HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL SCORES IN LUBBOCK, TX

It’s the problem most managers wish they had: What do you do to build sales and ratings when you’re already the market leader? But while nobody’s playing the violin for Raycom’s KCBD in Lubbock, Texas, it’s a tougher problem than it may seem.

“We’re the dominant station in Lubbock,” says General Sales Manager Beverly McBeath. “All the other newscasts combined don’t equal our viewership.” Even so, in this age of fragile market shares, no station can afford to rest on its laurels. So KCBD cooked up a smart promotion that hits Lubbock where it lives. And in DMA 174, it’s all about local sports.

“We feature a lot of Texas Tech sports, but we really pay attention to those high schools,” says McBeath. “We make sure we cover girls’ volleyball, girls’ softball and we throw in some soccer from time to time. And it’s paid off well for us.”

Indeed it has. All the more so thanks to a promotion built around high school football, recently cited as a money-making Topper at the NAB’s Small Market Exchange. Now in its third year, this September to November promotion builds new revenue, expands viewership and drives enormous amounts of Web traffic.

“It started out two years ago [2005] with Mascot Mania. It’s a bracket-style elimination competition like NCAA March Madness,” explains McBeath. “Over 70 schools in our DMA sent in video of their mascots in action.”

Viewers could vote for their favorites on the station’s Web site. Once the field narrowed a bit, the station posted the videos and pitted pairs of mascots against each other. “You could vote for the one you liked and until we narrowed it down to a Final Four,” McBeath says.

That first year netted 180,000 votes. Last year’s promotion, which shifted the focus to high school cheerleading squads, pulled 280,000 votes—70,000 during the Final Four voting alone.

The “Cheer Championship” also drove sales, says McBeath.

Two sponsors per year pay $6,000 each, so “it’s not huge in terms of dollars,” she says, but every year the sponsors have been new advertisers and most have remained ongoing clients.

The new business has come from small local hospitals, insurance companies, a community college—diverse sectors with little in common except a strong desire to be linked with the regional passion for high school football.

For their money, the sponsors receive a spot schedule in the news plus mentions in the frequent on-air promos.

“The sponsors also have to put up $1,250 in prize money, up from $1,000 last year,” adds McBeath. “That’s a big help to cheerleaders and bands who hold year-round car washes and bake sales to cover those huge expenses for traveling to competitions.”

It’s also a big help to KCBD’s image as the local sports leader and to the sports coverage itself. “During the football and basketball seasons, we need the schools and coaches to call us with their scores—and there are lots of schools out there—so this promotion has really has helped us develop a relationship with them. We want to always be the go-to station for people who want to know about the hot games among all these small towns.”

Judging from the Web traffic, KCBD is getting its wish. “Normally we have about 10,000 to 11,000 unique users a day, which is a lot for a market our size. Yesterday, we had 30,000 unique users.  About 23,000 of those came to a particular story we were running about the upcoming game between Texas Tech and Texas A&M.” (Tough break, Aggies. Tech triumphed 35-7.)

This year’s variation on the high school football promotion is a Battle of the Bands—marching bands, that is. Although tapes from the schools were a little slow in arriving (presumably due to the greater challenge of capturing an entire band routine on camera) viewer voting is running ahead of last year. And Beverly McBeath’s sales team is confident they can keep the idea fresh for years.

Apparently, it’s not just local viewers who have embraced the KCBD Web site, says McBeath. “This is the first year we’ve landed several national Internet advertisers. And Cadillac just renewed for 2008 on our Web site, which is really good.”

Surprisingly, the NBC affiliate hasn’t taken advantage of the seemingly-perfect match of the drama Friday Night Lights, says McBeath “No not yet, except to run promos in there. But a lot of our sales people just love that show so we definitely have our eye on it.”

Not that the KCBD sales team is lacking for things to do.

Despite the typical concerns about audience fragmentation, McBeath remains bullish on broadcasting. “We’re looking at lots of ways to sell both TV and Internet to advertisers—to advertise on TV and boost awareness by following up on the Website. We feel like next year will be a really good year for us on the internet.”

Market Share by Arthur Greenwald highlights successful promotions every Monday in TVNEWSDAY. Has your local team scored big with a major promotion? Go for the extra point by exercising your bragging rights. Write to Arthur at greenwald@tvnewsday.com.