If you’ve never listened to Saga Communications CEO Ed Christian’s earnings calls before Tuesday, you might think he dabbled in Russian vodka himself before getting into his quarterly numbers. This time around Christian peppered CFO Sam Bush with questions about Russia. Has he taken money from the Russian government? Has Bush ever been approached by Russian government officials? Was he aware of any Russian bots causing fraud in advertising? The only thing Bush copped to (jokingly) was having a bottle of Russian vodka in his freezer.
So what was Christian’s point with all of this?
After grilling Bush like he was a star witness on Capitol Hill, Christian said his point was not to be afraid of the things we do not know or understand. He said it’s hard to complicate radio. “Write compelling copy, run it with frequency, and people will be happy. For decades radio has been about relationships with clients. We specialize in that.” Christian was telling people not to be overcome by the chatter of big data.
Christian went on to say that radio is about simplicity. “We get mired in other stuff like trying to target left-handed men who drive Jaguars. Radio is about reach and frequency. It’s about branding products.” He said radio is his garden and he’s a very happy man. “We know what we do and we focus on it every day.”
Saga owns 75 FM’s and 33 AM’s in 26 small and medium markets. The company has churned out a cash dividend for 14 quarters paying out over $47 million to investors over the past 5 years.
