Archive for category: Planet Reynolds

If you’re a friend you know that in the winter months, my sport is basketball.  Especially college ball, given I live in the same market as NC State, Duke, and UNC-Chapel Hill.

Years ago, when my father came to terms that his eldest son would never play sports, he suggested that I officiate my uncle’s team’s basketball scrimmages.  That was appealing to an insecure 15-year old because I was told I’d have a whistle and the other kids had to listen to me.  I caught the referee bug so, for the last three decades, I’ve officiated high school basketball as a side hustle.

Many years in, I wondered why I never got the brass ring:  an invitation to call a state championship.  After all, I’d done my time and thought I was pretty good.  When was it my turn?  And why did I keep hearing about others getting that accolade, but not me?  Voicing this to a fellow official, he wondered out loud if I was mature enough to get an honest answer.  Expecting him to simply affirm my perspective, I was trapped and had to say yes.  He recorded me at several games and then showed me the video (an aircheck, if you will).  Who was that overweight guy running up and down the court, I wondered?  Who’s that guy out of position on his calls?  It was me, and I had lots of work to do to get better, if my goal of a state championship was to be realized.

In the many years since, and reflecting on the work I now do in radio, one thing has become apparent – no one gets better alone.

Everyone says they want to improve.  Very few are willing to do the two things improvement requires.

First, you must look inward.  Not casually.  Not defensively.  But honestly.

That means admitting there are parts of your craft that are average, habits that are comfortable, and blind spots you can’t see on your own. Self-awareness is the starting point, but it’s not enough.

Real improvement happens when you invite a small, trusted circle into your process—people who care more about your growth than your feelings.  Not cheerleaders.  Not critics with an agenda.  Professionals who can give you unbiased, dispassionate feedback.

These are the people who will tell you:  “That works… but it could work better.”  “You’re leaning on the same moves again.”  “You’re good—but you’re capable of more.”

That kind of feedback stings a little.  It should.  Growth usually does.

The mistake most people make is crowdsourcing opinions or avoiding feedback altogether.  Both are comfort plays.  Neither leads to mastery.

If you’re serious about improving, build your small circle.  Listen without defending.  Apply what fits.  Discard what doesn’t.  Repeat and get better.

Progress isn’t about talent.  It’s about humility, trust, and the courage to let others sharpen you.

I belong to lots of referee Facebook groups and am always learning when I watch a posted video or they engage their followers in a philosophical conversation.  Paul Diasparra, an official who runs one of them, recently said this.  I’ve changed the parts about officials, so it resonates with you:

“If there’s one message you take into your future, let it be this:  getting no feedback is the anchor that slows your growth. Too many of us spend time looking sideways, comparing ourselves to peers, measuring progress against others, wondering why someone else moved up faster or got an opportunity sooner. Others spend time looking upward, too focused on talent who are where they wanna be. They compare timelines, they compare paths, and it often breeds insecurity, doubt, and the feeling of being left behind. And then there’s looking downward when you’re comparing yourself.  Maybe comparing yourself to someone who’s earlier on their journey. That doesn’t lead to growth either because it creates a false sense of confidence, feeds the ego, and distracts from the work that’s still required. None of those directions help you improve. The direction that matters most is looking inward. Your career is your story, your pace, your lessons, your setbacks, your breakthroughs. None of it is meant to look like anyone else’s. So, when you focus inward on your preparation, your habits, your mindset, and your effort, that’s where the real growth begins.”

If we’re going to stay relevant as an industry, we all know the power of talent.  But we have a smaller margin for error than we once did because of the amount of competition for the attention of listeners.

If you don’t have anyone you trust or can lean on to help you with this, holler at me and I’ll be on your team.  I want nothing for it except that you pay it forward to others in our industry so they can improve, too.

Because no one gets better alone.

When Dick Cheney died, I wondered what the weather was for the rest of the day.  Those are two completely unrelated items.  Until I share that I opened my Carrot Weather app, and it said:

Storm clouds have formed over Raleigh because Dick Cheney has died.  There’s a great chance for thunderstorms because he’s trying to argue his way into heaven.

