Ferial Haffajee
JUST before dawn on August 1, Kaya FM will take to Gauteng’s airwaves and promises to tackle the contested radio terrain head-on. This station wants to be the voice and preferred listening zone of black economic empowerment.
“We’re not a Metro or a five,” says Kaya’s managing director Pat Dambe, referring to its closest competitors, Radio Metro and Radio 5. The station, which was licensed in March, has spared neither cash nor effort in attracting a line-up to suit its aim and to outshine anything the competition’s offering at the moment.
That line-up is firmly black, unlike SAfm and Radio 702, which attempt half-heartedly to vie for the same audience but offer few black voices in prime-time slots. Kaya will feature the crme de la crme of South African society.
It has attracted two of Metro’s top DJs: Ernest Pillay (who will host the drive-time programme) and Lawrence Dube (the morning anchor). Other well-knowns behind Kaya’s microphone include Gerry Williams, the singing brothers Marc and Alex Rantseli, Sibongile Khumalo, Natalia da Rocha and Hugh Masekela. The downside of the newly deregulated radio market is that stations about to hit the radio, like Kaya, play their cards close to their chests. Competition for audience and advertising will be fierce so there is no sneak preview of precisely how the station will sound. Demo tapes are being fiercely guarded.
But here’s a hint. “Our target listener is anybody (black, white, coloured or Indian) who enjoys black music like jazz, R’n’B, soul,” says Dambe. Business development director, Lucia Venter, adds: “That’s Eric Clapton, Phil Collins, Bayete, Masakela, Eryka Badu.”
The target audience is also aspirational, ambitious and acquisitive. They are likely to live in Johannesburg and its surrounds. “They’re concerned about shelter, good schools. They want a sense of security,” explains Dambe.
“It’s an attractive audience,” says Ogilvy and Mather’s group media director, Yvonne Johnston. “They’re trend-setters. They’re in an acquisitive phase. They’re big purchasers who are highly sought-after [by advertisers].”
But Johnston adds that Kaya will have to compete for advertising revenue as there’s little chance the slice of the advertising cake that radio attracts – 13% – will be increased significantly.
Kaya’s media barons know this and have been doing their homework. “We will focus on the market and research will be ongoing,” says Dambe, who has drafted in help from the United States. One of the help is programme director, Oliver Sutton, who is from a successful New York inner-city radio station. With Radio Metro going more and more musical, Kaya (whose target audience is older, aged between 25 and 49 years old) will be 40% talk.
This will see it lock horns with Radio 702 which still prides itself as the best in talk radio that South Africa has to offer. But talk on Kaya will be more aspirational: it’s likely to take the form of information programming (be they business or personal finance programmes) and topical talk, which will include a lot of discussion about Africa.
The new station is also investing quite a bit in news and every bulletin will feature news from Africa. “We want to fill the information gaps. That’s one of our strengths,” says Venter.