{"id":490643,"date":"2019-09-27T13:23:01","date_gmt":"2019-09-27T19:23:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=890883"},"modified":"2019-09-27T13:23:01","modified_gmt":"2019-09-27T19:23:01","slug":"a-number-one-radio-hit-costs-200000-according-to-one-label-head","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/music-news\/a-number-one-radio-hit-costs-200000-according-to-one-label-head\/","title":{"rendered":"A Number One Radio Hit Costs $200,000, According to One Label Head"},"content":{"rendered":"
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In April, P. Diddy\u2019s Revolt Media announced plans for a \u201cHip Hop Summit,\u201d with Diddy promising to \u201cempower young people with sessions on the issues they care about.\u201d \u201cFrom entrepreneurship and economic empowerment to social justice, we\u2019ll have the provocative conversations not happening anywhere else,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Sure enough, in a session that featured the rapper 2 Chainz and Coach K \u2014 who helped found the label Quality Control, known for breaking Migos, Lil Yachty, and Lil Baby \u2014 there was a brief-but-provocative detour into the cost of radio<\/a> promotion.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything costs money, it\u2019s the way of life,\u201d Coach K says. Radio is no different. \u201cWhen you sign an artist, [they\u2019re like], \u2018so, when am I going to radio?’\u201d the executive continues. \u201cTo take a record that y\u2019all see on the radio become Number One, that\u2019s $200,000.\u201d<\/p>\n

Coach K did not say what the money was needed for or how it was spent. A representative for Coach K did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

In an August article in Rolling Stone<\/em><\/a>, radio veterans detailed the process of buying their way onto the radio chart by paying to get added to different stations\u2019 playlists. \u201cAt a format like Triple A<\/a>, it probably averages about $500 [per add],\u201d one radio promoter explained. \u201cIn Hot AC<\/a> and Top 40<\/a>, could be anywhere from $1,000 to $2,000 depending on the competition.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Two other radio veterans estimated that the total cost of promoting a song to \u201curban\u201d radio and transforming it into a hit was between $100,000 and $125,000.<\/span> Coach K\u2019s estimate of $200,000 suggests that burden for artists hoping to win at radio today might be even higher.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, the cost is down somewhat compared to the 1990s. In Hit Men: Power Brokers and Fast Money Inside the Music Business<\/em>, Fredric Dannen\u2019s detailed history of radio pay-for-play, he writes that it cost more than $350,000 to get Semisonic\u2019s \u201cClosing Time\u201d significant airplay in the Alternative, Top 40, and AC formats. Despite that expense, \u201cClosing Time\u201d did not become a Top Ten hit. <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/blockquote>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In April, P. Diddy\u2019s Revolt Media announced plans for a \u201cHip Hop Summit,\u201d with Diddy promising to \u201cempower young people with sessions on the issues they care about.\u201d \u201cFrom entrepreneurship and economic empowerment to social justice, we\u2019ll have the provocative conversations not happening anywhere else,\u201d he added. Sure enough, in a session that featured the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-490643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-music-news"],"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-21 16:29:39","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KQZR - The Reel","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490643\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kqzr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}