The State Of The Station

Where we are and where we're going

It's clear that most of us grew some last year. We learned some things. A few of us even got some accomplishments under our belts. There are still great challenges ahead, though. Our ultimate vision of this brave new world just around the corner should be one in which we see opportunity to grow and improve the state of our stations -- not just carve up profits, yielding winners and losers.

The past is behind us. Hopefully, it taught us something useful to help us to build a better station and a better tomorrow. But it must not color our view of the future. Many industries took a beating last year. Meanwhile, the radio and record industries had (and continue to have) issues of their own. Consolidation in the radio and music industries is real. Layoffs are real. Personnel moves are real. Missed sales targets are real. Lowered profits are real.

But rather than look back upon 2005 negatively, we would do well to look ahead positively to 2006. The same issues remain in our path, but we've learned from our experiences of 2005 and know that we will have to become better at our jobs, do more with less, and think of ways to overcome challenges.

Where does confidence for a brighter future necessary to overcome challenges come from? From meeting with peers and sharing ideas -- pearls of wisdom gleaned from each other's individual experiences. It will come from the elite in the industry gathering to discuss the issues. It will come from these editorials, as well as conversations and exchanges. Lessons will be learned, solutions will be formulated, and goals laid out for a productive and successful 2006. Here are few thoughts on some of the things we can do to improve the state of our stations:

Take Out The Trash

The first thing has to do with removing some of the things that offend those listeners who are fond of our frequencies. I've said it before. I'm saying it again. Take out the trash! If we don't toss out the garbage soon, the U-Haul will appear in our driveway. Our listeners want our format to be funky, but they don't want it to stink. When it does, the trash has to be removed.

Should we spray it with disinfectant chemicals or cover it with "new joints?" Where and how can we store it until the stinky garbage is removed?

Auditorium tests or focus group studies reveal those music freaks that are left and who are now being shared with satellite radio, downloading, and iPods. These people are irritated by anything that is not fresh new music. The don't care that our stations needs commercials to survive and that you have to take time out now and then to inform them. They're not empathic to your needs to serve the community if it means stopping the music. You better be either funny or jamming.

Today's listeners -- even those who are not music freaks -- are selfish and spoiled. Most just want to be entertained. "Just make me laugh and play my favorite jams," is how most listeners feel. They want to hear just their personal favorite tracks over and over again and to have fun. Anything else is strictly trash -- a tune-out. With the winter book winding down and the important spring book upon us, cleaning up the clutter should be an important part of what urban stations that want to win must do. We've got to clean up the kitchen and then get down to some serious cookin'.

Critiquing & Horizontal Re-Cycling

One of the best places to begin removing the trash is with regular air checks with your jock staff. How may of them still attempt to be funny or informative, but only end up being boring and silly? An air-talent who adds clutter to the format is a liability that must be eliminated. Otherwise, the whole state of the station and the format are in jeopardy.

Dealing with talent is always a major issue, and it takes a different approach for each personality. Talent usually wants everyone to like them. The key is to get their egos to work for them. Don't criticize them directly; find their strengths and focus on those. If you can show them where they're shooting themselves in the foot, they'll take out some of the trash for you.

As a consultant, one of my pet peeves and one of the areas that I always find sorely lacking, is how personalities handle the phones. Many still put callers on live. That is a dangerous practice. Listener calls should always be recorded and edited. That way, poor or unwanted calls never get on the air and long callers get edited down. This is just one more effective way of "taking out the trash."

Personalities should be made aware that callers exist only to set up the talent and make them look good. They are essentially props. If Tom Joyner, Russ Parr, Doug Banks, Michael Baisden, Marc Clark or Skip Murphy never took callers, the audience wouldn't notice. Callers are such a very small percentage of the audience that they are not a critical response factor, providing the other elements are in place.

Create Compelling Content

Once you have taken out the trash, you have to replace that garbage with compelling programming. Just what is compelling programming? Compelling programming is when the air-personality tells the listeners something they don't know. They speak very frankly about it and it better be something they already care about. And then, if they speak on that subject with a touch of humor, and do that consistently, you've won the game.