There are dozens of weather apps to choose from.  The Weather Channel, Weather Underground, AccuWeather, WeatherBug, NOAA Weather, Wunderground, and on and on.  Every single one of them alike.  They’re utilities to us – we just want weather information – so it doesn’t matter which we’re loyal to.

But not my Carrot Weather.  It has attitude and edge, and it almost always makes me laugh because it’s topical.  And it curses at me.  Where I’m blah on all the above, this app entertains me while I’m getting the weather information.  As a result, I don’t shrug my shoulders at Carrot.  Even its name is different from all the above.  What do carrots have to do with the weather?  Nothing!  I’m loyal to it because of these differences, and gladly pay their $30 yearly fee because I (we?) need more laughter in our lives.

The world has gotten edgier.  Most comedians, with some exceptions, have an attitude that lives on the fringes.  Our politicians curse.  The memes we see online that make us feel something have a harsher edge.  And now my weather app is there.

Every choice in any brand category starts from the perceptual position of “they’re all the same”.  In radio, we live in a “sea of sameness”.  This was a point I made on a recent podcast done for RJ Curtis at CRS.  Pamal Broadcasting’s Kevin Callahan, and the terrific consultants Fred Jacobs and Randy Lane, and I talked about talent and the responsibility we have to differentiate ourselves in this morass of “we’re all alike” to listeners.

I’m certainly not suggesting you get on the air and curse like my weather app.  But I am asking what imaginative things did you do on your show today?  If you answer, “we launched a phone topic in the 8:00 hour and got great calls” or “we themed the trivia in our daily benchmark,” I’d probably buzz you out of the game.  Because to the audience, that reinforces we’re all the same.

Carrot Weather is imaginative.  When I got the app, it wanted to know my political leanings and how comfortable I was with profanity (that got dialed up to 11).  Now, when I want to know the temps today, I get attitude and profanity before it tells me, making me laugh or emote in some way so I remember it and become more loyal because it does something its competitors don’t.

One of the points we made on the podcast was that radio doesn’t have a listening problem, it has a top-of-mind-awareness problem.  Our curiosity and imagination must be re-captured if we’re ever going to fix that. And it’s okay to have an edge (important:  if you don’t have a personality that is edgy then don’t be that – be who you are – but that’s not to say you can’t find someone who has it and bring that into your show).

Innovation takes us there, which is why Carrot Weather, when I now open the app, tells me it’s become a musical.  It’s something quirky and new.  It’s opening number is called “What the Eff Is This?”  I bet 1:50 in you’ll be giggling and then curious if it’ll rain today.

I’m not Steve to the app.  I’m Meatbag.  Carrot the Musical continues – here’s I Hate You, Fun to Make Fun Of, and Human.  My weather app keeps entertaining me.  I just have to open the app every day to unlock the songs (more usage/more occasions).  Doing all of this helps them separate from all the other weather apps.  Instructional for us in radio, too.  How do you separate from all the other stations?

We just concluded our yearly state fair in Raleigh.  To make an appropriate analogy, radio is too much bumper cars, and not enough KMG Tango, a ride that spins and flips you in three separate directions all at the same time.

This is the one thing I preach to every show.  Innovate, ideate, be weird and quirky.  Come at things noticeably different, and push back on the standard things every show everywhere does with the topics.  Go be a little odd and edgy.  Because doing same old, same old won’t work any longer.

Rise above it by surrounding yourself with people of like mind so it influences your show.  Be big and bold, have some swagger, and know how you will be noticeably (and at times dramatically) different from everything else out there.  That is our best way of reigniting listeners’ passion for what we do.

Now, as Carrot Weather wants me to remind you, there’s no chance of rain today so go be fucking epic.

Coming this Monday, the all-new Molly and Steve Show (laser effects).  They lit up Binghamton, and now they’re bringing their number one morning show (extended echo to accentuate “number one”) to the ATL.  Molly and Steve – they’re real with more fun (canned laughter), more prizes (cash register sfx), and War of the Roses.  The all-new Molly and Steve Show – you won’t wanna miss it – starting Monday right here on Q100 (jingle, up tempo song).

