How to exaggerate your presence in syndication

Neal Boortz is syndicated by Dial Global and produced by Cox Radio / WSB in Atlanta.

His syndicators have an affiliate list online here

National advertisers want to reach the big markets. Let’s poke our heads into what stations in the big markets you can hear Boortz on: (click on the station call sign to see the predicted coverage pattern maps from radio-locater.com)

#1) New York City
Cox owned WSTC-AM and WNLK-AM (Simulcast)
  (only area along the Long Island sound gets the station due to the way AM signals carry on water)
#2)  Los Angeles
  KOSS-AM – station is in the high desert, which a mountain range between it and Los Angeles.  Zero people in the city of L.A. can hear this station
#3)  Chicago
  WJOL-AM – Joliet is just barely considered still in the Chicago suburbs.  Station airs 30 minutes of local news in the middle of the show.  The portion of Chicago that the signal reaches is the poverty stricken, mostly minority South Side
#4) San Francisco
  no affiliate
#5)  Dallas-Ft Worth
  Lists KAND-AM – station sold 6 months ago, Country Music station – no sign of Boortz on web site, not airing the show.   Even if it was, none of the Metroplex is within its local signal area
#6) Houston
  None
#7)  Atlanta   (list shows Atlanta as #8)
  Lists 8 stations  (WSB AM/FM is the home station)
#8)  Philadelphia
  None
#9) Washington DC
  None
#10) Boston
  None

The other day, Neal was complaining that he wasn’t being blamed for the shootings in Arizona, and he was mostly serious.

The point of this little story is that if you’re a national radio advertiser, don’t rely on a list of affiliates to give you any hint at the actual audience the show reaches.