Sunday Morning Odds & Sods

60° - sunny at 10:49am

Good Morning from Okemos.

Listening this morning to Bob Stroud on Chicago's WDRV...who - at the moment is doing a time-warp this this week in 1970.

Just played "Spirit In The Sky", "Instant Karma" and now "Come & Get It". Nice start to morning. Later: Bob's switched gears to 1975...and is now playing Kraftwerk's "Autobahn"....and its off vinyl....complete with ticks and scratches...too cool!

San Diego: Mark Ramsey points out a (copy-protected) campaign from AAA KPRI that tells the market "Don't Listen". A campaign designed to encourage trial. Perfect in the PPM world. Mark observes:

"...our goal should not be recall - it should be trial. The best way to get folks to remember they listen is for them to actually listen. Don't put the case before the horse.

So KPRI's campaign is obviously designed to seduce trial. Not to sell product attributes and benefits or, God forbid, awareness and recall. You can't know whether you like something or not until you try it, so why not?

And even smarter in the world of PPM, by the way."

Mark's complete post - including reader comments - is here. Anyone else here old enough to remember "Try It, You'll Like It" (I thought so..)


Last weekend: had the opportunity to check out night #2 of WCSX/Detroit's Birthday Bash featuring the J. Geils Band. Awesome time and kudos to OM/PD Doug Podell for pulling it off. The band only getting together for shows in their hometown of Boston and their adopted hometown of Detroit. 2 nights that sold out in minutes. Great time!

Speaking of: Noted that WCSX - after months with PPM data - has now shorted its morning drive show by an hour and gets back to music at 9am instead of 10. The station now kicking off its return to music with "9 at 9".

Haven't heard the feature yet, but I'm assuming "9 at 9" is similar to the "10 at 10" feature heard on other stations around the country.

Think summer. The sunshine today has me thinking warm weather (and mowing the lawn). Consultant Dave Lange has put together some ideas for radio in the summertime, noting:

"Radio has a real chance to shine as TV largely shuts down and our mobile medium has the advantage of being able to move with the audience. As they spend more time outside radio goes with them to the patio, the car, out in the community and even to the beach/pool. This is a time to hustle if you want to build your audience for the Fall."

Dave's suggestions for radio - including appearances, music, imaging and more here.

Great read: Rick Kaempfer's interview with Chicago radio legend John Gehron. Its been up for a week - but it was new to me this morning. Here. Also on Rick's Chicago Radio Spotlight is an interview with Chicago radio's Buzz Kilman. Worth the time here.

New Media Webinar: A "power lunch" this Tuesday at noon eastern from McVay New Media. SIgn-up and check it out here.

It's been another tough week for radio with cutbacks and furloughs at a few radio companies. I'm at a loss to offer anything positive. Bless the companies still investing in the product and people, both on air and off. And investing in real localism, radio's single biggest advantage over competitive media in this broadband/multi-media era. Think content that's difficult to duplicate.

There's people and programming assets that too many companies are foolishly throwing away. All in all a loss for listeners who can typically get what content is left through other sources. Example: how many sources are there on the internet for Ryan Seacrest? Don't need the local station for that. I'm just sayin'....

That said - the opportunity is may soon be ripe for a strong local competitor to take advantage of these MBA-programmed stations.

Related: this post from consultant Alan Mason.

Sunday Morning Odds & Sods

44° - rain at 12:23pm

Good Morning/afternoon from Okemos. Listening this morning to my usual Sunday Morning routine: WDRV/Chicago and WKLH/Milwaukee via the 'net.

I note some fresh imaging (voiced by Nick Michaels) on The Drive; very nice! I also sense that the station is working on their streaming presentation, especially with ad-insertion.

This past week I spent a few hours in Detroit listening to WCSX. OM/PD Doug Podell has really put some life into that station in recent months; at least since my last listen. The tempo is up....the entire presentation, not just the music. The station sounds so alive.

Reading. Mark Ramsey's Hear 2.0. Mark posted some great content this past week. Working backwards, Mark features an interview with author Richard Goldman, conducted by radio consultant Doug Erickson. Goldman is co-founder of Men's Warehouse. From that interview:

Radio right now seems unable to manage risk. It's trying to cut its way to profit by slashing "expense," by cutting research, marketing, promotion, management and staff. How did you handle risk, in the face of recession, in your successful retail career?

