Bob Lawrence, President/CEO

The multi billion dollar television industry may not be the medium that pays your salary however, the manner in which it affects radio listeners is extremely relevant. Could reality television help you deepen the “footprints” needed to secure radio’s place in our lives? The most successful entertainment endeavors offer an escape for the consumer and in the best scenarios connect with them in a way which moves them! Former AMFM President/CEO, Jimmy de Castro impressed upon many programmers, “Build relationships that listeners remember – make deep footprints in the sand”.

Consider the face of television over the last several years. From “Survivor” or “The Bachelor” to “American Idol”, “Dancing with the Stars” and “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition”, people are spending hours lost in programming where they can live their lives either in someone else’s reality, or in another person’s dreams. TV viewers are measuring their own successes or failures using these types of weekly shows as a barometer. What is it about reality programming that people love so much that they are committed to rearranging their lives for viewing, or at the very least, set a season pass on the DVR? We all complain there never seem to be enough minutes in a day to get it all done, yet we make the time for television, believing somehow our lives “might” be better by doing so. Reality TV has restored the “good feelings” to TV viewing because now many families are watching together. The association with “the idiot box” our parents tried to keep us from now has the most educated business man watching with his son to see if he, indeed, is “Smarter Than a Fifth Grader”. Television is making the connection and doing so with strong numbers. Is it possible for radio to do the same?

To add some perspective about the impact of television…
100 million votes were cast on the American Idol finale. In the 2008 US Presidential election, the winning popular vote accounted for just 66 million ballots. That translates into extremely “deep footprints” for the Fox Network.

Too often, we see an effort to make as many footprints as possible but quickly find that the first wave comes through and washes them away. Single attempts will not make lasting, indelible footprints! Very little of radio programming is so compelling that listeners want to record it. In our industry, we should begin to measure success on how “our” product impacts the listener on a daily basis. Successful morning shows have used character development and bonding methods for quite some time but what type of content can you provide that will transcend just the morning show? What would make your listener feel the same kind of connection, or desire appointment listening in the same way they view “American Idol”? Engaging your target audience with content that’s based on their own input and then delivering it in a way that matters to them is key!

Music will always be the magnet that draws listeners in… but the songs alone will never be enough to build your strong brand. A listener knows her favorite music station will continue to play her favorite songs every few hours. So, it’s that space between the music where you must create the deep footprints. Why as children did we all want to write our names, or put our hand prints in freshly poured cement? We wanted everyone to know that “we were there” and it would be seen “forever”! Everyday, imagine your station as that freshly poured cement in the minds of your listeners and seize every opportunity to put your name in it. It’s an impossible task once it sets – so don’t wait. Develop and create relationships that bond to listeners, constantly.

How are you connecting with your listeners to determine what is important to them? Your website is an enormous, no cost opportunity to transpose radio’s form of communication from unilateral to bilateral. Remove the clutter and make your website mostly about your listener using marriage like branding. Show them you are deeply interested in them. Very often, the best way to do that is to simply listen. If you ask questions that keep them talking about themselves and then build profiles within your database… two things happen. One, you gain a wealth of information and two, you’ve made them feel special; but the advantage is really to you – the one who listened. “Knowledge is power” so use all tools at your disposal, including a well managed website, to help you make “deeper footprints”.