Nova’s Smoothfm extends brand across Australia and names key partners
Ten years after launching in Sydney and Melbourne, NOVA Entertainment is taking smoothfm across Australia with live and local content in Brisbane, Adelaide, and Perth, supported by a multi-million dollar marketing campaign. The new stations and advertising campaign will start on 5 September 2022.
As well as taking smoothfm’s winning ‘feel good’ formula to even more Australians, the launch also provides advertisers with a national platform to reach more listeners across the country. The marketing campaign will run across TV, out-of-home (OOH), cinema, podcasting, digital, and socials and will be supported by a comprehensive experiential campaign. The brand campaign will roll out in several stages throughout the year with continued investment throughout 2023, with a full list of campaign credits to be released in the next few days.
NOVA chief growth officer, Adam Johnson told Mumbrella: “One of the things that I’m really passionate about is distribution, and for us, I think the penny drop moment was that we’re now getting to the point where you don’t really need a radio station to launch a radio station. Usually, you’d need an AM or FM license to have a radio brand, and those days are passed us. There’s no heritage there. The playlist goes back 30-40 years. So why wouldn’t we start to take it more broadly across the country rather than limit its exposure to the major cities?
“This really is a product and marketing effort based around distribution insight where on the 4 September we’re going to launch the campaign in Brisbane, Adelaide, and Perth, and tell people about this wonderful radio station called smoothfm that you can get on your DAB+ radio, or anywhere you listen to digital radio, be that a smart speaker, on an app, via a browser, and go from there,” said Johnson. “ We’ve got all these fantastic brands, and smoothfm is the one that’s under-distributed. It’s got such a universal proposition, with regards to music and presenters that make you feel good.”
“We are a proudly commercial business and brands that you hear on commercial radio are also a way to reinforce localness,” said Johnson. “The opportunity for advertisers is threefold, one is the local brands’ partners and agencies have more choice to ingrate into their campaigns, the second is our big national advertisers have another product which does address a different demo than NOVA does, and the third thing is integration. We have a great reputation for being able to integrate commercial partners into a brand-safe environment, and therefore in these new markets, there’s another opportunity to do that.”
Smoothfm has become one of the most successful media brands in the Australian radio landscape. The first Australian radio station to be programmed based on a mood rather than an era or genre, smoothfm’s playlist is curated to make listeners ‘feel good’ with announcers handpicked to complement the music format. The new markets will now have live breakfast shows hosted by respected broadcasters, Kate Mac in Perth, Nick Michaels in Brisbane, and Kellie Golding in Adelaide, providing a local connection and content for listeners in these states.
The brand has attracted a highly engaged audience across broadcast with 2.4 million listeners in Sydney and Melbourne, a 291% increase in cumulative broadcast listeners since launching in May 2012, and a further 76% increase in audiences accessing the station via streaming from March 2020 to July 2022.
NOVA Entertainment has worked with a number of category exclusive commercial partners for the launch of smoothfm across the country including Apia, Complete Home Filtration, Bedshed, Beaumont Tiles, Barbeques Galore, Crown Perth, Plico, and John Hughes Group. As Johnson mentioned, the audience can listen to smoothfm Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide on digital radio, smart speaker, or via the smooth player app.
NOVA Entertainment’s chief executive officer, Peter Charlton, said: “The organic discovery of smoothfm outside of its traditional FM heartlands has shown that the brand transcends geographies, with something for all Australians. With more and more listeners turning to DAB+, coupled with the rapid uptake of smart speakers and mobile devices for consuming audio, we felt the time was right to give smoothfm a national platform whilst ensuring a level of localness that our audiences expect. The investment and focus for this launch is at the level we would see for a traditional broadcast brand campaign, which is a reflection of the scale of the opportunity NOVA Entertainment sees in taking smooth across the country. We can’t wait to bring the feel-good to even more audiences.”
NOVA Entertainment’s chief commercial officer, Nick Young: added: “Whilst smoothfm has always been available to audiences outside of Sydney and Melbourne, with new breakfast shows and localised advertising output in five capital cities we now have a truly national proposition to offer advertisers. With the addition of the smooth relax, smooth vintage, and smooth 80s stations, we have a portfolio of ‘feel good’ content in brand-safe environments that we know our clients love.”
Reflecting the opportunity presented by the growth of smart speaker listening, smooth is partnering with Amazon Alexa to assist listeners in Brisbane, Adelaide, and Perth in discovering the brand. An integrated partnership will see the popular ‘smooth stars’ promotion delivered nationally for the first time and with the help of Alexa on air, listeners will learn how to engage with their Amazon device whilst enjoying their favourite ‘feel good’ station.
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