The easy fix is always to cut expenses. But at some point you run out of expenses to cut. At Men’s Wearhouse, we certainly tried to cut expenses, but more of the effort was spent in trying to increase sales.

You're a marketing expert. Any ideas on how you would market a radio station?

I would get out of the current mindset—if a listener could be transported to any city in the country and turn on any radio station (especially FM), they’d think that they were in their own home town.

Alice, schmalice—I’m sick of the format and disgusted with the way that radio has become so homogenous.

Read the entire piece here. (btw: CBS head honcho Les Moonves said this past week that "more staff cuts to reduce expenses are probably not a good idea. "There comes a point where you’re cutting into the bone." Nice to read. More here. -dan)

Another great Ramsey post featured Seth Godin speaking at the Country Radio Seminar. Read here.

Speaking of CRS: Consultant Alan Mason blogged about a topic he'd be speaking on this past week in Nashville. In a list he's made for a PD in today's environment he notes:

"Think in terms of the future , and new titles. Are you a PD or are you Brand Manager and Director of Listener Experience? Do you have a promotion director, or a director of listener engagement? You can see that one title operates in the past, while the other looks to the future. Of course you actually have to be and act like the new title - this is much more than a change of clothes."

Alan writes here.

Learn from Paul. A Great read from Dave Martin: "Six Lessons from Paul Harvey". Read here.

Chicago's Rick Kaempfer brings us up-to-date on Chicago radio people he's interviewed in the past. Read here. Check out Rick's piece on the late Paul Harvey too.

Have a great Sunday.

Monday Monday

32° - mostly cloudy at 7:35am

Last week turned into a busy one between the day job, the night job and everything else. And it didn't stop over the weekend. Thanks for stopping by.

From around my blogosphere:

Jerry Del Colliano has a great piece posted this morning: "Better Radio At No Additional Cost". In it, Jerry remembers Dick Carr of WIP/Philadelphia:

"When Dick prevailed at WIP he had one operating principle that always served him well. It cost no extra money -- it was a way to look for the additional benefits that make listeners appreciate you over and over again. He called it Another Reason to Listen."

"Everything that is done on the air should be designed to give the audience another reason to tune in and stay with the station. As Dick Carr puts it, "Work to create a listener expectation wherein once they heard "a shoe drop", they would instinctively turn to your station"."

Worth your time this morning. Read here.

Related piece from Dave Lange: Dave posts a great read on his blog "Opportunties Ahead #1" In the piece, Dave notes:

"Be Local: No doubt the biggest opportunity for radio is that it's LOCAL. While most of the new media, cable networks, broadcast networks and nearly all the web is national or even world wide most of the audience's world lies in their local area. We all know this, but in the end we do little to capitalize on it."

More here - including some thoughts on what you might do on a day-to-day basis.

Pass along to your GM/GSM: Alan Mason writes about those email "out of office" auto-responders - and something very clever your salespeople could be doing. In fact, I think even programmers or anyone on staff could be doing:

"Whoops. You've caught me at one of the rare times I'm not here waiting to help you. I'm gone for a short period but want you to receive royal treatment. This message has been automatically forwarded to our Sales Assistant, Carla ___. She'll be in touch with you forthwith. By the way, click on this link and you'll see a video of what happens when we do a remote at Van Chevrolet."

Alan does note that "If you're in business today, every e-mail should be forwarded to your PDA or cell phone." Read more here.

Welcome back David Martin. After a brief absence, Mr. Martin is back on his blog. Always worth your time. Read here.

And Dave: I did enjoy our conversation and intend to follow-up as promised. Last week turned impossible.

Belated congrats: To Fred Jacobs and Jacobs Media Web Guru Tim Davis, who created a custom station-branded iPhone application to listen to station streams. Read here. View below:

What I Said (or) What He Said...

40° - clear at 7:27am

Good Morning from Michigan.

