“Even though we’re doing the best we’ve ever done, I don’t think there’s a reciprocal reaction from advertisers,” says Judi Nwokedi, managing director of PBS (public broadcasting services) at the SABC. “Our growth is not as big as the commercial stations, and it should be. I believe our product is the best it’s ever been. The power of our audience to consume, to deliver revenue to industry, is not being exploited. They should be banging down our doors. They’re not.”
The sharp decline in PBS radio’s income growth over the last three years tells her story eloquently. From December 2001 to November 2002, according to Nielsen Media Research’s advertising index, revenue on the PBS radio stations had grown by 35% on the preceding year. That dropped to 24% from December 2002 to November 2003, and for the year December 2003 to November 2004 fell off even further to 9%. Simultaneously, revenue growth at South Africa’s independent radio stations has been on the up – together they grew by 19.6% against the preceding year to November.
Thing is, despite all their complaining about the SABC’s cross-selling advantage and unfair domination of the broadcast market, private radio looks to be pulling away from Auckland Park’s brands. Taking Nielsen’s version at face value, the independents are moving very close to doubling PBS’s revenue – the former collectively posted R1.03-billion from December 2003 to November 2004, against the latter’s R540.9-million. It’s a case of 54% market share versus 28%, and the gap seems to be widening.
Of course the Nielsen figures are generally considered a benchmark, a useful but less-than-perfect yardstick for researchers and number crunchers in the communications arena. SABC group sales and marketing director Mark Jakins argues that the broadcaster’s own figures paint a different picture. He points out that for the 2004 financial year the PBS stations will show growth of 25%, and that “RSG and SAfm are doing very nicely”. It’s an odd disparity, but whatever the explanation Jakins does admit that the African-language stations (ALS) within the PBS portfolio have been taking some pain.
“We’ve been battling to fully understand TV in the LSM 5 to 8 categories, where ALS radio is aimed, specifically the increased spend on e.tv, SABC 1 and SABC 2. We think there’s been a shift of spend from the PBS stations into television, because of the new affordability. It’s now a lot cheaper to make up a TV ad. We’re having a huge success story in television.
“Remember that LSM 8 to 10 is where the independent radio stations are aimed. This category commands nearly 60% of total national marketing budgets, as marketing mostly chases purchasing patterns. Having said that, the independent stations are the stations of choice for the media planners and marketers because these are the stations they know.”
Unfortunately, to many in the media and advertising industries, the line about South Africa’s predominantly white media planners and marketers not understanding the power of African-language or black media is overplayed. After two parliamentary hearings on racism in 2001 and 2002, a common retort in 2005 is that South Africa is still redressing its historic socio-economic imbalances, and that the divergence simply reflects a long national process that will eventually result in greater equity. But long processes or not, it’s tough to reconcile ALS radio’s revenue with some of the programme statistics, which totally dwarf anything else in the medium.
Consider this. Chomane Chomane’s morning drive-time show on the Sotho station Lesedi FM records national listenership of 1.8-million and Gauteng listenership of 641,000. In comparison, Highveld 94.7’s drive-time show hosted by Jeremy Mansfield has Gauteng listenership only, at 515,000 (Rams, Nov 2004). Thuso Motaung’s show Makgulong a Matala (along green pastures) on Lesedi attracts 2.3-million listeners on Sunday mornings between 9 and 12. Also on Lesedi, Seipati’s Rea Kubeletsa (afternoon drive) show continues to grow listenership survey on survey, and is currently at 1.2-million on the average weekday. Then there’s Mpho Nefale’s breakfast show on the tshiVenda station Phala Phala, renowned for its “piece jobs” slot, which attracts 320,000 listeners on the average weekday. As a last example (there’s plenty more) the huge Zulu language station Ukhozi FM has an afternoon drama slot that attracts 1.6-million listeners on the average weekday.
“Hardly anybody in the advertising industry knows these shows, or who these people are,” says Nwokedi. “These are great South Africans. People say you have to get a dose of Chomane Chomane in the morning because he is your inspiration. My Sotho isn’t that good, but even I listen to Chomane Chomane to get an energy boost.”
So, while Nwokedi acknowledges that the revenue problem can’t only be about racism, she is concerned that the portfolio committee on communications – the parliamentary body that drove the hearings a few years ago – is no longer advancing the agenda. “Where has it gone? What happened to the work streams and work committees? Maybe I’m out of the loop, but it just died. And it was critical to push those issues.”
The Government Communication and Information System (GCIS), which had also been heavily involved in the hearings and work groups, seems to have gone equally quiet. After a number of requests for clarification, a key question remains unanswered. Is the GCIS satisfied that their work, and the work of former chair of the portfolio committee Nkenke Kekana, has had the required (positive) impact on the imbalance?
At least one top advertising executive believes it hasn’t. Brian Ebden, managing director of ACMP Creative – in his own words the “only independent, wholly black-owned full-service agency in South Africa” – has been handling the Shoprite/Checkers account for a number of years and strongly promotes the ALS stations. His view is that there are “vested interests amongst the white agencies” which keep the black agencies out. “The ALS portfolio has always sucked up to white agencies. Our agency is the most aggressive when it comes to ALS radio. We spend R15-million to R20-million with them every year. Not once have the SABC given us any reciprocal business.”
Ebden may very well have his own axe to grind, but his point that black agencies are best placed to handle black media is hard to dispute. He explains his strategy for Shoprite/Checkers as “owning the culture”; getting into the mindset of the various South African groups that ALS radio reaches. “The problem is that most advertising agencies in Jo’burg get a black guy who went to a white school and think they can get into Soweto. The common denominator is not blackness. A Pedi doesn’t know what a Zulu is doing. This is isn’t a whole bunch of Negroes. You have to live the culture and tradition. You have to know.”
As for Ebden’s results on the Shoprite/Checkers account, he swears that the group “is now booming” because of its strategy with the African communities. Nwokedi also looks to the example as a success story, as proof that the ALS brands in her portfolio have the power to change a corporate’s fortunes. What she isn’t so enamoured with are some of the anomalies.
The lack of a sponsor for the second “Voice of Choice” initiative – a search for singing talent that runs across 11 PBS platforms – is a particularly difficult one to fathom. “The first Voice of Choice was sponsored by African Bank. We got 100,000 paying calls in 10 days. No M-Net or SABC TV reality programme has clocked that. The walk-in rate to African Bank shot through the roof because of it, and now we’re battling to find a sponsor for the second one.”
Again, Nwokedi doesn’t place the blame squarely at the feet of a so-called racist industry. Like Mark Jakins and head of SABC television airtime sales Clare O’Neil, she points out that in the TV space SABC 1 had a fantastic year primarily because they sold out on the (partly or fully) African language shows Generations, Yizo Yizo and Gazlam.
But whatever the reason advertisers aren’t knocking down the doors, Nwokedi will keep pushing for answers. One answer may very well prove to be the “brand activation” strategy she initiated in November last year, a plan to market the stations that should do justice to their listenerships. Clearly, as Nwokedi puts it, “the ghetto-isation of these stations has got to stop.”