Is Urban A Format Without A Future?

Repositioning & Changing Misperceptions

The radio industry as we once knew it has changed dramatically. Up until now, Urban radio has managed to survive despite the rise and fall of other, similar formats. Lately, Smooth Jazz stations have been dropping quicker than a live morning show.

Now in some markets, particularly those that have gone to electronic measurement, some Urban-formatted stations are at risk. I spoke with a major-market GM who told me, "Even when we had huge numbers, we still weren't getting all the buys we deserved. Now that we have dropped from the top five, agencies have all the excuses they need not to buy us, even at a lower rate." It has become almost impossible to remain the market leader -- even if you're the format leader. How do you maintain a relationship with an evolving, shrinking audience not only musically, but with new technology initiatives, marketing strategies and programming innovations?

One of the biggest challenges facing today's Urban programmers is how to maintain and/or improve on their ratings with less tools and people to work with. More than ever, your people are the key. Getting the most out of everyone on your staff is no longer a luxury. It's a necessity. And excelling at three or four different jobs is tough. A few years ago all you had to do was concentrate on being a totally connective jock, or a wizard at imaging or a programming guru, but now because of financial times we have to do our best to be peerless in all aspects of the gig. Just because those of us who are left have so many day-to-day responsibilities doesn't mean that one thing is more important than the other. They're all important.

In the past you might be able to survive with a talented jock who brought in big numbers, but didn't work well with sales or remotes. Today everyone must be the full package ... and often that is hard to find. Increased competition for attention of radio listeners will always be an issue. But great content will always win. We must continue to drive innovation with interesting and compelling personalities and great content.

Filling The Holes

Great content has to start with great music. Now there is less budget available for research. Does that mean that Urban radio is going to wind up playing some weak records because there was no time or little budget to test them? Now wait a minute, would any PD worth his cume knowingly play a "stiff?" Well, probably not knowingly, but the answer could be "yes" if his limited, online callout research mistakenly told him the track was something that ignited passion from his listeners.

Until it develops one way or the other, you just have to make certain it's surrounded on either side with a hit. Programmers also use some of these terms to describe jams they feel strongly about. Sometimes we'll place a record in the "C stack" just for balance. You have to go in the direction of the listeners. Sometimes you can break records and sometimes you are going to be late to the party. It's still better to be late on a hit rather than early on a stiff.

Format pundits often claim we are driving or have driven some of our most loyal listeners to satellite radio, the Internet or their iPods. One of the reasons so many listeners have moved away from terrestrial radio is a lack of variety. Another is clutter (things that happen between even the well-researched jams that are turning listeners off). Is it the air personalities? What they say? Or what they don't say?

The whole is still equal to the sum of its parts and opposites still attract. We need to do some defensive programming. We just have to find and air some attractive opposites. For example, if your competition is playing a lot of ballads, you need to put some hit tunes with tempo on the air.

After we get the music right, there are other holes to fill. Obviously we have to look at the air talent. We need to examine the people or "players," and then fix the ones that are broken or in need of repair. If they can't be fixed, they must be replaced.

Developing Better Hiring Habits With Fewer Dollars

Let's talk about replacement strategies. It's the middle of your day, Friday, and your star morning show just informs you that they will not be renewing. They just can't take the cut in salary you've been forced to make. They're going to be moving on, perhaps to your competition across the street. It's not like you didn't see it coming. As the PD, you had several conversations with your GM and told him to be prepared to give up some bigger bucks or risk losing them. He threw you out of his office and told you that it was your job to convince them to stay at a lower salary. You tried, failed and now the moment of truth is here. To make matters worse, the only syndicated show that might work is already taken.

On one hand, you might think it will be good for your station to have some fresh blood or perhaps a syndicated morning show if one were available. But then again, change always brings a little bit of fear. At least with the current show, you know what to expect. It's the devil you know, good and bad.

Sometimes stations need to look no further than down the hall for new hires. But in the case of a morning show, that might be a stretch. The GM might want you to take one of the interns off the van and "put the streets on the air." In the case of a part-timer or weekender, the same applies. You could take a chance and hope that you're right, but if you're wrong, both of you will be unemployed.

Despite all the talk about the current talent void, I believe there are still some talented people on the air right now. The problem is there are not enough of them and they need guidance. They need a program director who has or will take the time to listen to their shows and help them to improve.

The capacity of the human mind to be creative is infinite. There is lot of new, young talent out there who just need to be developed and given a chance to evolve. But where are they going to go to develop? Overnight shows are almost all voicetracked. And weekends are filled with syndication and full-timers who now must work six days.

Talent development sessions are missing at many stations. The program director is simply too busy. In many cases, he/she didn't come up as an air talent, so they don't know what or how to critique or instruct even if they had the time. If you're a programmer who never sat in the "air-chair," there are going to be some things you just don't know. And the talent can sense this. Programmers who are experts at scheduling music, but absolute failures at developing talent, are going to have problems filling the "holes." If that description fits you, remember the whole is still equal to the sum of its parts. The "hole-fillers" are out there. You just have to find them.

Something else you have to find for the filling process to be complete involves research. When you do audience research, you see a lot of answers to questions that say, "Yes." Yes, the voices are turning listeners off. And yes, there are things that boring, ill-prepared air personalities are both saying and not saying that bother listeners. There are basic things they would like to hear (like the title and artist of the songs they're playing, for instance). They want their favorite air talent to tell them about the artists between songs. They want to know where the artists they play live and where they party. They want to know how they live and what they like.

All we have to do is to begin to think like a listener and we will know right away what's wrong with our content. Then we need to revisit and then re-write the show prep manual to include or exclude the things we discover as a result of our research, and we're well on our way to solving one of our biggest problems.

You may work for a station that is part of a large group or conglomerate. Many of these stations have developed what I call the "studio envelope" concept. This is where the company houses all of its stations at one site to let them reduce the number of workers and share receptionists, management, studios, news and sales forces. One of the advantages to this type of set-up is that it allows for a great deal of sharing. For example, if an idea or a bit developed on the Rock or Top 40 station down the hall, that idea or joke could be shared and visa versa. Often this isn't done for a variety of reasons. But it could be and should be.

Finally, is Urban a format without a future? No, but it's going to be a different future because it came from a different past. Within every format there are industry-driven fads and listener-driven trends. In the past we worried about our format competitors. In today's environment, much of the innovating is technological innovation. Today our audience can listen to what they want to, when they want, at any time they want, on any device. We are going to see greater changes in our Urban media world in the next five years than we have in the last 50 years.

Word.