We radio folk tend to think of tune out as a benign little concept akin to teenagers button pushing looking for the latest Taylor Swift song. While that does happen and we should do our darnedest to minimize programming that results in tune out, there is a far more ominous idea lurking in the bushes.

Some people leave a brand and never come back.

A friend of a friend told me that when people leave a car brand they seldom come back. Eek! Specifically, when folks have an accident they are far less likely to purchase that brand of car again. Maybe it’s partly psychological (“It’s the car’s fault”), or maybe it’s the potential embarrassment of the folks at your dealership pegging you as the one that side-swiped the delivery truck of kumquats headed toward the orphanage. (There’s a sentence you don’t see real often!)

What if we radio folk considered the seriousness of “tune out” as if the listeners were NEVER going to tune back in? That is, they were likely to leave the brand once and for all.

You’ve probably seen them. The clever little social media posts that say something like “Tell me you’re from Texas without mentioning Texas.”

There’s also…

“Tell me you love pizza without saying pizza.”

“Tell me you love baseball without mentioning baseball.”

You get the idea.

In our case, tell me that you reflect my values without saying you reflect my values.

It was an hour that never existed.

We changed our clocks from 2 AM to 3 AM. Rod Serling might say, “Imagine if you will that one hour never existed. No babies were born. No one died. Next stop, the Twilight Zone!”

That hour doesn’t matter.

Waiting through the first part of a boring movie. You hope it will get better.

Sitting down at a restaurant. The waiter is slow to come over. Minutes tick by without giving your drink order. You hope it will get better.

What’s the best time to buy Christmas decorations?

Yep! AFTER Christmas!

Ever wonder why Valentine Day’s cards are half price AFTER Valentine’s Day, appliances at cheapest after the big Labor Day sale, and car dealers are eager to sell to you at $100 over invoice?

It’s because they don’t just make money off of selling stuff, they make money off of MOVING stuff.

They make no money when stuff sits on the shelf. And it takes up the space that could be used for something that MOVES.

When I checked out of my hotel I told the desk clerk, “You may want to have someone check the thermostat in my room. I never could get the room to warm up on the chilly night.”

I shared that the thermostat had numerous functions that made the simple process of making the room warmer almost impossible to figure out.

The desk clerk replied, “Yeah, that remote is pretty complicated.”

I don’t like to brag but I was third chair Sousaphone player in high school band. I could puff out my cheeks right along with the best in a three county radius. My West Texas public school education learned me a lot about good music.

But enough about me. I wonder what we could learn by comparing the design of a radio station to that of a great song.

Let’s start at the beginning. Perhaps you’d like to take notes.

Programming consists of two distinct elements – music, and the stuff that isn’t music. (Well, now! THAT’S some fancy talk!)

For almost a year now life has been very different for most of us. Many aren’t commuting to work resulting in morning and afternoon drive radio listening being very different. Some are homeschooling their kids through no choice of their own. Many have experienced restaurants at minimal capacity, social connections significantly limited, and churches closed. (I’m a part of a new church launch that was shut down longer than we were open.)

Are we grateful for our listeners? Are we grateful they still make us a part of their daily lives?

“Gratitude unexpressed is perceived as ingratitude.”

Andy Stanley

For the last twenty years I’ve spent enough time on airplanes and in rental cars that they’ve awarded me me special status. I get to board before the family of 17 heading off to Walt Disney World, a can of Fresca delivered with my licorice chewies, and I get assigned cars with fancy GPS systems that tell me, “You’re going the wrong way!”

So, what do those companies think of me when I’m hardly traveling at all?

We can all remember the first time someone said, “I love you.” (We can also painfully remember when someone didn’t).

We are created to be known. From the early playground experiences of “Mommy, mommy, look at me,” to the moment you discovered the pretty girl knew your name.

“To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything.”

Timothy Keller

Being known means we’re valued, seen as special. Being known validates who were are, that we have worth.

There is no place this is more evident than in the greeting card aisle at your local supermarket or drug store.

Take a look at your high school yearbook. I dare you. It’s embarrassing to think about how we used to think.

How could we possible have… thought that was cool… dressed like that… worn our hair like that?

In my not-so-effortless transition from thinking that programming a radio station was about 1) playing cool songs I like, and 2) evaluating talent on the basis of “he’s got a good voice and runs a tight board,” to embracing things like strategy, branding, and actually mattering to people, one of the first books I came across was Al Reis and Jack Trout’s “The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing.” (Do yourself a favor and read it.)

One of the concepts shared was “The Law of Sacrifice.”

On last week’s show I shared despite the fact that vanilla ice cream ranks as most people’s favorite there are NO vanilla ice cream stores. In other words “favorite” is not the only consideration. “Interesting” matters, too. Surprise and delight matters.

In my opinion one of the biggest challenges of Christian radio is the tendency to do the same old things the same old way. I know stations that don’t sound significantly different than they did ten years ago and yet the world has changed around them. Never has this been more obvious due to the pandemic.

“If you leave a white post alone it will soon be a black post. If you particularly want it to be white you must be always painting it again; that is, you must be always having a revolution. Briefly, if you want the old white post you must have a new white post.”

G. K. Chesterton