This past Monday, I wrote on this blog my worries about the present state of this industry, noting that the present staffing cutbacks, while they might provide corporate shareholders with short-term gains, they may in fact do long-term damage to the industry.

Over the last 12 hours - I've come across some similar pieces with the same concerns. First from Fred Jacobs writing this morning on his blog:

"...amidst all the cutting, radio certainly isn't going to sound better. When you see major league PDs like Bob Buchman and Larry Sharp on the street - despite sporting great ratings in the nation's biggest markets - you have to wonder whether all the budget cutting isn't going to eventually start eroding great brands that took years to build. As research, marketing, staffing, management, and yes, consulting is being sliced out of budgets, stations are going to need more than inertia to stay compelling, much less listenable."

"So, ask yourself whether radio companies are tightening belts or actually tightening the noose. It's a tough, but a fair question as the last quarter of the year plays out."

And...in a new-to-me post from last week - consultant Alan Mason looks at the present economy, noting:

"CBS has responded by cutting all of the staff of WSJT in Tampa except one person to do remotes and endorsements. Here's a station that's top ten 12+, and the product is being degraded. I'm not so sure that new technology is a growing threat as our own lack of interest in the product is pushing people toward it."

"This isn't the time for corporate thinking, it's the time for entrepreneurial thinking. Those who can see beyond the next quarter have been blessed with a huge opportunity to grow and build equity while the corporate dinosaurs cut, cut, cut. Your actions, what you do right now, will be the deciding factor."

Alan's post here.

I get the need to tighten belts in bad economic times. Most of my career has been spent with tight budgets and getting the most out of available dollars. But with recent events, are some companies and/or brands "saving" their way to irrelevance?

I'm really not a doom and gloom guy, but all this is hard to ignore.

Added: In this morning's Taylor-On-Radio newsletter (11/5) - Saga CEO Ed Christian offers some rational thinking, saying radio should be "careful that we don't eat our seed corn" with extreme cuts. "You mustn't chop off the things that make the business grow, long term."

Read more here (registration required).

Monday Monday (Late Edition)

61° - cloudy at 10:29pm

Took the weekend off from the blog (not intentional) - hope it was good for you.

Around my blogosphere:

Dave Lange. Dave blogs about "Authenticity - The Key To Reviving Radio" here. Authenticity the backbone of progressive rock in the 60s and 70s - and AOR in the 70s and 80s. Part one of a great piece here.

Coincidently - after reading Dave's post today, I overheard the syndicated Ryan Seacrest weekday program on an office radio..and I swear I heard a sweeper soliciting listener "phone calls". This on a recorded/recycled bits show from Ryan's Los Angeles AMD program. How does that work? I certainly didn't hear any "listener calls" on the air. I immediately thought of Dave's piece where he writes about "gimmicks, hype and illusion". Whatever.

More authenticity: Coincidently, consultant Alan Mason writes about voice-tracking on his blog today. With apologies to Alan for over-quoting:

"...now I’m seeing talent and on-air PD’s who voice track their shows because they’re too busy to be on the air. I’ve even heard of talent who didn’t like their shift, so they voice track instead of being live. I can’t help but wonder, when did being on the air stop being a priority for on-air talent?"

"Yes, I know all the arguments about how busy you are, but let me ask you a question: How do you explain that to the listeners? "Well, I’d like to be engaging and interactive instead of just announcing, but I’m just too busy?”

"Think they don’t notice the difference? In case you haven’t noticed yourself, listeners are becoming more interactive, and want more relevance. It’s a big challenge to do that in voice tracking. But there’s an even bigger question: With all the competition from other media, and life becoming so busy for the listener that they often feel overwhelmed, isn’t it important for us to be as good as possible? And do you really think you can do that through regular voice tracking?"

Alan's complete post here. Full disclosure: As a PD, I've been put in the position of voice-tracking my shift simply because I was too busy. Handling multiple stations, I should have not been on the air at all. Not my call. And I'm certain there's many other PDs in the same situation.

More PPM: 20 MORE Things explained - numbers 6 through 10. From Paragon Media Strategies here. Numbers 1 through 5 here. The complete list without narrative here.

