0 in die winter survey from a 5.0 last fall.
Cox's Urban Adult Contemporary WHQT-FM is No. 1 in morning drive (12plus) with die syndicated Tom Joyner Morning Show, while WPOW wins afternoon drive. One station diat cannot be overlooked is actually in a neighboring market. Beasley's Country WKIS-FM, licensed out of Boca Raton in the West Palm Beach-Boca Raton market, tied for tenth place overall in Miami-Fort Lauderdale with two other stations, Univision Communications' Spanish/Tropical WRTO-FM and Spanish Broadcasting's Spanish/Romantic WRMA-FM. WRTO jumped from No. 22 place in the fall book to a three-way tie for No. 10 in winter. Uni vision's Spanish News/Talk WAQI-AM remains the only AM station in the top 10.
Clear Channel Outdoor and Viacom Outdoor are die largest providers of outdoor advertising in the Miami area. Clear Channel offers transit shelters, 30-sheets, 8-sheets, bulletins, premiere panels, mobile panels, taxi and mall displays. Viacom offers buses, bulletins, telephone kiosks and mall signage.
Copyright VNU eMedia, Inc. Jul 12, 2004