What Does a Top-Billing Station Sound Like?

One of the most attention-getting things about Hubbard’s WTOP Washington, D.C., yesterday was a promo that ran near the end of the hour. It was a testimonial from a listener who declared “WTOP is better than WAZE when it comes to traffic.”

Some stations have held on to traffic because it remains easily sponsored. Recently, a survey found that 33% of listeners still wanted traffic reports in the morning, despite their easy availability elsewhere. WTOP has clearly decided to fight for that franchise; the reports I heard in the 10 a.m. hour were usually around 1:15, exhaustive in a market where traffic is often exhausting.

WTOP’s big story yesterday morning was the Maryland Primary and Angela Alsobrooks’ decisive win over the better-financed David Trone. The breaking news was the assassination attempt against Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico, a story I did not hear or receive alerts on elsewhere. But I wasn’t listening to WTOP for the news.  

I was listening to WTOP on Wednesday, May 15 to hear the commercials, in anticipation of today’s BIA Top Billing Stations of the Year, a listing that WTOP again topped.  WTOP has not been immune from radio’s travails. Its 2023 revenue was $66.3 million, down from $69 million the year before. But it remains impressive. 

I usually hear radio spots through the filter of a heavy streamer, meaning that I can’t always judge the quality of a station’s local spots. Sometimes, I tape the stations I want to hear, sparing myself the long-documented annoyances of spot-substitution issues and a streaming fill song that I just heard on the air 20 minutes ago. But in recent years, I’ve had an increased sense that even the over-the-air experience has a lot of the same unavoidable national advertisers and underbelly ads — tax relief, injury attorneys, etc.

I wondered how the ad experience on the nation’s top biller compared to other stations. Beyond that, I grew up listening to WTOP. When I lived in New York in the pre-streaming ’90s, its then-50,000-watt AM signal was often a connection to home. Its successful move to FM has prompted numerous other stations to do the same over the last two decades. (One of the ironies of the congressional debate over AM’s future is the availability of three major N/T FMs in the market.)  WTOP is currently No. 2 in DC only to NPR affiliate WAMU; it always rates a Fresh Listen.

I listened to WTOP’s stream in the 10 a.m. hour, May 15. Here’s what I noticed:

• No injury lawyers.
• One tax-relief spot, a few others that sounded like network filler (e.g., the star registry), but no Lowe’s/Home Depot, Granger, etc.
• Only one insurance sponsor, but that was Progressive, which sponsored five of the hour’s six traffic reports and received a live tag.
• A lot of home-repair and realty spots — probably the most-heard category during the hour. One of those ads was a testimonial from veteran D.C. morning man Jack Diamond. I also listened to WINS yesterday and heard three spots in that category vs. about 10 on WTOP. WINS is, it should be noted, the nation’s No. 3 biller and up from $32 million last year to $40 million, following its move to FM. Sister WCBS-AM, meanwhile, returned to the top 10.
• Two automotive spots. Not a ubiquitous category in this hour, but more than I sometimes hear on other major-market stations. (On the other hand, I still hear small-market stations with several hard-sell car spots in a stopset.)
• Some quirky local spots, including one encouraging drivers to use the toll express lanes on I-66 and another for a local church’s upcoming Greek Festival. (The champion for local-event and civic advertising in my recent listening, however, remains Adult R&B KJLH Los Angeles, where those ads are part of the appeal.)
• A promo for Hubbard’s Federal News Network, as well as another spot promoting both a sponsor (Red River Cybersecurity) and its podcast in conjunction with Federal News.

Earlier this year, I monitored two major-market music FMs for both the quantity and quality of their commercials. As was the case then, ads on WTOP were mostly straightforward. One of the home-repair sponsors, the only one to appear twice during the hour, had a jingle. There was also a smile-inducing Barbasol spot I’ve heard elsewhere in recent days. The feel of the ads wasn’t hard-sell or sleazy, and the overall experience was fine. But they weren’t additive in that way.

You might expect the ads on a major all-news outlet to be inherently sober. That wasn’t always the case. Growing up, the most drily comic ads were often the ones I heard on WTOP or all-news WCBS New York, something I figured must reflect the sophistication of the audience.

In recent years, I’ve had the sense that radio spots were one more poorly tended area in which it felt like the industry was throwing its collective hands up, allowing little relief from tax relief. Listening to the spots a little more in recent months has made me feel better. (I have, in particular, noticed a lot less graphic medical advertising.) I hear more high-quality ads than I expected; I hear stations trying to minimize the impact of hard-sell legal. If the spots were to also entertain, they could contribute to an experience that sets broadcast radio apart from streaming.