Mad Men. Must-see TV in my house, though not with me (yet). My wife and oldest son both addicted. Mark Ramsey blogs about AMC's smash hit and what it means to radio here.

Help. Asked over the weekend via email to help spread the word. From Dave Martin's blog this morning:

"Deborah Chesher is a published photographer [Amazon info]. Her rock star gets include George Harrison, Jerry Garcia and Frank Zappa. Now, her daughter is having brain surgery and Deborah is selling prints to help pay the bills. Get the story, see the prints here. If you're not able to buy a print, please share the link."

I read Deborah's story last night; please do what you can (and her work is wonderful).

More tomorrow including stuff I didn't have time for tonight. Thanks for stopping by.

The Weekend Classic Rock FM

84° - partly sunny at 2:25pm

Good afternoon from Lansing. A stay-home weekend in our plans. Enough traveling for a little while. And its great to have the kids home from their time in Denver.

Surfing around the web during lunch today:

Your Website: McVay Media's Dave Lange blogs today about ways of making your website just a little more sticky. From Dave:

1. Podcasts - Some stations use them but I bet 90% of you have only 1 or no podcasts on your site.

2. You Tube clips - How much as your station or team posted from station events, guest shots on the morning show, or even just a tour of the station with some pranks from the staff.

3. Collections of morning show bits.

4. Replay the phone calls from your afternoon show.

5. How about a new rock pod cast every week that doesn't air on the transmitter but only on the web with comments on new artists and songs.

6. Maybe a place for local bands to showcase their videos and music complete with reviews and chats.

Dave doesn't mention - but msuci on podcasts might involve additional licensing - but still worth exploring. Dave's complete piece - a great read - here. And some of this material could also be used as stopset filler on your internet stream...lots better than another Ad Council PSA or a pesky P.I. ad.

Meanwhile: Mark Ramsey blogs about non-music content - and as part of his piece talks about value - plus something as simple as labeling:

"Is there a market for the entire podcast of your morning show from February 11, 2008 (for example)? Or is that morning's show so much like every other morning's show that the value of any one episode is diminished and not worth sharing or seeking out?"

"And how do you label such a show, anyway? I may want to find Howard Stern's interview with Pamela Anderson, but not "Howard Stern's show from February 11, 2008."

Good thoughts. Of course as Mark points out, the material has to be worth hearing again too! And someone has to be in charge of selecting the material and getting on the web in a timely manner. Read Mark's complete piece here.

More Alan Mason. Alan promised more the other day and delivers. Check out "There's No Instant Brand" here.

More over the weekend.

Wednesday Blogs

70° - overcast at 8:20am

Good Morning from rainy Mid-Michigan.

Caught the Don Felder interview last night on Bloomberg; interesting insight into the politics of The Eagles. Video here.

Added: More spring winners: KQRS/Minneapolis up over a point a half to break a 10 share 12+. WRFX/Charlotte rebounds after a few rough books.

News: WAXQ/New York PD Bob Buchmann resigns, leaving Q104.3 in great shape with great numbers. I hope he's moving on to something wonderful after years of success in the Big Apple.

Around my blog-o-sphere:

Jaye Albright's "Favre" Stunt. Read here.

Dave Martin. Dave shares a great "trade secret" regarding Mel Karmazin negotiating with a potential hire. Read here. As a PD (and in life), we've reached that point in negotiations.

And if you missed it, Dave shared another trade secret/tip with this blog in comments a few weeks back. Scroll to the bottom of this page to read. Share with your air talent and web people. Well worth your time.

Sounds like a great radio station:

"A healthy balance of depth tracks and familiar hits. A true connection to community. A strong moral compass. Relatable human values. Direct audience relationships."

Paragon's Mike Henry on "Boss Radio" here. (I've had the "experience" Mike writes of four times in my own life...)

Added: Consultant Alan Mason writes about branding and radio. A great piece:

"...the tangible parts of your “product” are what first attract people, but the intangible parts are what bring them back again and again, and build loyalty. In a radio brand the music or talk/news programming are the tangibles, and any facet of them, except how it adds to the experience, are still tangibles. So slight variations, shades of gray, aren’t meaningful to the consumer. That’s why smart brand marketers, like Apple, always advertise based on the intangible parts - those that live in the mind of the consumer."

