ANOTHER NAIL IN OUR COFFINS

One of the common practices of modern radio is utilizing voice-track technology to share an air talent on multiple stations in the same market. Aside from the legitimate question of how high quality a performance one person can do when hosting multiple shows, there is another concern. These types of number-cruncher driven decision are easy to sell to management, but a real blow to the strength of the individual radio station's brand, and the given personality's credibility.

If we can get back to the real, long-lost meaning of the term "out of the box", I think you'll see my logic. Out of the box, by the way, doesn't mean "be creative". It means see things as your customers (in the case of radio programming, your listeners) see them. We work inside the box (the radio station, in this case). We see things from our perspective, "inside the box". Our listeners, on the other hand, are "outside the box". Their perspective is strikingly different from ours.

Listeners have favorite radio stations, but not favorite radio groups. Having a rock radio background, I've long known our core audience and the CHR core audience, even though they may share listening with each other, have an almost inverse definition of cool. