Christine and Salt, WTIC-FM, Hartford, with Connecticut Etiquette

You need experts on your show.  People who have an expertise in some area who can add to your breaks when you do that kind of content.  Think Oprah, who understood the value of doing relationships-based content and went out and found Dr. Phil.  Her ratings were always higher when he was on her show (until she realized they could make more money if Dr. Phil had his own show).  Put a list together of experts who can add to your show’s content.  Then find people with wattage who can do just that.  Christine and Salt, WTIC-FM, Hartford, CT did just that.  They found a fun person who was an expert in living a proper life.  So they created the Connecticut Etiquette (love the name because it rhymes and is so memorable) who comes on whenever they’re talking about manners.

Permission, Please

We are on the cusp of a new year of NFL and college football games.  You know what might be fun?  Get male listeners to call their wives or girlfriends on the air to ask their permission to watch the games this year.

Karson and Kennedy, MIX 104.1, Boston with Ice Cream Karen

Making a big thing out of a little thing.  That’s our theme in this week’s audio as shown by Karson and Kennedy, MIX 104.1, Boston who are always listening out for opportunity from callers.  A listener rang them on their regular Monday “what was the highlight of your weekend” feature.  The caller told them that her one son was selling homemade ice cream in the neighborhood to raise funds for her other son’s special needs hockey team when a Karen shut them down.  Karson and Kennedy to the rescue.  They put together a massive Saturday fundraiser, centered around the first son and his ice cream sales, to improve on the paltry $60 earned before Karen inserted herself in the good deed.  They heard the mom’s story and worked hard to make it larger than life, putting all efforts from the show behind it.  Rallying their listeners and making a big thing from a small thing, they helped raise over $3500 for the team.  Another stunning victory for radio, proving the power of talent.  Look to do this so you own memorable moments with your fans.

Teachers’ Rules

We start a new season of school with everyone teeming with excitement.  Talk to a teacher, and they’ll tell you stories of difficult parents.  Go gather audio from teachers, asking each to give you one or two “rules” from them for parents.  Then, as school commences, share that audio with your audience.  (Gathering it now instead of it being a phone topic will allow you to curate the best ones into produced features.)

“C” Is For Cat Lady

I live in a house addicted to Penzeys Spices.  At last count, we have 193 of them.  A dedicated drawer for spices with the overflow on several shelves in the pantry.  Just when you think you have all of them, four more show up in the mail.

One of the things that draws us to the Penzeys brand is that the owner (or marketing people) send funny emails centered around topical news items in their effort to sell us more spices.  Almost all of them make us laugh.  The most recent, seen here, is titled “’C’” Is For Cat Lady”.  Any spice starting with the letter “c” is on sale.

It’s a simple, but brilliant marketing move that places staid, boring spices into the national conversation.  It cost nothing more than a creative mind to conceive and put together.

How about your radio show?  How do you do there?

Great radio is about whatever is going on right now.  I listen around the dial and hear way too much evergreen radio.  Topics that could work as well next Wednesday as they do today.  Stuff that feels like it’s mostly from a prep service.  And all of it is a C+ to me.

When Leno and Letterman were in reruns, they’d air a show from years prior.  Until they realized two things:  the comedy and conversations on those shows were very dated (and it stood out).  They also got that the typical viewer didn’t watch every program.  So, when in reruns, they started airing shows from a few weeks before.  Because those topics, guests, and comedy pieces were still relevant.

If we air the show you did today in two weeks, would it feel “dated”?  If so, it really, really work today.  Go for that.

Be about right now in your topic choices.  This blog is about right now and that’s the sweet spot.

We have way more cumin in the house than we know what to do with.  If you need any, let me know?

The AD Rowntree Show, KSHE, St. Louis with Six Pack and the Art of Characters

Do you guys get regular callers?  Do you figure out how to make the more absurd of them contributors of content to your show?  The AD Rowntree Show, KSHE, St. Louis has some of the oddest oddballs calling their program (I say that with the greatest affection).  AD and Chris have figured out how to elevate these callers to star status by featuring their weirdness on their show.  We learned it years ago from Letterman, who made an art of using the quirkier people on his staff in his bits to entertain in ways that hadn’t been used before.  Howard does the exact same thing.  Think about your callers and focus on highlighting them to bring a fresh energy to your conversations.  Here’s an example of a regular caller to AD’s show and how they do this.

Profane for Propane

Here’s a fun summertime promotion compliments of Marci Braun, Brand Manager, WUSN, Chicago.  They had a gas grill to win in a promotion.  The caller had to curse them out to get qualified to win it.  They obviously bleeped all the curse words before airing the call, which made it funnier.  It was called Profane for Propane.

Dave Coombs, WKLH, Milwaukee with Fun with AI Joe

AI is a game-changer to create relevant fun content for your show.  Dave Coombs, WKLH, Milwaukee gets this on a level we all can learn from.  As Dave shows us here, you can have AI mimic any celebrity or famous person.  How can you use this to your advantage?  What big story with a famous person can you create humor around using AI?  Politics might be off the plate as a topic choice for your show, but not for Dave.  Before he left the presidential race, Dave had AI create fun stuff around Joe Biden.  He called it AI Joe so the audience knew it was a fake.  Here’s audio of how Dave did it, which opens up more topical and creative opportunities for doing unique things on your show.

The Winning Anthem

With the Olympics in full swing, every time you play a game this week and the listener wins, play the national anthem of the country of their ancestors.  You can find all of these online (even cheesy versions, which would be funnier).  Find out the country of their heritage before you play the game or contest and have it ready.

Only Talent Can Do That

The biggest gathering of radio’s truest point-of-differentiation starts this week in San Diego.  Don Anthony is hosting his 36th Morning Show Bootcamp.  Talent from all over the country, looking to become more valuable to their stations, clusters, and companies, will get together to be inspired by people and panels who’ll give their wisdom away.

So often in radio, we work hard to predict the future and get there before anyone else.  We also work overtime talking about how much radio has changed.  Andrew Curran from DMR Interactive wrote an interesting article that caught my eye about this.

In it, he talks about a question Amazon’s Jeff Bezos was recently asked about what won’t change in consumer behavior over the next ten years. The answers include we’ll still want choice in our product selection, we will still want our stuff tomorrow, and we will still want low prices.

With talent from all over so dedicated to their growth, this got me thinking about what won’t change about radio’s listeners.

Here’s a partial list.  I’m sure you’ll have one or two to add.  In the next ten years, this is what won’t change:

Listeners will still want to be emotionally connected to other human beings.

Only talent can do that.

Listeners will only want to buy (tune into) brands they trust.

Only talent can do that.

Listeners will still want to turn on the radio and have fun.

Only talent can do that.

Fans will look for someone to make sense of a complicated world and bring comfort to that as they start their day.

Only talent can do that.

In a world of negativity, listeners will want to know that a brand radiates goodness in their community.

Only talent can do that.

Listeners will look for an escape from the pressures of their daily life.

Only talent can do that.

People will search for brands that make their communities better.

Only talent can do that.

Clients will want to place their precious marketing money with brands that have built trust with their fans.

Only talent can do that.

Listeners will continue to search for other people just like them.

Only talent can do that.

Listeners will want to be around brands that radiate authenticity and humanity.

Only talent can do that.

Morning Show Bootcamp reminds me that, as much as we wanna figure out what’s next to gain any advantage, there are some constants about our industry that will never change.  And that’s the power of great talent and talent groomed to be great for the health of your radio station and our industry until the end of time.

If you’re a talent reading this, never take for granted what you do and always, always, always stay humble so you keep growing.