I can sometimes predict how a Frost Advisory will land. Sometimes it can be soothing to the ear, like a gentle breeze on an autumn day. (Pardon the mixed metaphor). Other times it can create discomfort with a frantic e-mail forwarding from GM to PD to air staff to chief engineer to receptionist with an accompanying “What do you make of this #?@#& tomfoolery?”
Frost Advisory #838 will be the latter.
Continue readingA station’s Program Director once proudly told me, “We only play 280 songs. With today’s Time Spent Listening stats, that’s all we need. A hit every song.”
Wrong. While “variety” has lost its meaning in the Imaging palette, it’s very real in the mind of the music-radio listener. That’s why Sirius/XM, Apple music, etc. thrive. There’s something new available all the time.
Continue readingI was driving to see my mechanic when I heard the news on the radio about Dolly Parton. I sat in the lobby for an hour or so and everyone… everyone that came in the shop talked about Dolly.
Some observations:
Continue readingWhile mainly working with radio stations over the last 30 years, I also worked with some television air talent. Spending the bulk of my career in Texas (Dallas and Houston), where they often outshone the major TV networks, I was able to help a few people in those markets. But coaching them helped me even more in dealing with smaller market TV folks.
Example: in Spokane, while I was coaching two radio stations, they also asked me to do some sessions with their TV stations’ news anchors.
Continue readingIt’s a curious thing. A few understand it, but most do not. In over 25 years in the format I’ve never been a part of an interview where a potential program director or air talent was even asked if they knew what the format was about.
Coming from a background in mainstream radio I didn’t really understand what our format was about either. I thought the format was about the music we play, the deejays, the promotions and doing radio stuff. After all, that’s radio, right? I had to undergo a process of learning that our format is about something much more important. I learned it from listening to our listeners.
Continue readingIn 30 years of Talent Coaching all sized markets, I’ve found that the smaller market radio stations often have something that the medium and large markets don’t have – Authenticity.
While their formatics may sometimes be weak by major market standards, they often MEAN more to listeners. The reason is simple: they can be local. So, they can reflect more easily what the majority of their listeners really care about and identify with – and that’s the whole Content ballgame.
Continue readingBack to school time is everywhere. In the stores with sales. On the streets with school buses. There are even tax free days for Back to School. It’s not an official holiday like Christmas, Ground Hog Day, or Millard Fillmore’s birthday, but it is just as evident.
Back to school affects everyone’s schedule, even those that don’t go to school. (Can’t say that about ole’ Millard’s birthday.)
Continue readingOne of the things that makes it hard to coach people is when their whole on-air position is just a catch phrase. A TV station in my hometown uses “On Your Side” as its ‘positioning’ statement. It’s in all their stupid promos. But it’s meaningless.
“On my side” for what? A lawsuit? A basketball game at the gym? A street fight? My political affiliation? My battle with every restaurant to not put onions or garlic in my food?
Their “position” is actually prone (as in “lying face downward” or “lying flat,” according to the dictionary).
Continue readingWhen the great artist and sculptor Michelangelo was asked how he created his famous 17-foot-tall statue of David he responded, “It was easy. I just took away everything that didn’t look like David.”
That profound simplicity could be a nifty way to approach fine tuning your radio station.
If people come to your station to be encouraged just take away the stuff that doesn’t do that.
Continue readingWhen I listen to the radio, the first thing is – I want to feel a human being there. Not just some quacky-voiced announcer who’s sitting there playing Wordle on their iPhone during the songs. And certainly not someone in the Talk arena who sounds like their every remark is prepared. (BE prepared, but don’t sound too prepared.)
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