Nova tunes in to what audiences (and advertisers) want
The starting gun has been fired on a new year of radio ratings and by most measures, Nova Entertainment, led by chief executive Peter Charlton, is faring better than the competition.
The starting gun has been fired on a new year of radio ratings as January 20 marks the first week of survey year 2025 and the return of most metro radio shows.
By most measures, Nova Entertainment, led by chief executive Peter Charlton, fared better than the competition across 2024.
But Mr Charlton revealed to The Australian it wasn’t just last year when the company performed well.
Market share in media often triggers the share of ad revenue available. In Nova Entertainment’s case it has been batting above its average for some time.
“It’s fair to say our relative performance in metro radio compared to our competition has been very favourable over the past 10 years,” Mr Charlton said.
“That’s long before I became CEO, four years ago. For all that time we’ve taken a greater share of metro radio revenue than we’ve had share of audience.”
That share of audience number blossomed in 2024. Nova Entertainment, which is controlled by News Corporation chairman Lachlan Murdoch, starts the new year being able to boast the biggest network audience (Nova and Smooth FM stations combined) of 6.4 million listeners. It ranked No.1 in all eight surveys across the year and ended 2024 with the three most-listened to stations – Nova in Melbourne and the Smooth FM stations in Sydney and Melbourne.
The audio sector has largely dodged the digital bullet that continues to reshape the publishing and video industry.
In the first half of calendar 2024, total metro ad revenue (broadcast plus digital audio) was up 2.6 per cent to $200.7m year-on-year. Metro revenue (broadcast only) was $178.172m in Q2 2024, up 0.1 per cent on Q2 2023, while digital audio revenue increased by 27.1 per cent.
“In 2024 we delivered a bigger broadcast audience for our advertisers than we’ve ever had in the history of the business,” continued Mr Charlton.
He admits the sector still has a job to do explaining to marketers that audio is a medium where audiences have not declined.
Radio broadcasters in Australia have all dived into the on-demand/podcast space.
Along with a growing number of independent podcasters, Nova Entertainment, alongside major competitors SCA (Hit and Triple M networks has LiSTNR), ARN (KIIS and Gold has iHeart) plus Nine Radio (2GB/3AW/6PR) are building significant new audiences. While Nova Entertainment wants the biggest share of the advertising pie, Mr Charlton explained a strong audio sector is essential.
“We’re as good as the medium is, really. And that’s audio as opposed to just radio. A rising tide floats all boats, and then we get competitive around share.”
Helping keep the sector strong is commercial radio and audio, now under the guidance of newish chief executive and former Nine executive Lizzie Young.
“We’re probably more collaborative around the CRA table than we ever have been. Despite what’s gone on with the major competitors, who have obviously gone toe-to-toe a little bit this year,” said Mr Charlton, alluding to the failed play ARN recently made for SCA’s Triple M network.
“We all have a common cause, which is growing the medium, making it more accessible.”
Giant killers
Part of the Nova Entertainment success story is the familiarity audiences have with its breakfast programming. The broadcaster has 10 metro breakfast shows (five Nova and five Smooth FM – although Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth are DAB+ only).
Five of those stations have team members who are well entrenched in their markets – Nova Sydney, Brisbane and Perth plus Smooth FM in Sydney and Melbourne.
Add to that mix its new Nova Melbourne breakfast show, Jase and Lauren, which now has the biggest breakfast show audience in Australia.
ARN has flirted, unsuccessfully so far, with networked breakfast via Kyle and Jackie O, leaving Nova Entertainment and SCA secure that their local metro breakfast strategy is the right one.
As a former UK radio executive, Mr Charlton keeps a watch on radio around the world. What works in the UK and elsewhere doesn’t mean it fits here.
“The capital cities in Australia are very different. From the weather, the traffic, sport, personality, humour, government, even the time,” he said.
“We still think you need to have relevant content to reflect that market, and an on-air personality that reflects that market. A live breakfast show in individual markets does provide a more varied, localised advertising opportunity as well.
“It seems to be working for us. About 2.3 million people listen to Nova breakfast, as big as it’s been for us. It’s No.1.
“Some of our competition had a different proposition, had different objectives, had different pressures, and some of which you can read about because they’re public businesses.”
Boosting the bigger-than-ever Nova reach has been the runaway train that is Nova Melbourne breakfast with Jason Hawkins, Lauren Phillips and Clint Stanaway.
Hawkins is a broadcaster who has conquered timeslots around Australia and New Zealand, successfully building programs for broadcasters. He wasn’t delivering what ARN wanted in his time at KIIS in Melbourne with two different co-hosts and he and Lauren were discarded in 2023 to make way for Kyle and Jackie O in that city.
Nova was watching. “Very early on in my tenure as a CEO, we were monitoring, researching, and watching that (Jase and Lauren) show. More and more, it sort of felt more like one of our shows. It felt that it could easily fit into our brand. When we got the chance, and we didn’t pre-empt that, we moved.”
Mr Charlton explained how a programming and PR strategy was formed around the move from KIIS to Nova.
“We talked about the brand and the people and the product and Melbourne and nothing else that was going on elsewhere.”
Smooth FM operator
The newer of the two Nova Entertainment brands is Smooth FM. It still feels like something of a sleeping giant. But can it be one after over a decade of growth that saw it end 2024 with two of the three biggest radio audiences?
“Smooth is an incredible brand and I can’t take any credit for it,” said Mr Charlton. “I joined the week it launched and was given the opportunity to sell it.”
He was group commercial officer before taking over as CEO from Cathy O’Connor in 2020.
“There is further upside for Smooth. This year we’ve changed the market positioning and spent a bit of money around it.”
Although Smooth achieved its budget target, Charlton thinks it can secure more revenue. “It probably should be on every radio schedule,” he said ambitiously.
One thing holding back Smooth FM ad sales is its smaller DAB+ audiences outside Sydney and Melbourne.
“The less talk, more music format can be challenging around a traditional integrated brand promotion. That’s the bit we’ve got to work on. It’s a very brand-safe environment. How all brands might want to integrate with Smooth, we’ve got to work on that.”
Regulation wish list
Former CRA executive Joan Warner was good at making the sector’s presence felt in Canberra, something Lizzie Young will now continue. Top of the agenda for the board, of which Mr Charlton is a member, is prominence. “Australians can have free and easy access to their local radio station on digital devices. To many, they have no idea they’re not consuming on an analogue radio. This new tech, being controlled by big tech, can’t deprive listeners of what they want. And there is a danger that will happen without government help,” he said. “It’s really important that radio stays accessible to a consumer and is not complicated. Audiences should not be driven in other directions that they actively don’t want to go.
“A relaxation of media ownership laws, too, would be good. That’s a wish more than anything else. It might give us an opportunity to pop some Smooth stations into those markets that they’re currently not in.”
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