iHeartMedia CEO Says Radio as ‘Strong As Ever’

iHeartMedia CEO Bob Pittman was interviewed this week by Lydian Moynihan, who writes The On The Money column for the NY Post.  Pittman weighs in on Burning Man, radio, and why he’s one of the few executives who believes in remote work.

Lydia: Every car in the world can connect to Bluetooth. Now that people have Spotify, Apple Music, and podcasts, why do we still need radio?

Bob Pittman

Bob: Actually, radio is as strong as ever. All the new streaming music services replace products that came before – iTunes, CDs, and even cassettes. Radio and music collection services are quite different products. In fact, 80% of Americans agree with the statement ‘I listen to both FM radio and music collections, but at different times, for different reasons.’ We’re not competitive with the music services – we’re synergistic. The consumer uses us both.

When people listen to their music collection they’re trying to unplug from the world – no on-air personalities, no information, no stories, no interviews – just music. When people listen to the radio, they’re joining the world. With us, they’re looking for connection, companionship and someone to hang out with, and that’s our purpose – even though we may also be playing music on some of our radio stations.

Lydia: You’re also competing with big guns like Apple and Spotify and their massive cash war chests? Would you plan to eventually shut down the radio stations and towers? Use the spectrum for other purposes?

Bob: To the contrary – the strength and foundation of our company is our broadcast radio stations. 90% of Americans listen to iHeart broadcast radio stations every month. To put that in context, the biggest TV network reaches less than 40% of Americans and the big streaming music services reach less than 30%. And we use that massive and unique reach of our broadcast radio to build complementary products like the iHeartRadio digital service and our major events like the iHeartRadio Music Festival, the iHeartRadio Music Awards and the iHeartRadio Jingle Ball Tour, and it’s why we’re the #1 podcast publisher by a lot. It all starts with using the trusted voices on our broadcast radio stations and creating demand – and with our unparalleled reach we have quite an advantage over the other audio players, regardless of their cash war chests.