Throughout 2020, starting at the beginning of the year, San Diego radio station KFBG 100.7-FM, which calls itself 100.7 BIG-FM, played a variety of music without on-air talent. That changed in early January when Corey Dylan joined the station as its first deejay.
“I’m thrilled given what’s happening right now in the radio industry with job cuts by the larger companies,” Dylan told Times of San Diego. “I’m fortunate to be working for a local company that’s interested in putting people to work. This is really a dream job.”
Dylan is hosting the 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. time slot. It’s actually the second time in her 20-year radio career when she has been named a radio station’s first on-air deejay. It previously happened in Tampa, at WPOI 101.5-FM.
Prior to KFBG-FM, she spent the past two years in Atlanta at WKHX New Country 101.5-FM. Her career has included four years in Seattle with KZOK-FM and KBKS-FM, as well as 17 years in the Tampa-St. Petersburg, Fla. market as an on-air TV host for a syndicated variety show called “Daytime” and on-air talent for radio stations WMTX 100.7-FM and WPOI 101.5-FM.
A native of Detroit who grew up in Seattle, Dylan also has worked as a voice-over talent for such brands as Hewlett-Packard, Alessi/Vigo Foods and the Arizona Coyotes of the National Hockey League. She also spent three years selling home-technology products on Home Shopping Network. In her second HSN appearance, Dylan’s 12-minute presentation contributed to selling more than $41,000 of a product that had not previously sold well.
“I’m proof that sometimes you life can change for the better with a phone call out of the blue,” said Dylan. “It was the day after the November election. Because of the pandemic, I had been working at home at my kitchen counter since March. My phone rang and it was an unfamiliar number starting with an eight. I didn’t answer it, but then they called again. It was a voice from the past. Garett (Michaels, KFBG program director) and I worked together in Seattle in 2001. It was the best news I had heard since the pandemic started.”
Michaels said, “Corey is the consummate radio professional. In addition to her outstanding on-air skills, she brings a broad range of multimedia skills that make her the ideal choice to anchor mornings on 100.7 BIG-FM. We’re excited to bring her back to the West Coast, and to have her on the team.”
“`Never turn down an adventure’ is a personal motto,” said Dylan. “You have to say yes to stuff when it comes your way. That’s because life never happens as you plan it. I’m thrilled to be close to family (her sister lives in San Diego) and call America’s Finest City my home.”
KFBG-FM is owned by radio station operator Local Media San Diego, which began operating the 100.7-FM frequency in January 2020, after acquiring KFMB 100.7-FM and KFMB 760-AM from Tegna, Inc. (NYSE: TGNA). LMSD added KFMB-FM to its existing cluster of three Mexican-licensed stations, including XHRM-FM Magic 92.5, XHTZ-FM Z-90.3 and XTRA-FM 91X.
In March 2020, when the Federal Communications Commission officially approved the sale from Tegna, LMSD then sold the AM station to iHeart San Diego.
In April 2020, the FCC approved LMSD’s call-letter change from KFMB-FM to KFBG-FM. The station offers a wide variety of music and different adult-hits genres from such artists as Aerosmith, Prince, Queen Madonna, Fleetwood Mac, Bon Jovi, Adele, Depeche Mode, Billy Idol, the Beatles, Michael Jackson, Duran Duran, Phil Collins, Coldplay, the Rolling Stones and Bob Marley.
SOCi Raises Another $80 Million to Accelerate Growth
SOCi, a San Diego-based developer of social media and marketing tools to help multi-location brands, has closed a Series D investment round of $80 million led by La Jolla-based JMI Equity. Additional participation included Ankona Capital, Afif Khoury, SOCi CEO and co-founder, and Doug Winter, SOCi board member and co-founder and CEO of Seismic. A statement said SOCi plans to use the funding to accelerate growth with investments in sales and marketing teams, an aggressive lineup of product innovations and strategic mergers-and-acquisition activity.
A SOCi spokesperson told Times of San Diego the company — with the latest infusion of additional capital — has now raised roughly $115 million since its founding in 2012.
The SOCi platform is leveraged by more than 350 national and global enterprises, including Ace Hardware, Anytime Fitness, Hertz Corporation, Nekter Juice Bar and others, to effectively manage local search, social, reviews and ad campaigns for more than 100,000 individual business locations. In 2020, the company added more than 100 new customers and nearly 30,000 additional business locations to its platform. SOCi also invested heavily in product innovation, expanding its platform with 55 new features and products.
In a statement, Khoury said, “The localized marketing movement could not have been more important than it was in 2020. For multi-location enterprises, the ability to connect with local audiences across numerous key marketing channels was critical to keeping their local businesses afloat. SOCi’s comprehensive platform was built to optimize that local engagement in every meaningful way, and we are proud to have empowered so many brands and their locations to thrive in an environment where so many have struggled. JMI Equity’s investment in SOCi in the midst of such a tumultuous time is a testament to SOCi’s value to its customers, as well as to its leadership, execution, and the tremendous market opportunity out in front of us. JMI’s experience and expertise investing in high-growth enterprise software companies, as well as their acumen for M&A, will help us move aggressively through 2021, and accelerate our localized marketing industry leadership.”
“All signs point to an equally difficult first few months of this year for restaurants and other businesses dependent on their communities,” said Suken Vakil, general partner, JMI Equity. “This means there will be a continued need for localized marketing campaigns that align with national brand values but also provide for community-specific messaging. SOCi’s multi-location functionality positions it as a market leader that currently stands far beyond its competitors as the must-have platform solution for multi-location franchises-brands.”
The Mightier 1090 Debuts ‘Out of Nowhere’
“Out of Nowhere,” featuring former San Diego Chargers players Danny Woodhead and Matt Slauson, is the newest sports-talk show on XEPRS 1090-AM, The Mightier 1090. The show airs from 6 to 7 p.m. Mondays.
Woodhead, signed in 2008 as an undrafted free agent by the New York Jets after setting rushing records at Chadron State College in Nebraska, played 10 years in the National Football League. He also played for the New England Patriots, San Diego Chargers and Baltimore Ravens.
Slauson, who played football at the University of Nebraska, was signed by the New York Jets in the sixth round of the 2009 draft. He also played for the Chicago Bears, San Diego and Los Angeles Chargers and Indianapolis Colts before retiring after the 2018 season.
“Out of Nowhere is another great addition to our all-star lineup,” said Bill Hagen, station operator. “Each day we continue to build this historic radio station back into a powerhouse.”
Hagen, owner of Out The Window Advertising, a Flagstaff, Ariz.-based ad agency, re-launched the San Diego-based sports-talk station in August 2020 after it had been off the air since April 2019.
IABC San Diego Plans Webinar on Minneapolis Black Lives Matter Riots
The International Association of Business Communicators San Diego chapter will host “Communicating the Chaos, Lessons from the Frontlines,” a free webinar on crisis communications during last year’s Minneapolis riots, from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m., on Thursday, Jan. 28, over Zoom.
Minneapolis native and IABC Minnesota member Paul Omodt will discuss how a group of veteran crisis communicators were assembled to assist state and local officials in developing communications strategies and tactics as the city burned and protests raged following the death of George Floyd on Memorial Day 2020.
IABC said the group became a critical part of the state’s command structure and provided skills and guidance that helped return peace to the city. For more event information, visit http://sandiego.iabc.com/.
Rick Griffin is a San Diego-based public relations and marketing consultant. His MarketInk column appears weekly on Mondays in Times of San Diego.