Features
‘He agreed to do that, he wants to win in Melbourne’: KIIS boss says Kyle Sandilands will cut the smut in 2025
Millions of dollars were spent launching Kyle and Jackie O into the Melbourne radio market, but the duo have so far failed to make a dent - even repelling many who don't want sex talk over breakfast.
As ARN's chief content officer Duncan Campbell tells Mumbrella, even Kyle agrees it might be time to tone it down.
Kyle and Jackie O have been on air in Melbourne since late April, and are currently ranked eighth in the breakfast radio ratings, with a modest 5.1% audience share.
Worse, their share seems to be slipping: the first full ratings book they were on air for saw them take a 6.1% share, which dropped to 5.2% the following survey, and again to 5.1% in the latest survey this week.
When Mumbrella spoke to ARN’s chief content officer Duncan Campbell in August, Kyle and Jackie O had just won their 45th FM breakfast survey in a row in Sydney – but fumbled the ball in Melbourne.
Worse still, Jase and Lauren – the KIIS 101.1 show dumped to make room for Kyle and Jackie – had hit #1 for Nova; a position they have held since.
“I think we were all very enthusiastic about expectations early on,” he admitted at the time, adding: “It is going to take a bit longer.”
Now, ARN is changing tack with the show in order to win over Melbourne: less graphic sex talk, more… well, everything else. Surprisingly, Sandilands has agreed to this new edict.
“We know it’s a longer game now and a longer battle, if you like,” Campbell explains, hours after the release of the latest survey which finds the duo just one percentage point above AM sports radio station SEN.
“The positive that comes out of that is the cume (cumulative listenership) went up – it went up by only 8,000, but still, if it had have gone down, it would have been maybe a different conversation.
“But we know that’s a challenge and we’re preparing to reset and help change perceptions next year with more marketing. And the goal there is to get the lapsed cume back, listening to the show again.”
Next year, the marketing blitz will be less brash and unapologetic – sending a Barbie-pink K+J van to a Jase and Lauren radio event weeks after taking their jobs wasn’t the most gracious entry into the market — and more cap in hand.
“We believe, with the removal of the graphic sexual content, the show’s much, much easier to listen now. But that takes time to change perceptions, obviously.”
Campbell says this perception shift will be both public-facing – through marketing that takes a different approach, and by the actual on-air content shifting away from the more unsavoury elements seen historically on the show – and with ARN and KIIS’ clients: “Being proactive in that area, as well, just changing people’s perceptions of the show.”
Just last week, Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young slammed communications watchdog the ACMA for failing to investigate the “divisive and violent language about women and sex” on the program, arguing that it falls short of broadcast decency standards.
Campbell believes “the sexual content was really a small part of the show” and reasons “because it was graphic, it grabbed everyone’s attention – but he’s taken that off, really.”
Meaning Sandilands has toned down the content on the show?
“It’s still sexual content,” Campbell admits, “but not the graphic sexual content that it once was.”
He continues: “I think that’s detracted away from some of the really high quality content that that show produces. They’re fantastic with the interviews with celebrities and also, you know, people in general. It’s a fun show really overall. It’s a bit of a soap opera with all the ensemble cast there as well. So when you get engaged with the show, it becomes quite infectious.
“We just have to get people re-engaged with that show. That’s our goal.”
And Sandilands came to the table when it came to toning down the graphic sexual content?
“Yeah, he did,” Campbell confirms.
“I mean, he has creative control of the show. He agreed to do that, which was a real positive.
“And, I mean, he wants to win in Melbourne. There’s no doubt about that.”
To that end, Kyle and Jackie O will be spending more time in Melbourne next year, starting with “kicking off the Australian Open” and carrying through with a number of Melbourne-based broadcasts in the first quarter of 2025.
“There’s plans for them to be down there more often,” Campbell explains. “It’s a bit of a job still to do, but we’re determined to turn it around.
