The Bucking Skinny
Posted by Kate on 07 Apr 2008 at 05:52 pm |
The headline reads: “Network Radio Bucking Trend.”
Really? Amidst all the sexy buzz of Satellite, iPods, Pandora, Last FM etc., somehow, somewhere, someone is successfully resurrecting the art of bona fide radio?
Yeah, no.
Rest assured, the “trend” of listeners moving away from radio is still going strong. For the multitude of late-adopting advertisers, it’s a different story.
In theory, if, miraculously, you are still convinced that radio is your optimum connection to consumers, Network Radio makes sense. As the big-box stores of radio, Citadel, Infinity, Westwood One, etc. can offer lower prices across a larger reach. Not surprisingly, local stations can’t compete.
In theory.
First and foremost, let’s be clear that for Network Radio, and most radio in general, you, the listener, are NOT the priority. When radio execs talk about “client service,” you are NOT the client. Of course, if you’ve listened to radio in the last 20-30 years or so, you already know this: the advertiser is king, you are an afterthought.
Nonetheless, this is what Maja Mijatovic, director of national radio at Horizon Media calls the “hot new medium.”
Um, NOT.
Here’s how it works.
It’s all based on so-called research. First, the folks at Arbitron ask a few listeners to record their radio habits over a short amount of time. And by a few, I mean less than 1% of the entire US population… accounting for ALL radio listening estimates. Clearly, it’s not an exact science… more of a trust-based thing? Okay….
Once the decidedly questionable data is collected, it can be manipulated in a variety of ways (as all data can) so as to best benefit each station. Most importantly, a station’s “share,” i.e., the percentage of listeners, as it relates to that of other stations in the area, then becomes the determining factor for how much they can charge for commercial.
So it’s no wonder that the actual music being broadcast in between the commercials (and not the other way around) is utter crap. They’re not programming for you, they’re programming for the ad execs at Wal-Mart.
Barry Berman, president of CRN Radio (Mancow syndicators) calls this “client service mentality.” I call it client-programming.
And when you program for the client — the wallet-waving hoi polloi — banal, formulaic, factory-made-for-the-herd ear-candy will do.
Because nobody’s listening. They don’t have to. Taste has been made obsolete.
The thing is, for a while there, we, the listeners, were more or less okay with this. We trusted radio. We honestly believed that a human being with actual discerning taste was still choosing music, just for us. And even as it became more and more clear that this was no longer the case, we placidly continued to go along with the whole guise. We didn’t demand anything better. Shame on us. Or should I say, moo.
And then Radio 2.0 started to happen… all kinds of music that we’d never heard on the radio was suddenly everywhere. And it was so much better! And we felt tricked. Buh-bye radio.
Network Radio’s response? Dumb it down even more. Alice. Froggy. Jack.
Jackass.
Local Radio’s response? Panic and try to be more like Network Radio.
No! No! No!
Dear Local Radio, truth be told, we miss you. We miss spontaneity, creativity, all the things that made up that once-upon–time radio magic. We miss a trusted source, a flesh-and-blood human who we connected with, who talked to us (not at us), who seemed to magically know exactly what it was we wanted to hear, when we wanted to hear it. We miss being MORE than listeners… we miss being FANS.
Lord knows that at least Satellite Radio is certainly trying to give this a go. But as for Local Radio, barring a few exceptional stations peppered across the country, it’s likely too late. So there seems to be only two choices: throw in the towel and get swallowed up along with Network Radio or… buck the damned trend! Stop chasing Network Radio’s tail. Take a risk: make fans the priority. And, I’ve said it before: screw Arbitron, find great music, play it.
One thing’s for sure… programming for the masses is out. Programming for the niche is in.
And no one is better poised to program for the niche than Local Radio.
Providing a great service for the niche, that’s the ticket. That’s how you create fans. And once you have fans, the money will follow. Because fans are more than willing to pay for great service. Fans even fight for great service. Hell, television’s got fans who are even willing to happily tolerate commercials, in some cases, with baited breath. Why not radio?
Now that would be the real hot new medium. Yowsers.
© Outlandos MusicTM 2008
We have a local station in Nashville - 100.1 Radio Lightning that is locally owned and programmed. You can go to their site and fill out surveys on your listening habits and preferences, which then goes into their playlist. So they claim anyway. It is a great variety of new and old and I hear B sides all the time that I never hear on the radio. It seems to be working for them.
That’s great. Although extremely rare. The really sad thing is as you probably know, pretty much no one knows about stations like that. They’re almost always some kind of best-kept secret.
And I don’t mean to sound like a pessimist but locally owned and programmed doesn’t necessarily mean great.
And I don’t think that playing what listeners want to hear is really the right thing. Listeners aren’t programmers. I know it’s going to ruffle some feathers but it’s true. That’s why you used to turn the radio on in the first place. You’re trusting someone else to do that for you. The same way you would hire a decorator to decorate your home or a contractor to remodel your kitchen. Programming requires expertise. Unfortunately, nobody knows that anymore because it’s been so shit for so long. Programming is an art. And to do it well, you’ve got to have great music, you’ve got to have flow and you’ve got to have connection. As long as we trust the person behind the music they can take us pretty much anywhere… a beautiful thing.
Essential qualities for whoever is cracking the mic: Do they have interesting things to say? Are they human? Do they make mistakes? It’s important for DJs to make mistakes… that’s real.
Getting back to flow, flow almost doesn’t exist anywhere not even on the handful of radio stations that are fairly decent. That’s what makes radio true art. Same key segues? Actual hand mixes? Do they have commercials? Are they the same dumb commercials that everyone else writes? Or does the production staff at that radio station make sure that whenever commercials they air pass some sort of quality test? I’m not kidding. I’ve worked at stations where we actually did this and it made for an amazingly improved listening experience, that is, if you are under the impression that commercials are a must. What’s the imaging like? Does it sound fake? Do the voices yell at you or talk to you in some way that sounds completely abnormal?
Simply put, the whole package, every single sound coming out of that dial better be great or it’s all Bullshit.
Now I am sounding really pessimistic, I know but I really have a hard time believing that any radio station is doing all of the above. And I’m just saying, this can be done. I know it. I’ve lived it. Recently. It can be done right and it can be done to make money, which of course is the bottom line.
If, on the other hand, radio continues to not do all of the above, every last bit, it’s all just a jukebox. B-sides or not. Presentation is everything. Every single detail matters because we, the listeners, the long-lost fans… we notice. You know what I mean? Just because we’ve been eating McDonald’s hamburgers all these years and suddenly they improve the quality of the lettuce doesn’t mean it’s still not a McDonald’s hamburger. And I think we deserve prime rib.