Horizontal Recycling

Another thing that will help the state of the station and something new programmers need to recognize is the value of horizontal recycling. It works better when you use it to promote tomorrow at the same time, rather than trying to promote the rest of the show, even though both are important. Even the most loyal listeners (including those with a diary) are only listening to one of five hours of a show. Morning shows have a tendency to come on the air with guns blazing, doing the passionate, personal stuff they're excited about at six o'clock. But the power hour doesn't begin until seven. If you structure and schedule the content on the morning show with this in mind, that can make a huge difference. The power hour is seven to eight o'clock. That 's when there are the highest number of sets in use. You have people in the cars going to or from work and school along with those at home. They need you to make the most of their time, editing and expurgating.

This whole concept of editing and eliminating the "trash" is a special problem. It often involves a lack of training. It's a known fact that the demand for qualified air-talent, particularly in the mornings, far exceeds the supply. Today's programmers and consultants have to spend more time listening to air checks (and music) and less time in front of their computers. The reason is obvious. If we can't find talented on-air personalities, we have to train them and nobody wants to do that. We want someone else to find them, just like we want someone else to find our hits. Research can't find them. It can help to sort out those music titles that are burned or don't achieve high passion scores, but it can't find them. And a consultant whose forte is not urban really can't find them. We all want to play it safe, but you can't put the station on automatic and expect ratings to rise. That's simply not going to happen. There are reasons why training and talent development continue to be major problems for urban radio. The reasons go far beyond the basics of just getting the music right.

Some of today's decision-makers have problems training others because they weren't really trained themselves. Many came from stations where the PD was on the air, moved up, and never knew how to use talent development. If that's your situation, you can't ignore the problem and wait for it to bite you. Sit down with your air-talent and really listen at least once a week. Listen critically for one hour a week. Transcribe the show in detail, catching the missed formatics, wrong sequences, lack of meaningful content, poor voice transitions, etc. It you note just one little thing that you can tell your air talent, they'll think you listen all the time.

Audience Fatigue And Sound Processing

After we've taken care of the air talent trash, we have to look at the overall sound of the station. Even if you get the perfect staff and play list, if it sounds like it's being filtered through a wind tunnel, you've still got big problems. If your engineer can't tell that the sound of the station is flat, shallow and "muddy," compared to your competition, you've got a tough fight. It will be noticed right away by your listeners, who constantly make comparisons, even subconscious, left brain ones, between you and your direct (or indirect) format competitors. So you better take care of it. You must convince your chief engineer, GM, owner, consultant or group PD that there is a need for some new audio processing equipment -- an area that is all too often overlooked in urban radio. And HD radio is coming. So when you upgrade, you should upgrade with an eye toward the future.

Now let's check out the signal itself. Regardless of your power, you want to sound as clean and crisp as possible. One of the ways urban stations often lose, especially with the blurring of formats and music lately, is when your competition plays the same song, often at the same time you are playing it, and it sounds better over there. All of a sudden, it doesn't matter who plays ten songs in a row, because all that hum, hiss, cross talk, vibration and distortion in your audio signal is going to take its toll. It's called audience fatigue. Let's face it, tuners and other audio equipment in homes, cars and portable versions are now digital and getting better, cheaper and smaller all the time. This is making even the younger members of your audience somewhat purist, if only by comparison.

We're talking about the state of the station and the future here. We're talking about not being afraid to embrace the unknown. It's it a good idea to take a real interest in the future. After all, that's where you will spend the rest of your life.

If you're skilled, persistent, or fortunate enough to take out the trash, improve your air-talent and audio processing, get your station lean and on top, naturally, you are then expected to keep it there. The problem, however, is that chances are your GM may even add more commercial units and promos, remotes and garbage and ask you to understand. They've got pressure, too. The problem is that these extra units and remotes directly affect the state of station. And you need to find a way to remind your GM when those Arbitron digits drop, so will both of you.

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