Radio’s Mojo
27 May, 2008 05:29:00

This has been bothering me for quite some time: When did Radio People become so wimpy and insecure? Who did we leave in charge of our Mojo, and where did he hide it?

I grew up in a business full of pirates, Merlins, and dream catchers: Jim Hilliard, George Burns, Gordon McClendon, Kent Burkhart, Rick Sklar, Bill Meeks, Steve Berger, E Karl. Lucky me, I worked with many of them.
There used to be a ‘damn the flying monkeys, full speed ahead’ swagger to Radio innovators like Bill Drake, Hal Neal, and Jim Long.

What happened?

I woke up one morning and we were all in a corner nervous and shivering about satellite radio and its 300,000 channels. Yes, those same channels that go deeper into the red by hundreds of millions of dollars every Quarter. Yes, the same channels that can’t exist at all unless there is a dubious merger between the two players.

So, we were spooked and panicky about………?

Then it was hand-wringing over the people meter … never mind that it’s a poor substitute for good research and has yet to pass muster in all the pending markets, “…we’ve got to give the agencies something…” “…it’s better than the diary…” even if it’s going to own your research budget line and flip the whole relationship of cume to AQH on its head.

Posting? Sure! Why not commit to a bucket full of make-goods and do-overs that are sure to detonate the PDs format clocks and make any attempt at inventory management and spot limits another dreamy artifact from Radio’s distant past?

We talk Local and put on more and more national and network shows over which we have no creative control. We have become television -- a handful of generally poorly-done local moments surrounded mostly by network feeds. Even when we claim to have local creative oversight, it takes us almost two months to deal with a racist song we let air for days and days. Or, we run local contests that injure and kill listeners. At least they are, were, Local listeners. We have that goin’ for us.

We waste our time on HD channels when no one owns an HD Radio while we virtually ignore the Web where millions and millions are on line 24/7/52.

And, while I’m at it -- At what meeting did we decide a two-share was just fine and dandy, thank-you very much?

So, I ask: Will the person who has been hiding Radio’s Mojo please FedEx it to me? I have a couple of people who know what to do with it.

All yours, Willie…

“My heroes have always been cowboys.

And they still are, it seems.

Sadly, in search of, but one step in back of,

Themselves and their slow-movin' dreams.”

Bob Harper
www.BobHarper.com

Absolutely accurate. Radio handed the game to Wall Street. They will not get it back any time soon.

It's still there, but there are too many PDs who just threw up ther hands because the creative control was taken away. Can't staff the station as you want when the budget isn't there. Some of 'em battled till they left or were shown the door. Some of them stayed around but now oversee 3 or 4 or more stations rather than 1. When you get spread so thinly, something suffers. Spend your time and resources to cement the #1 position of your "NEW COUNTRY" station, and there is no money left to staff and promote the Classic Rock and Hot AC also under your wing. Ask for more money, and you are told that will cut into the margin for the entire cluster. Want to go head to head with the rival Classic hits across town? Do it with existing staff and resources. VT that midday slot, run segueway serenade nights and weekends. get that sydie show for overnight. You have only so many hours in a day. If you run one station, you can concentrate all of your efforts on making that the best. Running three, and something won't get your full attention.

A MANDATORY job skill today is the ability to delegate responsibilities. You might be the Cluster PD/OM, and you know you will catch ALL of the heat for any shortcomings, but you have to have the confidence in your staff. Many of todays PDs do not have that necessary skill. They run off the corporate template and there is no room for innovation and no encouragement of creativity in many places. My way or the highway across the board. Wanna try that? Get it approved first, keep focused on the next 12 in a row, color inside the lines. Mr. PD doesn't want to catch flak from the regional programming VP when the computer printout showed DJ Bob played Jet at 10:23am on Tuesday when the music log specifically called for "Band On The Run" in that slot. Can't be honoring a request! Don't care if it's the same Artist! Follow the damn log! Damn it Jet is a "B" song The other an "A" title. NO "B" titles in that Clock Position!!! If you can't control your people we will get someone in here who can!!!

