Interview with Radio One's President Chris Wegmann

Story by Inside Radio

Radio One began the New Year with a new head of its 55-station radio division. But Chris Wegmann is no newcomer to the urban media specialist. He worked as a regional VP for the company for nearly five years, overseeing stations in Washington, Atlanta, Baltimore, Philadelphia and St. Louis. Known for turning around under-performing properties, the broadcast vet previously managed high-profile stations for Cox Media Group in Atlanta and Houston in a career arc that has spanned more than three decades.

IR: After 35 years in the business, how does it feel to be running an entire radio division?
CW: It’s very exciting and very rewarding. When I first got in the business in 1976, this was a goal that I set for myself, to own a station or run a group of stations.

IR: You’re known for a disciplined but people-friendly approach. How would you describe your management style?
CW: People want leadership, they look to leaders for decisions. They won’t always agree with you but they have to respect your decisions. Something I learned early on was that until you sit at that desk, you don't have all the facts and you can’t ascertain whether someone made the right or wrong decision.

IR: Radio One has separate divisions for radio, TV and interactive. What is the company doing to break down barriers and help them work together as one?
CW: The main thing is communication. We have set up committees and have a common goal with our One Vision philosophy. When you put together all our assets, we reach over 80% of the African-American population. We’re not bundling by any means but we are showing marketers the opportunity of putting put our various assets together to give them choices.

IR: Is that more holistic approach helping you grow revenue?
CW: It has grown each year as we approached and partnered with various clients. And other clients are starting to take notice of what our capabilities are. It hasn’t grown by leaps and bounds but the growth has been very solid.

IR: Is it helping you bring new clients on board?
CW: Not necessarily new clients but it has helped us with a number of established clients. We now have a multi-year deal with Wal-Mart that crosses all of our assets.

IR: How are digital extensions helping Radio One grow business?
CW: If you’re not in the digital field you’ll be left behind. It’s the fastest growing field in media and an important part of our business going forward. We’re still trying to figure out new ways to utilize and sell it. We thought we could take our traditional radio sellers and have them talk to their advertisers about digital. It’s a whole new world for us and there’s a big learning curve. We’re still in the process of learning how to best utilize our assets to reach the consumer.

IR: Did you realize you needed to bring in more digital experts?
CW: There were a certain percent of AEs that picked it up pretty quickly. There were some that kind of got it and some who didn’t get it at all. They were almost equally divided into thirds. I saw the same thing at Cox, where some AEs just picked it up and ran with it, both new and seasoned AEs. You can’t stereotype anyone based on their tenure in the business as to whether they’ve embraced selling the One Voice multiplatform concept.

IR: Did you restructure sales?
CW: Not a restructure. We brought digital sales managers into a number of our markets to assist the sellers. In a couple of markets we have plans to hire digital-only sellers.

IR: Do you still have a digital-first sales approach with new clients?
CW: When we review the customer needs analysis with clients, digital is very much up front. Have we moved radio second behind digital? No, we still sell radio but we have these great digital assets that we can use to help marketers.

IR: Radio One now owns 80% of Reach Media. Do you see the company investing more in the network radio sector, such as launching new shows?
CW: Yes, we just recently launched DL Hughley and early indications are extremely encouraging. We're very excited. He’s a funny guy, a smart guy who gets radio. He goes to markets and works it, he’s seeing clients and doing appearances. He still does his comedy shows on the weekends. It’s a terrific expansion for Reach. They have other shows we’re working on and other ideas we’re looking at.

IR: You have a background in news and helped launch “News 92” KROI, Houston. But it’s been slow out of the gate in terms of ratings.
CW: Revenues have recently been increasing but ratings have been a slow climb. We did a recent research piece and it’s a lot better than what we’ve seen in the ratings and we’re encouraged by what we’ve seen.

IR: Radio One has had success with general market formats. How do you see the company adjusting its mix of African-American targeted stations versus general market?
CW: We evaluate each of our properties in each market in an ongoing process. We know the African-American audience and our track record shows that we do it well. But in some markets we already have that covered. If we have a station that’s under-performing, we start looking at where the potential opportunity in the market is and how we can best utilize our assets. But our primary focus is serving the African-American community.

IR: What efforts is Radio One making to raise the profile of urban radio?
CW: Five or six years ago, a number of our markets signed up with the Center For Strategic Sales. All of our markets now, except Houston and Atlanta, subscribe to CSS, which I consider the best sales consultant. They have helped raise the level of education and professionalism. I feel we’ve raised the quality of sales talent considerably in the five years that I will have been with the company in March.

IR: As member of the Nielsen Audio Advisory Committee, what pros and cons do you see from its acquisition of Arbitron?
CW: I’m very excited. I attended the first advisory board meeting in Baltimore and it was encouraging to see their enthusiasm to be involved again in radio and to see their vast research resources.

IR: Will being measured alongside TV and the internet give radio a more prominent seat at the sales table?
CW: I think it will but it’s going to take a little bit of time to get integrated into their systems, to get everything together. But from what I’ve seen so far, I’m very encouraged.

IR: If you were to create a highlight reel of your career, what would you put in it?
CW: I was hired by Gulf Star in the early ‘90s to run four stations in Baton Rouge and after going through Gulf Star, Capstar, AMFM and Clear Channel, I ended up overseeing stations in Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Alexandria, Shreveport and Beaumont. I was recruited by Cox to run their Houston properties and set a plan in place to take on KILT, the big CBS country station. We went after them with KKBQ [“93Q”] which now dominates KILT in all the demos. When I was in Houston, “Kicks” dropped country and went modern AC and we immediately took our top 40 station and flipped it to classic county, which was a big success. That combo is still in affect with KKBQ. After two years in Houston, Cox transferred me to Atlanta to take over [news/talk] WSB, one of the premier stations in the country.

IR: What’s your outlook for 2014?
CW: I’m excited and very optimistic. In almost of all our markets we have solid programming. We consolidated our national sales efforts last year under Sam Rogers, the longtime CBS-Washington market manager who also spent time with Cumulus in DC. He’s done terrific job of getting our national sales more focused. We hired a DC-based political position to help with DC and national political dollars. We have the midterm elections in 2014. In the last midterm elections, the Democrats took the African-American voters for granted. I don’t think they can afford to do that again this year. So there’s the potential for political, although we were very modest in our political budgeting. We’re getting better at selling our digital assets as we learn more about them. We have a lot of positivity going for us.