Come Saturday Morning

37° - light rain at 11:34am

Very cool: Clear Channel's WAXQ/New York (Q104.3) has a great gallery of the "Top Ten Songs From Classic Rock." The feature includes album covers and 7-inch picture sleeves of songs between 1965 and 1987. Check out here.

Again, something any classic rock station can do; much of this stuff is on the internet already; more content to strengthen your heritage rock position, even if your station has only been in the format a few years. You might be able to enhance this with You Tube videos of the same songs!

Speaking of Q104.3: The station has the winners of its "Hottest Mom 2008" Contest. Lots of photos including "Behind The Scenes" video. Very sticky web content for a classic rock station. See here.

Likewise - one of my favorite CGM-savvy classic rock stations is WGRF/Buffalo - and PD John Hager has just posted a photo gallery of the winner and contestants on his station's website here.

John also takes the right path - explaining here a budget-related talent departure to station listeners.


Saying Goodbye to The Lake. Fellow blogger Jim Bartlett writes about the loss of the Madison classic rock station (WHLK) he was working at; wondering why it didn't work.

As only a casual listener of the station via the web, I could only offer some random thoughts in a prior email exchange that Jim shares on his piece here.

More tomorrow. My day includes a trip to Home Depot to price a replacement gas hot water heater before the little leak becomes a flood. The joys of home ownership....

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).

49° - overcast at 8:12am

Good Morning From Okemos, Michigan.

Congrats: To WDRV/Chicago's Bob Stroud on releasing Volume 10 of his Rock & Roll Roots CD series, with proceeds going to charity. The CD series an extension of his long-running Sunday Morning "Rock 'N Roll Roots" program. I covered the release of Volume 9 last year here. Read more about this year's CD on The Drive website here.

Election Day: Headed down the street to my polling place on the way to work this morning. Starbucks offering a free cup of java if you go in and tell them you voted. Harve Alan asks: "What "free for a day" styled promotion could radio be doing to rekindle interest in our aging brands?"

Meanwhile - Dave Lange makes some observations with "Lessons for Radio From Campaign 08" - a great read here.

Yesterday I wrote about the cutback virus that is spreading throughout the industry. Not to ignore those who find themselves out of work, but I feel that those who still have a job in radio need some TLC and attention during these tough times.

Dave Martin - in the second part of a series for media CEOs titled "Execution, Not Excuses", notes that 2009 is "mission critical" for HR:

"As a practical matter, making HR important beyond compliance issues will be a new concept for many media firms. We have to start treating our employees like our best customers. Every person on the payroll is talent. Employees help the company achieve its goals by becoming the best at what they do."

"Leadership must create the context in which people can do their best work. An important part of the D in R&D is HR-D. The key to growing profits is growing people. Employees deserve and need an advocate, that's a critical mission for HR."

As I've written here before - PDs have the responsibility of being an advocate for their staff as well as station listeners. Fear is counter-productive - and in talking to others still employed in the industry, there's too much of it getting in the way of the job.

As a sidenote, PDs also now - more than ever, need to be an advocate for their station's sales departments when neccessary...and find ways to make revenue opportunities integrate well with programming and listenership goals.

More later today. Get out and vote!