"How’s your imaging today? As you listen, are you focusing on the experience and intangible parts of your station? Or are you, like most of us, still talking about the beans and the water?"

Read more here. And in a second post (here) - Alan writes:

"The “everything counts” principle simply lays it out that there is no neutral, or any get of of jail free card in anything we do. That no only includes the commercials, but also how the receptionist answers the phone. Or rather how the voice mail answers the phone these days. It includes how your your talent act at the remotes. It includes you having voice-tracked “weak ends” instead of weekends. It includes jocks who aren’t show prepping and sound like it."

"It includes the jock who tried to make a date on the Internet who turned out to be a cop. It includes the salesperson who demeans the product by giving it away at a ridiculously low price."

"Anything that doesn’t reinforce and solidify the brand then detracts from the brand."

Read his second post here. And Alan promises more tomorrow!

Have a good night.

Sunday Morning Odds & Sods

84° - clear at 10:11am. Above: the skies here Friday around 7pm.

Back to the blog. Just not enough hours in the past few days. Lots of severe weather here the last two nights...thunderstorms and funnel clouds.

Aside from work - my wife and I had to deal with someone stealing my debit card information and purchasing $500 worth of software on my dime. Contacted the company and had the money returned to our account; and with the help of the company (also a victim) was easily able to trace the culprit back to a telephone purchase I had made in the past month. I then exchanged email with the CEO of that company about his "people problem" and had my bank cancel the card. All minor in nature vs. the horror stories of others.

Listening: My usual Sunday morning habits. WDRV now. WKLH later.

Making HD Radio work. Dave Martin introduces a new blog dedicated to the cause. Here.

As I've point out before in this blog - in a reply to comments posted by one of the angry anti-HD fanatics: "HD is here - its the job and obligation of broadcast industry professionals to make it work to the best of our abilities. Our employers expect nothing less." Let's get the dialogue going.

Kudos to Randy Michaels, Lee Abrams and Sean Compton. The new branding and programming changes on WGN America have been noted. In recent years, I've found little reason to watch. Channel surfing Friday Night brought me to WGN and WKRP reruns. Schweet!

Also caught promos for WGN America's new primetime lineup. All this early in the game. I can only imagine good things down the road. And was that Casey Kasem doing the voice work?

P.S. to Randy: consider the name Neal Sabin if you haven't already. A guy in Chicago television who "gets it". I don't know Neal, but I know his work. He's a brilliant tv guy who could probably be a great radio guy too.

Speaking of WKRP: Dave Lange notes:

"Perhaps WKRP could have been a winner if the team had been paying attention more to the audience than how much office space Les Nessman had or who Jennifer was dating this week. But that wouldn't have been funny. KRP is not real it's a sitcom."

Dave's post - with his point - here.

Alan Mason. I've really been enjoying Alan's observations in his blog, especially over the past month or so. His latest post starts with a quote from a Tim Manners: "When that authenticity is compromised, the brand enters decline."

Alan refers to his cell-phone provider's "fine print" that qualifies their coverage claims compares this to what radio has done with its listeners in recent years:

"It’s not that far off of the kind of thinking that says, everyone else is running 16-18 minutes an hour of commercials, so I can too. Everyone else is voice tracking, I can too. Forget that the people formerly known as listeners have plenty of options to choose from, or that it’s doubly difficult to connect and engage through voice tracking, everyone else is doing it so the radio consumer should understand. Wow!"

"Where did things go so wrong, that we try to fool and manipulate the consumer? No wonder people change cell providers all the time, and there’s no loyalty. No wonder listenership and TSL is slowly planing down, there’s no loyalty. Like cell service, we’re in danger of becoming a commodity, where the cheapest (fewest commercials) radio service will be in the lead. You can’t fool Mother Nature, and you can’t fool your radio consumers. It’s not 1965 any more, and you don’t have a monopoly in attention. There are too many choices out there, and if we continue to lower the quality of the content, we’ll soon hear our own “boop-boop” as the consumers tune way, not tune out, but tune away."

Alan's complete post here. Apologies to Alan, I've just printed about half his post!