Trivial? Happens all the time in some places.

Trust your people to keep their audience entertained. When the listeners slip because DJ Bob is a wild renegade, you'll know.

The problem is too many stations, too many move ins at the expense of communities that lost their local station. Too many new stations coming on line. All are fighting for a piece of the pie. Rate integrity is compromised when the sales guy is selling the CLUSTER rather than a station, and can add on stations without adding on revenue. Sure, the talker is about sold out in the morning, but for an addition 10 percent we can add 10 30s on the Nostalgia and 10 on the Hot AC.
over budget Mr. advertiser, OK I'll throw the extras in at no charge for your 3 month commitment. If the staff is out selling the Cluster rather than the station, we save on people we don't need 6 sales people for each station. we can have 10 cover all five. Same with the talent. VTs and Tesh, Lia and Delilah, Rushbo and Hannity, Coast to Coast overnight, Savage, Bob and Tom, by golly do it right and we can get by with a few locals, some PT board ops, and a sales staff to cover the local avails.

Sure the voices sound fine, but the "sameness" across the board, market after market has given listeners the impetius to sample other options like sat rad. They are bored and passive.

Personal music sources have been around forever, records, cassettes, 8 tracks, walkmans, I-Pods, but radio always had an audience. People LIKE to be connected. They like to here someone talikng about things they like. sharing info about music they enjoy, hearing something that makes them think, makes them laugh, or makes them feel smarter than the guy on the other side of the mic.

Owners have ALWAYS been in the business to make money. They still are, but with the inflated prices of broadcast properties came mega financing and stock offerings. So rather than contending with the budget of your 7 mostly regional TVs and Radios, you now have layers of management and compartmentalization, budgeting, acquiring, spinning off, and financing hundreds of stations and hundreds of millions of dollars. The paper holders want instant returns. Miss that quarterly estimate by 2 percent? Cut 10 the next quarte to cover it. Hey we turned a profit isn't good enough. The percentage necessary to keep the investors happy has to be high enough to keep their money in place. Meet the estimate or they will pull their cash and seek another venue. HEY, Oil and Gold are looking good. Wall street does NOT look for creativity and innovation, and the owners and managers of stations are not going to risk their cluster coming up short to push for their idea of "GOOD RADIO".

Hence, some great people sitting on the sidelines, some mediocre people in place who do only what someone else dictates, while offering no input of their own, and an industry that serves Wall Street first rather than the local people who are the catalysts for creating revenue. Top down not bottom up.

The focus should be on the audience whose numbers create the interest in the advertisers, whose dollars generate the income, to pay the bills.

Offer the best product possible, to generate the most listeners possible to generate the most advertisers possible at the higest rates possible.

Offer a mediocre, prefab, product and keep your costs low, but run the risk that you audience won't be maximized, nor you revenue........

That's where we stand today.

and I'll stop here rather than bore you any further

OK sabres drawn..........

Cut away!

As you addressed near the end of your post, money will find content. All those that keep trying to count the money have no concept or dedication to developing great content. Instead, they focus on cost cutting and wonder how radio's dollars dried up. And, you are right, not enough people are willing to fight, as they need work. But, what a compromise.

The fight is still there, John Gorman comes to mind, but for some (me included) we are no more effective fighting from the outside as we were fighting on the inside. Still fighting though......

I happily welcome the changes that made for a more enhanced workplace and an easier work place...Maestro and selector, web pages and streaming are fine tools to enhance the presentation. BUT in too many places, they are used to replace broadcast content. Taking a phone callers input on the air is immediate and interactive. Having a listener hit the website to answer todays poll question while interactive, is a passive activity that does nothing to enhance the presentation of the station. Hosting a LIVE "Battle of the Bands" weekend is more interactive than having listeners go online to vote for you favorite K*** artist and song while the VTs intro another looooooong muzac sweep...
cheaper to deliver but what is the long term cost?