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A Super Brand in the Media Landscape: How Nova has Started Dominating the Airwaves

It’s not surprising that, given his title, NOVA Entertainment’s chief growth officer Adam Johnson is pleased at the moment. The growth across both the Nova Network and sister network Smooth FM has been remarkable this year.

With the recently-recruited Jason Hawkins and Lauren Phillips, Nova 100 now has the top FM Breakfast show in the highly contested Melbourne market, while Ricki-Lee, Tim & Joel are not only commanding Drive, with the most-listened show nationally in the 4-6pm slot, but is now the most-listened to networked show in the country.

“We’re delighted of course,” Johnson tells Mumbrella. “The speed at which [Jase and Lauren] have made the transition from the previous brand over to Nova has been great, both internally and culturally but also with listeners. And then, to have done it in three-and-a-half surveys is more than we could have ever hoped for, if I’m honest.”

Adam Johnson

The ‘previous brand’ was, of course KIIS, who unceremoniously dumped the duo after signing Kyle and Jackie O to a new $200 million deal that involved expanding into Melbourne. This was in late November, 2023, and by February, the pair had signed with Nova, taking over the Breakfast slot during the second week of March.

It was an obvious fit – as NOVA’s chief content officer Brendan Taylor told Mumbrella in July, when the pair climbed to second spot in Book 4, Hawkins and Phillips “always should have been on Nova.”

Now, it’s late August, and the pair can already boast the #1 FM Breakfast show in the most competitive market in the country, with 9.9% of the market. Meanwhile, Kyle and Jackie O, who shunted them out of their seats at KIIS, are currently hosting the #5 FM Breakfast show in Melbourne, with just 6.1% share.

Of course, Jase and Lauren didn’t jump into empty seats, either, with previous Nova 100 breakfast team Ben Harvey, Liam Stapleton and Belle Jackson sliding into a new national show, Late Drive with Ben, Liam and Belle, airing nightly between 6pm-8pm, directly after Ricki-Lee, Tim & Joel.

“We’re bookending the day really well at the moment,” Johnson says. “The Drive show is a big vehicle for us, in terms of overall audience and from a commercial point of view as well. They’re great to have on the network.

“And then obviously, when Jase and Lauren came in, that created a reshuffle towards the back end of the day. And that Ben, Liam and Belle show just goes from strength to strength – it’s a natural fit for a national show.”

Johnson says “it’s fallen into place – some of it by accident, some by design”.

It’s not all roses at NOVA Entertainment. After climbing to the top spot in the Sydney FM market last survey, with consistent growth throughout all of 2024, smoothfm has now fallen 0.1% behind KIIS in the country’s biggest market, something that rankles Johnson.

“Smooth has had a really good start to the year,” he reasons, “and, the GFK survey is a fickle mistress,” he laughs. “She gives and takes away sometimes. So you can never really predict what’s going to happen. But to be that close is both validating of the strategy, and also slightly disappointing to not be at that number one spot – in both both cities, actually.”

SmoothFM currently sits at #2 in Melbourne’s FM market – and is sniffing out the top spot.

“It’s carved out its own niche. I genuinely believe that in a world, particularly in Melbourne, where there’s a lot of noise around the music radio stations, lots of competitions and those kinds of things, audiences are looking for something a bit different – and you just can’t argue with a more music, less talk proposition, when some of the people are genuinely seeking that out.

“The work we’ve done this year repositioning the brand around ‘Together In Music’, has helped create that destination in people’s minds. And we’re seeing them seeing the benefits of that.”

When asked what he credits Nova’s overall success to, Johnson jokes, “if I could distill that, I would probably be better at my job,” before offering up a compelling reason – namely the strong national brands they have built up, in a world of city-centric marketing.

“I’m unbelievably fortunate to have a brand that is just – it is a super brand in the media landscape,” he said. “And we’re very fortunate to have that.

“The strategy of having a network brand, while the different brands in each market has played out very well for us, it allows you to do things like, you know, Nova’s Red Rooms, for example, that cast a brand halo across all of our stations – regardless of what city they’re in.

“And, when you have a measurement system, which is about salience, ultimately — it’s about the people recalling the brands that they use, the brands they listen to, the brands they think of — strong branding is really important.

The selling proposition is a lot clearer too, when there’s a nationally recognisable brand to take to market. Johnson believes the fractured city-based approach is fading away.

“From a marketing point of view, when I started my marketing career in Australia in 2003, you would buy Metro campaigns, you’d buy cap cities, and you would assume that audiences would be exposed to the campaigns that are run in your city.

“We now live in a hyper-connected world where people consume content, not just from all around the country, but all around the world. And therefore the media platforms that support that, they tend to have ubiquitous brand-led messaging.

He notes the ‘networks’ that some of Nova’s competitors tout aren’t actually a consistent brand in consumer’s minds, no matter how they wish to spin it. Nova is Nova – no matter which city you hear it in.

“Having a single brand proposition, and having a consistent brand message and being true to that brand, however you execute, is definitely our strategy.”

First published by Mumbrella. Read original here