Gas prices. Lee Arnold comments on the travesty of it all and writes:

"Everyone in your audience is being adversely affected by this. To ignore it is to be out of touch. If you're not being hurt by this because you make lots of money, pretend it's hurting you. You can not have this disconnect from your audience and still be credible."

Lee blogs here (and also offers up a great video example on branding from Harley posted too!).

Have a great Sunday.

Monday Monday - Late Edition

64° - clear at 11:31pm

Listening tonight: In the mail today a CD I ordered from Chicago-based country/rock band "Heartsfield" - and their debut album released in 1973. An album I remember playing to death on the radio when it was new.

Haven't heard the album in 30 years but still was able to sing along in my head as if the words were parked in some brain cells long thought dead. Too cool. Heartsfield is a definite Midwest thing.

Remembering Bo Diddley. Got the news today from a listener email from Buffalo's WGRF/97 Rock. Bo's sound will live forever.

Perception vs. Reality. San Francisco's Ben Fong-Torres clears up some consumer confusion over song repetition on KFOG. A good read here. Tipped by Sean Ross.

Earlier today I posted a line from a recent Alan Mason post that I thought were fantastic. Couldn't post more then - but here's more:

"I also understand that without a strategic reason for doing something, which includes clear differentiation, and a brand that will keep the consumer engaged instead of just listening, you’re probably going to fail. One of the secrets is that clear differentiation makes it easier for the consumer to remember you, and use you. Anything less than a brand relationship create as much loyalty as the many gasoline stations you pass. In the new world order, all those gasoline stations have different names, and some slight variations on “mixology,” but when you go out chances are you’re going to go the statin that’s the cheapest or the most convenient. You rarely build a relationship with a gasoline station any more, since they quit being service stations."

"You might be doing the same thing with your radio station. If you’re pushing people to only use you when the price is the lowest (fewest commercials), or when it’s convenient (already recognized stations), there’s very little chance you’re going to cut through the clutter and become a recognized entity. I’ve even seen stations that spent quite a bit on outside marketing and still fail, because they didn’t cut through the clutter."

Alan's complete post here. Bedtime for Bonzo. More tomorrow.

Words from Alan Mason

"You rarely build a relationship with a gasoline station any more, since they quit being service stations."

-Consultant Alan Mason 6/2/08

More here later.

Alan Mason: Put The Listener First (Shareholder Value Follows)

48° - clear at 9:45pm

Good Evening from Michigan.

Long day and I'm writing this as I'm about to call it a day.

Consultant Alan Mason posted this piece earlier today on his blog - "A Change Manifesto".

Among Alan's bullet points:

"Put the listeners first. I never did figure out how ignoring the primary consumer was going to create a stronger industry, and it hasn’t. Why is TSL down across the country and we see so many reports of dissatisfaction with radio? Because we’ve forgotten that in order to provide value to the share holder we first have to provide value to the listener. Once we’ve provided value to the listener we’ll be able to provide value to the client. Only after those two constituencies have been satisfied will we be able to provide value to the share holder."

I've written the same before on this blog. Longterm share holder value comes from investing in the product and growing listenership. Where is this thinking wrong?

And from Ken Calvert - afternoons at WCSX/Detroit came the following email today:

Have a good night.

The Weekend Classic Rock FM

48° - mostly sunny at 9:08am. Above: driving in downtown Lansing is a challenge these days with construction and orange barrels/barriers everywhere.

Welcome to Friday.

Evaluation: Looking back at my blog posts over the last couple of weeks, I've been leaving out much of the everyday programming nuts and bolts that were the original intent of this blog....who's doing what - sharing programming and promotion ideas.

The other issues our industry faces has also been important; and adding it to the discussion will continue also. All about balance. Here's a promise to get back on track soon. And thanks for continuing to drop by.

The Classic Rock Community. Fred Jacobs writes about being acknowledged by R&R this past week. And how great programmers are creating classic rock communities with their stations and websites. Here.

Radio stories. WMMO/Orlando. Inside Radio's Mike Kinosian interviews original WMMO programmer Cary Pall about the success of rock/ac. A great read here.

