Will WXRT update their web site?

[chgodave]

I had pretty much given up months ago, and just for the heck of it, checked again today. The majority of the limited time I listen to WXRT is for their feature programming, such as live concert segments and featured artists.

So here I am on a Thursday afternoon curious as to what live music they will have for the coming weekend. And, as has been the case for years, they show "TBA" for their Saturday AND Sunday night live music shows.

No - WXRT, I'm not going to remember to tune in to find out. I'll forget, because there is nothing that I know I will want to hear. And, I'll probably check in 2 weeks and THEN find out I missed something I would have wanted to listen to.

This has become even more painful since they started streaming last year. Now they have listeners coming to their web site much more often to hear the streams, one would think the station would wake up and be on top of things such as programming coming up on the station. It was bad enough this has been going on for years, but is many times more frustrating with the streaming and how often they pump the site. Not next year, but 2 and 3 days from now. Why even have these links on the site if they are only going to frustrate people?

This happens by clicking on their "programming and features" (whatever) link, and clicking on their Saturday and Sunday night concert links. You'll always see what you MISSED...but rarely see what is coming up.

Hmmmm. No reasons to listen this weekend, and no reason to go back to their web site either. Oh well, guess I'll pull out a concert CD from my collection and enjoy that instead.

 

[BarneyPip]

chgodave,

Radio is not serious about the internet. All talk, no walk. The corporate directives in most of the big companies is drive people to the web and develop it as revenue stream. The biggest of 'em's stream utility notoriously doesn't work in just about every market and its standard template is so cluttered it's not very useful. Emmis' sites are the most promising right now -- they capture data as a quid pro quo for their streams and offer some interesting content. CBS's sites look great but as you've noticed, no consistent updating and lots of dead or non-functional links. Bonneville -- can't figure out why they've let their WILV site go to s****. They redesigned it and stopped short of any real content. It's just a "look." 'XRT is particularly puzzling because they're pushing so much e-mail right now -- which actually looks great. But then the links don't work.

You'd think, too, that web contesting (I'm not talking about national stuff, but local contests) would be resolved and integrated with the air product, i.e. "Congrats to Joe Blow of Lincolnwood who picked up the Pearl Jam tix we gave away last hour on WXYZ dot com." But no.

You'd think it would be simple: An index page that would tempt somebody to make it their browser's home page because there's updated weather, news, demo-targeted content, and frequently refreshing web-exclusive contesting, and functional connection to station-related events, etc. Basic brand building. With so many design firms out there with slam dunk CMS, you'd think stations would outsource this and get it right.

It's stunning how mediocre almost every radio company is at this.

 

[Countrykev]

There are some companies who are really making the leap to the Internet.

The one company who comes to mind is Emmis. They've really made huge strides to make their web content pretty solid and thourough. That, and it's regularly updated. Last I knew at WLUP/WKQX they had something like 3 or 4 fulltime people dedicated to the websites.