Image courtesy of Gareth Cliff on Facebook
South African radio personality and CliffCentral founder Gareth Cliff talks to HumanIPO about his move away from traditional broadcasting and what he sees as the future of the medium.
HumanIPO: When did you first decide to leave 5fm, and when was CliffCentral conceptualised?
Gareth Cliff: Going online is the way all content producers will eventually have to go. If you have something valuable to give an audience, you’re not paying attention if they can’t find it online. 5FM renews its contracts annually, in April. While I was in New York in February, I started making the decision.
How has it been going? How have the figures been?
So far it has been superb. We broke records on the first day – I think a lot of people were curious, but the best news is that our listenership is mostly very consistent. As you may or may not know, we had over 60,000 people subscribe to CliffCentral before we had even explained properly what it was. Once you’ve heard and watched what we’re doing, normal radio sounds lame.
Does the move to online broadcasting allow you to be more controversial?
Yes, but also get more substance in. I’m not interested in shocking anyone – we just want to give people a valuable listening and viewing experience. There’s a lot of content – entertainment, intelligence, inspiration and empowerment. It’s so much more than playing eight songs an hour.
What advantages does the relatively unregulated internet offer?
We don’t have to comply with all the self-imposed rules of broadcasters, and we don’t have to worry about all the things that make it so hard to deliver to the audience in traditional radio and TV. All we care about, is the audience’s own wishes, and the needs of our sponsors – in that order.
How did commercialisation hinder you at 5fm? How will you avoid it now?
It didn’t hinder me, but it became onerous: We had to do a give-away every day; we had to play a bunch of one-minute long SABC promos; we had to do very dry commercial messaging because it was logged and scripted and sold by people who didn’t put the audience first. There’s a way to do commercial things where everyone wins, but that didn’t always happen.
Are South Africans willing to embrace online radio? Are data costs an issue? Will traditional radio really ever die?
No, radio won’t die, but the platform is less important than ever. Rich, discerning people will want to choose their content more carefully and they’ll pay the costs to get what they want. I’m not looking to steal audience from Ukhozi FM. Data costs are going to come down, the internet is more reliable than an FM signal in most of the country, and radio is trapped by it’s own success, unable to take the next step. We will offer listeners something they can’t get anywhere else, and we’re confident that we will also find ways to deliver it that cost next to nothing. We’ve already started that with deals like the WeChat/MTN/CliffCentral internet service package.
What role do smartphones play in all this? Why have you linked up with WeChat?
Smartphones are very important. These devices are always with the user and are their main (sometimes only) source for all content – music, TV, movies, clips, programmes, connecting to friends and posting their own stuff. WeChat and CliffCentral can offer a mobile solution that benefits the user.
How will you work on building CliffCentral’s audience?
By doing great things on air. We’re on the internet, on mobile, on live TV, on DStv.com, and available as a podcast. There’s no other radio show in Africa that is doing that much, on that many platforms, with three solid hours of content daily. Once people try it, they’ll stick around.
Any plans for the future?
Getting CliffCentral off the ground and making it a tremendous success. We’ll also create opportunities for other young talented people to try and hone their skills as broadcasters. If you’re not paying attention, you might miss out.
