Alpha Flips on GeoCasting

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Back in April of 2020 Alpha Media’s Director of Engineering Mike Everhart urged the FCC to expeditiously modify its rules and approve the geotargeting technology being proposed by GeoBroadcast Solution. That all changed yesterday.

In a new letter to The Commission Alpha claims that GeoBroadcast Solutions had not been honest about how much it will cost stations to install the technology. Alpha’s original support for the technology followed testing it had been doing on WIL-FM in Union Grove, Wisconsin.

GeoBroadcast Solutions is asking the FCC to modify its rules that would allow FM booster to target programming and ads to smaller communities for up to 5 minutes per hour. The NAB has come out strong in opposition to that request, claiming interference and loss of revenue from other stations.

Alpha CEO Bob Proffitt says its turnabout on the technology is based on its familiarity with the GBS technology and the cost to deploy the technology. “GBS has not been transparent with the Commission about the costs of deploying ZoneCasting. Instead, GBS has briefly mentioned “some additional one-time capital and annual operating costs” and made vague assertions that GBS will offer some kind of vendor financing to small broadcasters.”

Proffitt says the estimates of $51,000 for upfront costs and $59,000 in annual recurring costs that GeoBroadcast quoted the company would be significantly higher. He said those estimates do not include additional significant expenses for the actual booster equipment. And, Proffitt says because most stations are automated, to deploy the ZoneCasting technology, those automation systems will need to be upgraded or replaced.

Proffitt concludes that the investment necessary to deploy the technology would be out of reach for small and mid-sized broadcasters.

In response to Proffitt’s comments to the FCC GeoBroadcast spokesperson Robert Udowitz said, “Alpha Media claims that geotargeting technology is too expensive. This is incorrect, especially because we have creative vendor financing solutions for station owners like Alpha Media. Moreover, geotargeting is purely voluntary, meaning Alpha Media doesn’t have to deploy the technology if it doesn’t want to. So from the FCC’s perspective, the only question is whether the technology is in the public interest. The record makes clear that it is.”

1 COMMENT

  1. I’m not an engineer, but after more than 50 years of seeing new technology be adopted -and rejected, this whole Zonecasting issue seems to be right up there with AM Stereo (of which I was an advocate and introduced in 2 markets on 2 very successful stations), Quad FM and IBOC digital. In an email to a friend -just today, I explained (unsolicited) my opinion and only mine. I’ve budgeted for enough radio stations to know that hidden costs will come to the surface when this is all an open book.

    1. “Mixed signals”. Much of today’s radio listening is done in the car. Traveling from one “zone” to another would undoubtedly cause an overlap, or a switching (or both) of booster signals. One station here operates 3 boosters and unless you’re staring at the radio, when it switches you don’t know it. We also have 3 signals on 103.3. Different signals. One is a super-powered FM from Santa Barbara, one is a 250 watt translator for iHeart’s sports station and one is a 15 watt translator for a 1000 watt AM religious station. They appear to be about 10 miles apart – but where we live, the Santa Barbara signal fights with the Sports Station. The effect is that both signals are unlistenable. Imagine hearing 3 of them fight with each other. That’s kind of the effect we might expect with “Zonecasting”.

    2. 2, 3, 4 different spots running at once? – I know it’s extreme, but in an ideal world a station with 3 “boosters” could Zonecast 4 different spots to 4 different areas. This is more difficult than running, say -a Bills network where you’re running local spots on the local station and “network” spots on the network. Been there, done that with carts and switching console outputs. Today you’ve got to have a “Zonecast” digital service that would offer up the different files to the different boosters. Would that be more complicated than the typical Wide Orbit/NexGen/Audiovault/Playout One system? I would think so. Configure it wrong-and you’re in makegood territory at best.

    3. The above digital delivery configuration could possibly affect #1 as well. We’ve all heard online radio stations switching from the local spots to the “online” spots. Originally with Clear Channel the transition was horrible. With CBS later on, the transition was only stupid with spots/talk sets being upcut and dropped. Spots 2, 3 and 4 would have to be identical in length to spot #1 -or you’ve got upcuts, dead air, spots being cut off..well, ya know.

    4. Production costs? Who’s gonna produce all of this? That would be 4 different spots -and if this were actually a successful endeavor, the 5 minute rule might mean up to 20 different spots running per hour. (They’re claiming to want 5 separate minutes per hour for this Zonecasting thing). Do production people have enough to do these days without having their workload multiplied 4 times ?

    5. Return on Investment. Exactly how much audience does each booster cover? If you have 10,000 listeners, 3 boosters you can assume that 2500 people per “signal” (1 main, 3 boosters) would exist. However the booster wouldn’t have the same power (coverage) as the “main” signal. One station here has 4 boosters ranging from 30 watts to 200. The main signal is 50k. Try to ‘splain that to your advertisers. The 30 watt booster doesn’t cover more than 96,000 people. The station has a 33,000 cume for the entire county of 2 million people. So, if the cost per point is $35, the station has a 1.65 rating -overall. So they could (theoretically) charge $58 per spot on a full market coverage, a 30 watt booster signal could be 3.95. I’m sure someone would come up with another wonderful formula and this is very basic.

    6. Return on investment 2. Ibiquity came up with a brilliant plan for “HD” radio -which allowed broadcasters to license the technology. Most HD radio in 2022 makes exactly ZERO money. In 2014 CBS did a deal for our HD2 channel to run one spot per hour-and no one knows for how much. “Zonecasting” won’t be free. Stations have to build and operate the boosters. The local sports station with 4 boosters was hoping to get better coverage for The Padres rights. Their current transmitter site is about to go away –

    I’m all for technology-that would enhance the user experience. This is answering a problem that really doesn’t exist, especially for small broadcasters. In an era where content is king, a broadcaster would be better served to spend the money on talent that will engage its audience and bring better results for the advertiser it already has. My math here may not be the best example, but in its simplest form, Zonecasting can only benefit the company that’s going to license the technology. It’s my opinion -based on my experience. Zonecasting’s response to Alpha is interesting. “If you don’t like it, don’t use it.”

    Not really sure they’ve made their point in how this technology will serve the public interest. Moreover, how will it serve the needs of the broadcaster?

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