Human beings gravitate to routine and structure.  The Bert Show on Q100 in Atlanta has been a part of that for decades.  And poof, one day soon, it will go away.  What will happen to his massive, loyal following in Atlanta and across his network of stations?  However the station handles this moment could determine its success for many years.

Maybe you’re going through this, too.  I’d like to help.  But first, can I take you out for bite to eat?  My treat.

I have a friend who owns a bunch of restaurants where I live in Raleigh.  Almost all of them are successful.  I asked her how that happened.  While location and the food experience are important, she shared a template for launch which both fascinated me and is one I’ve adopted when introducing a new show to any audience.

It’s the soft launch.  Low profile, zero hyperbole, none of the hype.  All of that chest-pounding about how great things will be is for all of us, insiders who want to communicate that a show is so damn good, they’ll be damn good for listeners, too.  You must earn your stripes, and she reminded me that the higher the expectations, the greater the chance of failure.  Promotion heightens expectations.  Listeners hate hype and hyperbole and eventually reject it because it’s never that good upon a first listen.

Her soft launches are very quiet.  They open and whoever finds them gets the experience as the host team, kitchen crew, and wait staffs find their chemistry.  Figuring all that out quietly and with little attention and no klieg lights shows her where the speed bumps are.  Once that’s all smoothed out after a few months, and word-of-mouth starts, is when they consider promoting a more mature product.

I’ve launched tons of shows over the years.  My most paramount rule and the companion to every decision we make, is to do no harm to the existing cume.  They’re there for many reasons:  loyalty to the old show, habit, they like the music, there were features they enjoyed.  When people wake in the morning, they like routines.  And they hate when those routines are disrupted.  So, acknowledge this and go slow lest that cume scatter.  If we lose them, it costs money to get them back.  Protect it.

Goal #1 is to endear the new show to the exiting audience.  Here are the general rules I ask shows to follow when they’re new to the station or market:

1. Topics should be familiar because you aren’t.  Familiarity is so important when people wake up.  Play the hits when it comes to topics.  Nothing unfamiliar.  Topics:  what’s going on locally, what’s up in pop (popular) culture, stories of your life that show you’re just like them, and music/artist-based content (so the show weaves itself into the larger station brand).
2. Affirm and earn images that you’re fun, genuine, friendly, and authentic in every break.
3. Character development is very important. Introduce yourself by being honest and sharing your life.  Letting them get to know you helps form that connection which leads to being familiar and loyalty.  A goal should be the audience saying, “they’re just like me and I feel like I know them.”  You don’t get that done in one break.
4. Be interested in them so they’re interested in you. Lots of phones, lots of storytelling.  Put the focus on the audience.  Nothing is more powerful than you getting them to talk about their favorite subject – themselves.
5. Avoid the point-of-fatigue that happens in breaks by under-staying the welcome. Short breaks lead them to wanting more.
6. Music is your friend right now. Lots of music holds their hand through the transition.
7. Be careful of the treatments to your strategic content so listeners don’t think, “They’re trying too hard to impress me.” In three words:  don’t be wacky.
8. Benchmarks, especially now, help provide that structure I noted above. They give you the best chance to define the show and get into the listener’s morning routine.
9. Respect the past. What fits the brand and what expectations do longtime listeners have?  Meet those in every break.
10. No promotion of the show just yet because promoting something heightens expectations by users. This is a soft, quiet launch.

My restaurant friend said that, while food and location are important to each of her places, it’s the dozens of people she employs who make that experience come to life.  She’s worried about them and the other group of people – those who float in to eat who have no formed opinions of her restaurant (aka listeners).  Managing all of that takes precedence.

That conversation re-wired how I think about debuting shows.  The talent you’ve hired might get frustrated at the slower pace, but it sets up the existing cume (who hate change) to have a better chance to react positively to what you’re doing.  Whoever follows Bert is in a unique spot to save that audience.   But only if they’re strategic will they have their best chance to protect what’s there.