Invitation to steal: David Martin - inspired by Lee Arnold - writes about "blocking and tackling".

A great Friday Morning read here.

And: I became "uncomfortably numb" when I read what one radio group head told Wall Street yesterday. The broadcast exec stated that "cost cutting is ongoing" and "every air shift also must be justified".

I'm certain that tough talk sounded great to Wall Street, not so sure about the rank and file inside the stations. And its unclear was "justified" really means.

Added/Related: Consultant Alan Mason offers his two cents. Here.

Lurking on your streaming player. Or perhaps on your RDS display: Internal notes such as "voice track", perhaps? Sean Ross writes about this here.

More over the weekend.

WAXQ Scores in the Big Apple

29° - clear at 7:17am

Good Morning from Okemos.

Just reviewing yesterday's first release of 12+ winter book numbers. In New York, WAXQ rises almost a half point on the Arbi-meter. Classic Hits WCBS-FM remains flat but steady and healthy.

In Chicago - WDRV is basically flat. WLUP down a few notches. That's all 12+....25-54 will tell the real story.

Speaking of Chicago. In an email yesterday regarding the passing of Ron O'Brien, I had a friend in the biz tell me he once got the chance to meet Ron and was invited to sit in the studio during his show at WCFL one night.

Do wonderful moments like that still happen? I hope so.

Consultant Alan Mason has given his blog a makeover - and wrote a couple of great pieces in the last few days. In one post, Alan writes:

"Want to know about one of the most important changes in programming? It’s that it’s no longer “good enough” to have simple announcers trying to be funny or entertaining, or, on the other hand, simply doing the “that was/this is” thing. People want to be more involved in radio, to be more than a passive listener, and that happens when you connect with them."

"OK, most people can agree with that – we need to connect with our listeners in order to develop a deeper relationship with them. But what does that mean strategically? It means we have to have a new strategy, one where “show prep” doesn’t mean a prep sheet or what we heard on another station, but instead starts with the listener and works backwards."

Explore Alan's blog here.

Late Night Add: Radio with Pictures. Television. Bob Pittman thinks "local" (and small). Bob's a principal in Barrington Broadcasting - which owns television stations in the smaller markets. Bob highlighted in a great piece posted earlier today on the TV Newsday website. Pittman on content:

"I like smaller market broadcast television because what we’re seeing is that local means an awful lot to people. Nothing is more important than knowing the local news and what’s going on in the local community."

"The final piece of why it’s an exciting opportunity in the smaller markets is that TV stations can go start the community Internet sites with all the stuff they can’t do on the air—obituaries, school lunch menus, a phone directory like the Yellow Pages, etc. And they can use the power of the TV to promote the sites and re-use all the news and information they gather. They can create another business which in five to 10 years should be just as profitable as the TV stations in those markets."

What Bob says here applies to radio too; especially with websites. The Pittman article here (registration required - free).

Thank You. To Dave Martin for the plug today.

Bedtime for Bonzo. Have a good night.

No Foolin'

52° - light rain at 6:46am

Good Morning from Okemos

More on "shareholder value". Consultant Alan Mason quotes Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz (from the new issue of Time Magazine):

“We want to have the courage to do the things that support the core purpose and the reason for being and not veer off and get caught up in chasing revenue, because long-term value for the shareholder can only be achieved if you create long-term value for the customer and your people."

I couldn't agree more and wrote something similar here last week.

Alan then asks the question for the radio industry:

"Where’s Our Howard Schultz?". Why does it seem so many other business are taking notice of focusing on the brand, but not radio? Doesn’t any of the leadership of the mega-groups understand the comparison with radio?"

Read Alan Mason here.

Use Your Gut. Dave Lange:

"No doubt you've got a personality, a promotion idea, a unique feature or a stunt that turned into a success without research or even the thought of it. We used to have more of these moments in Radio, but the 'prove it before you commit' moment has clearly been holding us back for a number of years. In may cases you can hear stations that haven't had a good idea since two for Tuesday and others that have flamed out with way too many ideas."

Dave writes about the balance of art & science; the need for a plan; leaving room for improv; and the need to be patient. And more. Read here.

Have a great Tuesday.