Why Imus is history: the market for insults dried up
I woke to NPR news this morning leading again a story about Don Imus, this time noting that CBS has finally fired Don Imus. After an entire week of all Imus scandal all the time, I thought I might add my ten kilobits or so to why it all happened. After all, Imus had been insulting various enthnic groups for decades. so what changed? Why did CBS fire him now over what was Imus' shock stock in trade?
It's simple: the market changed and Imus didn't.
When Don Imus started in radio, he said things that others would not. He was a fast-quipping DJ with a nasty streak that countered an establishment that insisted on political correctness. That differentiation found an audience, ranging from California to New York, and Imus' parlayed that audience into a national forum. In the process, his show insulted US presidents, political candidates, Jews, blacks, women, Palestinians, breast cancer victims, and a host of others. His rise to national TV simulcasting on MSNBC in 1996 coincided with the rise of a Republican majority in Congress that rebelled against political correctness, and thereby accepted, if not endorsed, Imus' style of insult-based comedy. And with staid corporations ranging from American Express to Staples paying to advertise on Imus In The Morning, that money also spoke volumes about corporate acceptance of shock radio programming.
Too bad Imus didn't pay attention in the results of how candidates marketed themselves in the 2006 elections.
2006 was the first year in a decade when negative campaign tactics in the US elections didn't work like they used to. Democrats swept contested races in both the House and the Senate, not just because voters liked their candidates and positions on the war better, but because negative campaigning, a staple of the last ten years, lost its effectiveness among voters. In short, people got tired of insults.
Ask any marketer if insulting another product works well as a marketing campaign. Most marketers won't touch a negative campaign with a ten-foot pole. Why? Because it takes potential customers who may be buyers for what you want to sell and alienates them. Differentiation is a fine way to build brand value; insults just polarize audiences. That polarization has been what Imus has been selling -- and it went out of style a year ago.
So what does it all mean? Imus' firing isn't the end of this change in the market. In fact, this is a shot across the bow of all insult-media hosts from Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh to Bill O'Reilly and Michael Savage.. As the New York Times noted this morning in David Carr's article, Flying Solo Past the Point of No Return, "...radio is now visible — Mr. Imus’s show was simulcast on MSNBC, and more to the point, it is downloadable. By Friday, reporters and advocates could click up the remark on the Media Matters for America Web site, and later YouTube, and see a vicious racial insult that delighted him visibly as it rolled off his tongue. The ether now has a memory." And consumers are pretty good at tapping that memory -- and then casting offenders off their media islands with their wallets and votes.
Donnie Deutsch, the host of CNBC’s "The Big Idea," said it well on the Today show this week.
I hope Deutsch is right. We're all minorities in some part of our lives, be it religion, race, belief, sex, political leaning, education, or income class. After ten years of insults to our minority status, whatever they may be, nice would be a welcome change -- and much better marketing.
It's simple: the market changed and Imus didn't.
When Don Imus started in radio, he said things that others would not. He was a fast-quipping DJ with a nasty streak that countered an establishment that insisted on political correctness. That differentiation found an audience, ranging from California to New York, and Imus' parlayed that audience into a national forum. In the process, his show insulted US presidents, political candidates, Jews, blacks, women, Palestinians, breast cancer victims, and a host of others. His rise to national TV simulcasting on MSNBC in 1996 coincided with the rise of a Republican majority in Congress that rebelled against political correctness, and thereby accepted, if not endorsed, Imus' style of insult-based comedy. And with staid corporations ranging from American Express to Staples paying to advertise on Imus In The Morning, that money also spoke volumes about corporate acceptance of shock radio programming.
Too bad Imus didn't pay attention in the results of how candidates marketed themselves in the 2006 elections.
2006 was the first year in a decade when negative campaign tactics in the US elections didn't work like they used to. Democrats swept contested races in both the House and the Senate, not just because voters liked their candidates and positions on the war better, but because negative campaigning, a staple of the last ten years, lost its effectiveness among voters. In short, people got tired of insults.
Ask any marketer if insulting another product works well as a marketing campaign. Most marketers won't touch a negative campaign with a ten-foot pole. Why? Because it takes potential customers who may be buyers for what you want to sell and alienates them. Differentiation is a fine way to build brand value; insults just polarize audiences. That polarization has been what Imus has been selling -- and it went out of style a year ago.
So what does it all mean? Imus' firing isn't the end of this change in the market. In fact, this is a shot across the bow of all insult-media hosts from Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh to Bill O'Reilly and Michael Savage.. As the New York Times noted this morning in David Carr's article, Flying Solo Past the Point of No Return, "...radio is now visible — Mr. Imus’s show was simulcast on MSNBC, and more to the point, it is downloadable. By Friday, reporters and advocates could click up the remark on the Media Matters for America Web site, and later YouTube, and see a vicious racial insult that delighted him visibly as it rolled off his tongue. The ether now has a memory." And consumers are pretty good at tapping that memory -- and then casting offenders off their media islands with their wallets and votes.
Donnie Deutsch, the host of CNBC’s "The Big Idea," said it well on the Today show this week.
"This to me is a seminal moment," he told [Today show host, Matt] Lauer. "This was not even about race or sexism. It’s about hate. I’m going to make a prediction now that nice is going to be the new black. I don’t mean in terms of race, I mean in terms of style."
I hope Deutsch is right. We're all minorities in some part of our lives, be it religion, race, belief, sex, political leaning, education, or income class. After ten years of insults to our minority status, whatever they may be, nice would be a welcome change -- and much better marketing.
Technorati Tags: CNBC, Don Imus, Elections, Insults, Marketing, MSNBC, Opinion, Shock radio
posted by Carl Howe at
10:54 AM
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