It should be the Molly and Steve show because they’d kill.

Want a one-sheet of the above rules?  Grab that here.

I’m told the story of the market manager who went to find the morning show at 10am to congratulate them on their great ratings the day prior and they’d already left.

Seriously, that still happens in radio?  Yup.

We’re not so much in the radio business as we are in the business of radio.  A mentor taught me years ago there are two seasons in that business world.  The season of “I need you” and the season of “you need me”.  He said we should always be in the season of “you need me”.

Given that, let’s talk about how you shift the seasons to protect yourself.

This blog’s for my on-air folks.  Which season are you in?  In an industry that’s contracting, having any advantage is smart.  There was a time when great ratings insulated anyone from a RIF.  Today, more is expected from each of us to create value for those we serve.

I got let go from an on-air job years ago.  Several weeks later, the manager wanted to re-hire me, but in sales.  I said no because that was real work.  I used to think that just having great ratings was enough to keep my job.  No longer.  Radio companies are “for profit” and we creatives must help.

Let’s help you move from the former season to the latter.  Let’s talk about two areas that help you get there:  the money and the culture in your building (how you’re perceived).  I’m not suggesting you’re not doing any of this or haven’t tried, but take these as reminders of ways you can become even more valuable in the building.

My friend Jim Ryan wrote a great blog on these pages a few weeks ago about how Taylor Swift took control of her career.  This expands that conversation.

First, let’s talk about the money.  If you’re close to it, you’re much more valuable to your cluster and company and insulated from a RIF:

• What kind of relationship do you have with the AEs? This isn’t “I know them, and they like me.”  This is do you take them for lunch.  Do you actively engage them regularly to make their job easier?  Do you go on sales calls to close deals?  Do you know lots about their lives, so they know you care about them and their work?  You’re the star of the station to clients and can close a deal with your presence in a meeting.  But you must first have a relationship with the AEs to impact that.
• Do you know and pay attention to the top local accounts on the station?  I’m aware of a talent who knows these clients and regularly finds himself on their side of town.  He shows up on occasion unannounced to say hello and thank them for believing in the station/his show with their marketing money.  What kind of impact does that have both financially to the station and to their image with station management when they find out?  This talent gives clients his cell and tells them if they ever need anything to call.  It always gets back to the AE and manager that the talent did this.  He’s respecting those clients and protecting them, too.
• Do you have endorsements? They’re great, huh?  For the decision-makers on that side, do you know their birthdays and other important dates in their personal life and acknowledge them?  Do you regularly take them for lunch (on you!) to see how they are?  If you snag extra tickets to a local concert or sporting event, do you offer it to them as a gift for their belief in you?
• Do what others won’t. Grab some personalized thank you cards online and every week, write a handwritten note to these folks to thank them (clients and co-workers) for what they do for you and the station.  I cannot express enough the power of doing this.  No one does this, which fuels why you should.
• Do you frequent an establishment regularly? Why not extol the value of marketing to them and work with an AE to turn them into a client?
• Could your content get better if you involve a client in an appropriate break? Building any value-added, with the AE and station knowing, helps you shift seasons.
• Say yes, even if there’s no win for you. Showing up when you’re not expected is a positive.  Building that equity is long-term smart.  There are still talent whose first question when asked to do something is, “What’s the talent fee?”  In this environment, that’s a no-no.

Now let’s tackle being seen and being additive to your building’s culture:

• When I was a baby DJ starting on a morning show, I lived close to the station. Many days, when out running afternoon errands, I’d show up at the station for a few minutes to say hello to everyone.  If you do a morning show, when was the last time you saw the afternoon folks?  It’ll scare the hell out of those there at 4pm, but being seen by everyone is important.
• Work the halls. I know there might be fewer people in the buildings now, but walking around the station checking on everyone, seeing what’s up in their life, are connection points where they know you care for them personally.
• How about that support person, promotions assistant, or engineer who did something to help your show? You know those personalized note cards I mentioned above?  Sending one to their home or leaving it on their desk saying thanks goes a long way to you shifting in the seasons.
• Ditto the above, birthdays, anniversaries, etc. You feel special when someone remembers yours.  Go remember theirs!  That’s low effort, but high impact.
• Internal marketing is important. Putting together a synopsis of your show for everyone, with links to audio, lets them know your pride.  I work with shows that do this.  It’s very powerful.
• Do you regularly develop content that can be better with other personality’s involvement? Prove there are no silos by involving other talent in your content.  You’ll help make them bigger stars and they’ll end up returning the favor by talking about your show on their program.  This also works if any co-worker has a sense of humor or bold take on a topic.  Make them stars, too.