“I’m still convinced that show will be a successful show in Melbourne.”
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Nathan Jolly is the Features Editor at Mumbrella. He joined the team in July, 2023.
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The desperation is palpable.
There is no (graceful) plan B now that the commitment has been made invest $200M and roll these two out across the Nation. And unfortunately for ARN, according the breakfast ratings, the K&JO show seems to have already peaked in Sydney, which begs the question.. If the K&JO smut was the only thing propping up the Sydney ratings, what happens when they gentrify it for the Melbourne market. ARN have now put themselves into an almost impossible position imo.
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Can someone explain to me what Ciaran Davis has achieved at ARN
No Shareholder Value – A1N down over 40 %
25-54 ratings nationally are abysmal
SCA takeover a complete failure
No movement in Radio share as chair of CRA
100’s of redundancies – via poor employment decisions at senior management level
The Board continues to believe the snake oil salesman and shareholders should be screaming for change
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Very optimistic outlook above. The mood of Melbourne isn’t ambivalent it’s openly hostile to presence of K&J, gonna take a lot more than a modest shift in tone and some marketing I’d hazard to guess
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If I wanted to listen to a talentless hack with a god complex I wouldn’t have moved away from my former housemate.
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I only listened once to gauge the show and will never listen again no matter what they do…for parents taking lids to school in the morning it is totally unacceptable to have this crap on the radio…go Jase and Lauren….
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Rather than cut the smut ,Kyle’s program would probably do much better in Melbourne if the network simply cut both Kyle…and Jackie…and got the previous presenters back. These two no-talents from north of the Murray have already proven that they can not compete in a market where the competition is tougher and the standards are higher. Nothing complicated about it. I can only assume that the powers that be are airing Kyle’s mess in Melbourne as a tax write off. Kyle and Jackie are about as “funny”as a serious outbreak of cholera and as “interesting” as a boring collection of sea shells. What have Melbourne listeners done to deserve this terrible punishment? Please stop.
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I absolutely love the Kyle & Jackie’O show.
If you don’t like it then don’t listen it’s that simple. If boring G – rated radio is what you like then GREAT, that’s fine go listen to it and stop ruining it for everyone one else!!!
Shout out to Kyle & Jackie’O, im in Melbourne and love the show cheers!
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It’s like Trump— you just can’t figure out how he’s getting away with it— or how the Prime Minister is considering inviting him to his wedding. I suggest Elbo actually listen to 5 minutes of the show before he sends out the invite.
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Yep, i turned off a long time ago. Will the adult in the room please stand up, we can all be smutty – but ALL THE TIME? YEAH, NAA.
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Kyle get paid big all he does is bag everyone , hardly entertaining
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Congrats Melbournians. Sandilands is offensive. A mea culpa to gain some traction won’t work. Leopard/spots.
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I think it is time for them to hang up the mic. They are so irrelevant. We want entertainment, not rich people with connections (how else are they getting these deals) telling us their opinions.
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They’re too well known and too synonymous with Sydney to relaunch, people have an opinion on them already.
Their show is obviously a non listen to anyone with kids in the car or at the breakfast table. Parochially Melbourne people hate the arrogant Sydney people who thought they could just show up and grab the crown. The Melbourne radio audience are either old fuddy duddies listening to the AM dial or conditioned to expect NICE people on the radio. I can’t remember the last FM show that did well in Melbourne that you wouldn’t categorise as nice.
Should bite the bullet, refocus on Sydney, and find someone young, cheap and nice for the Melbourne market.
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Kyles fortunes seemed to have fallen in the same trajectory of the PM they latched on to each other after the election thinking it was a savvy move. That was always a poor judgement. Now albo is on the nose and the KJO radio show has sailed with him. Always pick your friends carefully.
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They’ll end this ratings and financial disaster at the end of financial year 2025. Sydneysiders will start to lose interest too, after realising what failures they have been in Melbourne.
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