With Covid abating and everything opening up, we’ll get a more normal set of holiday celebrations this year. Set up a special email address and tell everyone that if it’s happening in their town for the holidays, you wanna know about it. Let businesses and malls tell you when decorations go up, have mayors call to tell you about their Christmas tree lightings, etc. Be the market’s one-stop-spot for everything holidays with free plugs and fresh social media content.
Sometimes a simple update to an old idea makes it new again. Everyone’s pitted awful Halloween candy against itself to get calls. That one has been around since Marconi invented radio. How do you update this so it’s different and fresh? Kyle, Bryan, and Sarah, WRAL-FM, Raleigh figured out a fix. First, they tied it into the World Series, making it double-topical. The World Series of Worst Halloween Candies. Great name. Then, they wrote parody scripts as though the candies were in a WWE contest to present the matchups to the audience so they voted on-air and on their social media channels. The over-the-top scripts, voiced by a Joe Buck parody, isn’t meant to fool the audience – it’s just there to elevate the idea. Their social media engagement was through the roof because of these elements. Here are two examples of what they used this week.
Kyle, Bryan, and Sarah, MIX 101.5, Raleigh are creating a new group of listeners for their program. Knowing how people feel when they turn them on early, the show is branding early listeners Team No Sleep. Humans are very tribal so creating the group is really smart.
This is one of my all-time favorite breaks, done by the great Dave and Veronica, WQYK, Tampa several years ago. Dave was absolutely fearless and both had work ethics out the door. There was no idea we came up with that scared them, if they heard it in their head. With Halloween approaching, we wondered what it would be like to get local dignitaries to do their version of Vincent Price’s poem at the end of Michael Jackson’s Thriller. Knowing that there was a town hall meeting coming up in his building with the mayor of St. Pete, Dave decided to show up and ask the mayor to do it in front of a room full of people. The room had a righteous what-the-hell-is-going-on-here reaction when Dave took the mic. The mayor was confused, too. But he played along in this impressive break that no one else thought to do. The St. Pete mayor does Thriller. Go be different around the big topics. Think about the talk this one break caused for the show. Enjoy!
The best stories are comeback stories. Wanna be more local? Highlight local small businesses that fought their way through the pandemic and are back to thriving. Solicit for them on-air and then talk with the owners to celebrate their perseverance. The audience will applaud you if you do.
One of the character development traits we recently learned about Brittney and Zach, B100, South Bed, IN is that they both do their family’s laundry. How do you talk about this and develop a separate persona for each? By folding the laundry, bringing it into the studio, then finding a highly opinionated and very fun co-worker (Mother Mary) go through all your unmentionables to make whatever comments she wants as she dissects who’s good and who’s bad in the folding department. The extra is that it’s being done on Facebook live. But this very visual idea comes alive for those tuning in because Mother Mary’s commentary makes it so.
Program directors and talent wonder the same question: when will we get ratings? Managers and sales folks ask a different question: when will the show help me make money?
The trajectory has always been the same to answer both questions:
Content leads to…
Images which lead to …
Perceptions which lead to…
Ratings which lead to…
$$ Revenue $$
Doing the right content in the right way leads to positive images, which give you the right perceptions, which then generate ratings, which results in revenue.
It all starts with the right content. Remember: everything you do (everything!) is content to the audience. Are you making the best content choices all the time so they stick around or come back?
This trajectory applies to every show, and any format. Patience plays a critical role, but being strategic about your content, based on the age of the show and its relationship with the audience, informs the strategy.
Guess at that content and who knows where you’ll land? But have that right game plan and add in the patience noted above (it’s very important to be patient because you cannot move this along faster than the audience will allow) and you’ll make lots of money and might even become epic.
I’ve spoken before in Planet Reynolds about the foundational elements every show needs to be strategic: what is the show about (its “plot”)? What is your game plan for character development? Is the cast focused on earning the right images to drive loyalty? Does the show have significant benchmark appointments, that cannot be duplicated, which will drive occasions back to the program?
I talk with new shows about the “need for C’s”. A subjective metric to assess if your show is on course. These are the Four C’s every talent and show should work on, around the framework above, to assure they’re strategic. How would you rate your show in each of these areas?
The Four C’s: Connection, Companionship, Content, and Comedy.
It might be instructional to ask your show to grade themselves in each area on a 1-10 scale, with managers doing it, too. Compare those grades and see where you match. Any disparity gives great programmers an opportunity to influence their show with yet another strategic conversation about their growth.
I’d be interested to hear how that turns out so let me know.
Because grading your morning show and giving them all C’s might just keep you on the path to being f’n epic.
What’s the audience looking for when they turn you on? Yes, humor and companionship. They’re also looking to connect with people just like them. That is one of the foundational images that jettisons you to success. “They are just like me,” is one of the most powerful things an audience can say about its favorite morning show. Like all their fans, Karson and Kennedy, MIX 104.1, Boston is having issues when they order stuff online. Everywhere they turn, they can’t get what they want due to “supply chain issues”. Sometimes the best breaks are the easiest. A quick conversation to communicate they know what the audience is experiencing. Followed by phone calls of passionate (sometimes upset) listeners who cannot get the simplest things ordered in their life. Great radio is “me, too”. That’s when the audience hears the content and is entertained by it because it speaks for them, as well.
When you were a kid, was there a family in your neighborhood that was tormented Halloween night each year? If you played a role, why not find that family today and apologize on-the-air with them on the phone?