Doing even a fraction of the above moves you through the seasons.  It creates the season of “you need me”.  Then when budget cuts happen, they realize they can’t lose you.

I know there’s a lot here if you are on-the-air and it’s overwhelming to ask you to do more.  But, in the current environment in our industry, this protects you because it shifts you perceptually by the decision-makers from the season of “I need you” to the much more valuable season of “you need me.”  That’s the season you always want to be in.

The million-dollar talent and successful personalities I’ve touched over the years do all of this – it’s part of their ethos and personal business model.  If you do it, double down.  If you don’t, start today.  Then get saved.

I’m turning over the blog this week to one of the smartest people in radio.   Jim Ryan consults, coaches talent, and is one of my closest friends.  After nearly thirty years programming day-to-day in New York City for immensely successful brands like WLTW, CBS-FM, and WNEW-FM, along with growing national formats for Clear Channel, CBS, and Audacy, Jim felt it was time to take control of his future, so he’s stepped out on his own.  Jim not only teaches me in every conversation, he makes me laugh out loud, too.  Reach him at jim@jimryanmedia.com.  Ladies and gents, Jim Ryan…

Stop worrying about your future.  Control it.

For lessons in controlling your future, think Taylor Swift. Like every other artist, she signed a contract when she was fifteen, giving total control of her master recordings to the labels.  When the masters were sold to someone she didn’t like, she didn’t sulk away or raise the white flag of surrender.  She re-recorded the songs and released them (something her contract didn’t prohibit).  It was an insane amount of work.  She took control and planned lots of behind-the-scenes marketing.

When radio played an original version of one of her songs (the ones owned by the guy she didn’t like), the request lines lit up immediately with Swifties telling the talent they needed to play her new versions.  Companies like iHeart and Audacy moved to the new versions, mapping another Taylor win.  The streaming services saw immediate results as well – Taylor’s new versions were crushing the originals in airplay.  It all led this summer to Taylor buying back the original masters at a somewhat reasonable price.

Okay so you’re a radio talent and not Taylor Swift.  How does all this affect you and what’s the lesson here?

How are you controlling your future?  Today the work is different – it’s harder, compelling each of us to work smarter than the competition, just like Taylor.  Ratings are great, but in the world of Nielsen, even the best shows have bad months.   But if you’re where the eyes and ears are when not on the radio, it will enhance your win and increase your value to the station.

Podcasts of your show should be everywhere.  If you have a hobby or outside interest, do a second podcast on that passion.  Steve Kramer from Kramer and Jess, MIX 106.5, Baltimore, does a second podcast with his mother.  How endearing is that?  Being all over social media with great content could net you thousands of likes, comments, and shares.

When Scott Shannon came across the street to CBS-FM, the cash register rang immediately.  It was so good, we even hired the leading seller of WPLJ, his former station!  So, have a positive relationship with the sales folks and meet and know as many clients as you can.  I can’t tell you how many downsizing meetings I’ve been in over my career where the topic of endorsements came up.  Bring in revenue and your value enhances to the station and cluster even more.  When you’re the sales manager’s best friend, it’s not just income for you, it’s job security.

Doing simple things like knowing a client’s birthday or special anniversary and acknowledging it in some fashion works to build a special bond.  The days of talent being in a silo are over.  Having a relationship with listeners, sales, and clients is not just required today, it’s smart business for you.  The deeper those relationships, the more you’re just like Taylor Swift.  In control of your future.

From Swift to shift, own your career.  It’s exactly where you should be.