Headlines

CNBC reported on Friday that the music streaming service is now open to being sold and is willing to have discussions with SiriusXM. CNBC reported that SiriusXM is expected to pursue a deal.

(Bob McCurdy) This week I worked on several pieces of key long-term businesses that were targeting W25-54, one of which was a nationally known grocery chain. The challenge in this particular market with this specific station was twofold: to overcome “rank” and a heavy male skew. This required building a case for the importance of the total audience -- women and men.

(By Ronald Robinson) While swapping some emails discussing the business of copywriting, my friend – he of the “Old School” – and I, of the, shall we say, “Whizzy, New, Advanced and Superior School,” were promoting very different approaches. Cranking out listenable and more effective scripts for our trusting advertisers was the stated, desired outcome.

It’s the giving season, and radio just keeps on giving. This time it’s Alpha Media Mason City, Iowa, raising $32,000 for Children’s Miracle Network with a radiothon, November 16-17. Mason City’s Kids Helping Kids campaign played a big role =.

The stations – WXMA, WDJX, WGZB, WMJM, and WGHL – raised an incredible $890,000 from the marathon, November 17-18. They broadcast live from Norton Children’s Hospital, which was also the beneficiary of the radiothon. In a nice touch, each station took the name of a child treated by the hospital.

Radio's number one advertising category had a pretty good month thanks to deep discounts and Black Friday. The 3.7% increase in sales over November 2015 translates to a rate of 17.87 million vehicles on an annualized basis. The strong month puts the auto industry on track to break an all time record for sales.

Listeners across the country can now get a free taste of iHeartRadio's two new on-demand services: iHeartRadio Plus and iHeartRadio All Access. The official launch of the products will be in January, but iHeartRadio app users will have an opportunity to sample the two new products over the next 30 days. iHeart hopes being able to save songs from live radio, replay them at will and have unlimited skips will give the company an advantage over all other streaming companies now in this space. The question is will consumers pay $5 or $10 per month for those features?

(By Laurie Kahn) Many of us remember the style of interviews that were done in the ‘90s and early 2000s: Tell them how hard the job is and try to scare them away; if they come back, consider hiring them. Unfortunately, even with a tight labor market, many managers are still scaring away people who could be solid candidates and potentially successful in sales.

(By Tracy Johnson) Tracy Johnson is president and CEO of the Tracy Johnson Media Group. We stockpiled your questions, shipped them off to Tracy, and he delivered the kind of information you’re going to want to print out and tape to your studio window.

The overnight show is hosted by Jon Grayson, and Westwood confirms the syndicated version of the program will be history January 1.