week 12 / 21 March 2013 FRANCE’S oNLY L EADING RADIO Christopher Baldelli on how revamping its news helped RTL Radio achieve its best season start in ten years United Kingdom Belgium Luxembourg Talkback Thames’ 25th Télévie has 80 years ago, Radio The Bill has its own begun in Belgium Luxembourg addressed Youtube channel the world on long wave week 12 / 21 March 2013 FRANCE’S oNLY L EADING RADIO Christopher Baldelli on how revamping its news helped RTL Radio achieve its best season start in ten years United Kingdom Belgium Luxembourg Talkback Thames’ 25th Télévie has 80 years ago, Radio The Bill has its own begun in Belgium Luxembourg addressed Youtube channel the world on long wave Cover Christopher Baldelli, CEO of RTL Radio Publisher RTL Group 45, Bd Pierre Frieden L-1543 Luxembourg Editor, Design, Production RTL Group Corporate Communications & Marketing k before y hin ou T p r in t backstage.rtlgroup.com backstage.rtlgroup.fr backstage.rtlgroup.de QUICK VIEW The 25th Télévie has begun The Bill is back FremantleMedia UK in Belgium p. 8 RTL Belgium p. 9-10 80 years ago, Radio Luxembourg addressed the world on long wave RTL Group p. 11-12 Celebrating 30th anniversary Media Assurances p. 13 “Making significant changes to our three news slots was not an easy decision to make” Catch-up TV RTL Radio France on the rise p. 4-7 in France RTL Group p. 14 Big Picture p.15 SHORT NEWS PEOPLE p. 16–17 p.18-19 After the April-June 2012 survey showed a slight loss of cumulated audience to NRJ, RTL Radio unveiled last autumn innovations revolving “MaKING around the redesign of its three news slots. A delicate SIGNIFICANT but successful move, as the station – which promptly regained its absolute CHANGES TO OUR audience leadership – had its best season start in THREE NEWS slots ten years, and confirmed its leadership with rising ratings. Christopher Baldelli, WAS Not AN EASY Chairman of the Management Board of RTL Group’s French DECISION TO MAKE” radio stations, explains the rationale behind these strategic choices in an France – 21 March 2013 exclusive interview. RTL Radio Christopher Baldelli (left) worked hand in hand with Information Director Jacques Esnous on the redesign of the news slots 4 Why were RTL Matin, RTL Midi and RTL Soir Why these shows and not others? given a revamp? During the past two seasons, we already made a One of the special aspects of radio is that it’s a lot of changes to our entertainment programming. habitual media. Listeners tend to have only a few In fact, we’ve successfully revamped over 80 per favourite radio stations, and will often tune into just cent of the RTL programme line-up in the past one. So you don’t want change just for change’s three years. All of these new shows are now very sake. And if you have to make a change, you need to popular and there was no reason to change them make sure it’s something that will add quality to your further, as is demonstrated by the latest good programmes and match your listeners’ expectations. ratings (editor’s note: for the November-December For RTL, making significant changes simultaneously period, A la bonne heure and Les Grosses Têtes to its three news slots was not an easy decision. This respectively recorded an 8- and 9-percentage-point had never been done before in RTL Radio’s history, year-on-year increase in the number of listeners). but as some of our ratings were softening compared to the previous season, we felt we had to introduce a new dynamic. “CHANGING We decided to SIMULTANEOUSLY switch around our presenters: ITS THREE NEWS Vincent Parizot SLOTS HAS NEVER – our morning BEEN DONE host for the four BEFORE IN RTL last seasons – moved to RTL RADIO’S history” Midi and was replaced by Laurent Bazin, who joined Vincent Parizot (left) and Elisabeth Martichoux, RTL last year. Vincent did a great job and achieved co-hosts of RTL Midi high ratings, but as the morning show starts very early, it’s a very exhausting job in the long run. The You have changed the three anchors of the main previous season was also rather special because of news programmes. What qualities do each of the presidential elections, and our surveys revealed them bring to their time slots? that our listeners wanted improvements made to the I’ll start with Laurent Bazin. The morning session show. Vincent is good at interacting with listeners is very important for our listeners. They wake up on air, so we thought he would make a good new with their favourite radio station and they continue co-presenter for the midday news programme with listening as they