a radio tale

[bueller]

I worked at a Missouri country station. We were surrounded by strong signals and big budgets playing 100% researched, charted, tight playlists and giving away cash and trucks. The only show on our station that had listeners was the morning show for the trading post.

Something had to be done, so when I was installed as OM/PD, I started to make adjustments. Started really listening to the new music coming in, talking to the listeners, taking their requests seriously.

As I started working the Texas and independent music in along with some lost classics and lessening the rotation of the burned out songs, I started getting more people listening for longer periods of time. Started getting compliments from the audience when I was out in public, thanking us for playing new music and the old stuff too, for not playing the same stuff as the other guys.

We added Altville with Buzz Brainard. Within the first month, Buzz played 2 requests from listeners in our area. Keep in mind, the acts they requested had never been played on radio in this region or even on Altville in the time we'd aired it, and they had to go online to the website to do this. This is an area where people think most people are internet-ignorant, but they went to the effort to make those requests.

You know the drill. The morning DJ hated the music and so did the sales manager. So they claimed that advertisers were complaining about the "weird" music. Despite this month being a record billing month in the entire station's history. I was never once presented with the name of one advertiser who had a complaint, nor did I hear any complaints from the listeners.

Got called into the GM's office. Was told my audience didn't want to hear that "new" music. Was told they only cared about the top 40 and they didn't buy records. I said "you mean to tell me they will turn this station off if they hear something they haven't seen on a chart?" Of course this guy, ex Clear Channel, said "it's never worked anywhere it's been tried." Well it was working for us, but oh well.

Morning guy became PD. To this day, he plays straight by the charts and people wonder why the station went back to sounding like a low budget automated copy of the big guys instead of being their local station. I hyped local, emphasized it, and took the station in a good direction where we talked to our audience instead of AT them.

My theory is, the GM was too stuck in the big city CC way to understand the market. The morning guy never abided by my playlist anyways, skipped over my currents, etc. He had 12 years in the market.

Because his father in law bought him a radio station and let he and his wife run it. That was one of my first and most powerful exposures to how this business can screw over the listener in favor of status quo.

Todd Fritsch's cover of "I've Got Mexico" was the last record I added. Fortunately, I arranged to have Todd come in the studio before I was demoted. Got to meet him and hear him play an amazing live set at our station.

And as soon as he walked out the door, that new PD didn't spin his record anymore. He told me "I can't play an unproven artist in regular rotation." Todd came back this year and sang at the fireworks display in a nearby town. The newspaper promoted it. And a lot of people wondered who he was, because their "Hometown Country" station won't play his music. He just disappeared. Like tons of other talented artists who are screwed over by selfish, arrogant management in radio who think that Clear Channel wrote the Bible on radio formatting.

Proud to be a radio outlaw,
Bueller

 

[PTBoardOp94]

Mighty Merle said it best. "Big City, turn me loose and set me free"

If you're in a place like I am with 6 other country stations, someone has to be different. If that means Texas music, sure.

We run a block of all-local artists on weekends, and it is one of the highest rated programs we run. There is a fair bit of hard-rock leaning country, along with country gospel, and just plain old covers.

 

[Keith Thompson]

Here's an alternate explanation...

As an OP/PD, you're being hired to implement the station owner's/management's vision of the kind of radio station they want to sell. It is not your job to implement your own programming vision unless you're given permission to do so by the ownership/management.

Here are a few arguments to counter your rant...

1. While it is may be true that the station was having a record sales period, those record sales were based more on the history of the station rather than what the station is doing at a given time...especially when you consider that sales contracts specify a future period of time when the spots will air since you can't retroactively run spots in the past.

2. It may very well be true that the sales manager is out selling a conventional country station and is telling clients that we're a hit driven station playing lots of Kenny Chesney, Toby Keith, Tim McGraw, etc. The clients could be tuning the station in expecting to hear Kenny, Toby, Tim etc. and not these unfamiliar arttists and are complaining to the sales manager that they aren't getting what they paid for. A client is going to complain to the person they have the most contact with and that's the salesperson, not the programmer.

3. In a competitive situation, it is generally not a good idea to base most your programming decisions around the listeners you come into direct contact with because those listeners are a very small sample of your listening audience (maybe 10% at the most) and those listeners tend to be the most passionate about the format.

4. If you're trying to program a radio station to generate revenue, you're far more interested in generating cume than with TSL and you're willing to sacrifice TSL to gain cume. You're programming approach which involved introducing new and unfamiliar music most likely had the effect of creating a high TSL/low cume station, which is not a desirable situation from a sales standpoint. Such programming drives away the cume which is what the clients want. And while the more loyal audience that remains certainly listens longer, even that is a disadvantage because any advertiser that wants to reach your narrower audience knows full well that they don't have to run as many spots as they would on a competiting station since they know that one spot will reach a higher percentage of your audience.

It's all well and good to have the attitude that radio can do more to support quality music, but that kind of attitude will only work if the station ownership/management is committed to the idea of running a radio station as a public service rather than as a business. If you're lucky enough to work for such a station enjoy it, but you'll also not be making near as much money.

Finally, keep in mind that many big market programmers made it to the big markets because they learned from the mistakes that they made working in smaller markets. Your tale represents the most common mistake made by small market programmers. Someday you'll learn from it.