Southern Cross Austereo (SCA) is in a real pickle. Their star radio presenter, self-proclaimed “King” Kyle Sandilands is pretty much off limits to major advertisers because of his offensive on-air comments about a female journalist last year. Publicly, most of the advertisers that pulled out of his show late last year said they were boycotting as a matter of principle. Privately, though, I imagine most were doing it because they simply couldn’t stomach the unprecedented heat from journalists and in social media. Of course, any client that thought the storm might have passed over the Christmas break need only look at Jenny Craig’s short-lived (and hopelessly misguided) sponsorship of the show to be reminded consumers are still pretty pissed.
Of course, a great deal of the continued hostility towards Kyle is down to his apparent lack of remorse. His ‘apology’ took too long coming, and when it finally did, it was weakly worded and full of excuses. There were no consequences for his actions, either. People like to see wrongdoing punished but to the public, Kyle seemingly got off scot free. Perhaps SCA fining him by docking his pay or sending him on some highly visible community service might have gone some way to appeasing people. That might still be an option to quell the anger that’s clearly still out there but SCA needs to move decisively and quickly.
Herein lies the pickle. The Kyle and Jackie O Show is still hugely popular with listeners. In fact, the ratings juggernaut actually got a performance bump after the whole Kyle incident. Clearly SCA’s continued backing of Kyle is designed to protect their stellar ratings - the only problem is those ratings are meaningless if advertisers won’t purchase airtime in the show.
The sad truth is the Kyle and Jackie O Show is the best-performing dud in Australian media history.
So, the time has come for King Kyle to abdicate. The end of his fairly brutal reign will enable advertisers to return to the Sydney breakfast show en masse and that’s important for their businesses, SCA and the wider radio industry. Sure, the ratings might not be as good but at least advertisers will be able to get back into breakfast radio. Hell, SCA might even sell a breakfast sponsorship or two.
And it’s not all bad news for Kyle, either. He has lots to be thankful for. After all, he’s had a bloody good run. He bought his luxury Los Angeles pad and $1 million Rolls-Royce Phantom using the advertising dollars many of our clients pumped into his show for years. But Kyle’s actions have burned many of those supportive advertisers and they have lost confidence in him. Ultimately, it is advertisers that have decided to ‘fire’ Kyle by withholding their budgets from his show. The only thing left for now is for SCA chief executive Rhys Holleran to pass on the message.
This article first appeared in the January 27 edition of AdNews. Click here to subscribe for more news, features and opinion.
Mat Baxter is chief executive of UM
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