go to work. As a result, they expect Elisabeth Martichoux. In the evening, Marc-Olivier a good mix of information including breaking news Fogiel has become the new host of RTL Soir and background insight from the best analysts, as following the departure of Christophe Hondelatte. I well as lighter moments. Laurent Bazin succeeds in spotted Marc-Olivier a few years ago when he was bringing this right mix of serious news, good humour hosting the morning show on commercial station and closeness to the audience. Europe 1. The midday news programme RTL Midi is not as fast-paced as the morning news. There is also more time to interact with listeners via call-ins. For example, our listeners appreciate Vincent Parizot as a new co-host for the way he interacts with listeners. In the evening, people expect something different once again with RTL Soir. The first part of the show consists of a full news bulletin, investigations, and interviews. At that time of the day there is very fierce competition with other radio stations and also TV companies, which is why we decided to give this slot to Marc-Olivier Fogiel, who is a real trooper. Laurent Bazin (right), host of RTL Matin He always tries to be first with the news and get Next > 5 According to the latest audience figures for the November-December period, all three of your major news programmes gained listeners year- on-year. Were these new listeners from other stations, or new or returning radio listeners? The survey shows we gained 405,000 new listeners over a year, which represents 6.584 million daily listeners. RTL saw the largest increase in cumulative audience of all radio stations combined. The success of the new season schedule was confirmed with a gain of 122,000 listeners compared to the previous survey. With this Marc-Olivier Fogiel (right), host of RTL Soir “WE GAINED growth, we must have won back both former exclusive interviews. He gets deeply involved and 405,000 NEW RTL listeners as well gives our radio station lots of scoops. This is exactly LISTENERS as new ones. The the kind of profile and qualities we need at that time OVER A YEAR” CEO of NRJ, one of of day. our main competitors, actually said that in 30 years in the radio business he had never seen such a huge The ratings in September for the start of the and high-speed start to a new news programme as new season were your best in ten years. RTL Matin delivered in September. Was the schedule the reason for the increased ratings, or were there other factors? Last but not least, what makes RTL Matin so I think there are two main reasons. The first is that successful? all our news and entertainment shows are quite The morning show – prime time for radio – is very new. They have been on the air for a maximum competitive in radio, which is why RTL is sometimes of one, two or three years, as I mentioned earlier. neck and neck with other radio stations like France This means that they are always fresh and have a Inter. Our trademark is the good mix of news and positive momentum. upbeat humour that I mentioned earlier, as well as the high quality of our news programmes. We The second reason is that in radio every show leads have good journalists, we get a lot of scoops and up to the next one. Therefore, when a morning show more importantly, we strive to ensure the news is gets a ratings increase, the next show automatically understood by all our listeners, even when the topics benefits from this. Another thing that makes radio are complex. so special is that changes can be done on a ‘work in progress’ basis. In other words, changes can be made within the show based on the latest ratings and surveys without revolutionising the whole format. In November-December 2012, RTL Radio was the absolute leader across all indicators: Besides the ratings, what do listeners think of the changes? We do specific marketing research and our regular #1 IN AUDIENCE SHARE focus groups show that the listeners massively with 11.6% audience share approve our new choices – it’s very encouraging. We are not only seeing an increase in ratings but #1 IN CUMULATED AUDIENCE can also confirm that with 6.584 million daily listeners listeners are getting “OUR REGULAR what they want. FOCUS GROUPS #1 IN LISTENING TIME PER DAY SHOW that with 2:16 h/day THE LISTENERS #1 IN EVEry MOMENT massively with 784,000 listeners APPROVE OUR NEW CHOICES” Next > 6 A GAIN OF 237,000 LISTENERS YEAR-ON-YEAR +6 PER CENT1 A programme built around the listener: it informs and enlightens them, but also serves as their forum for expression.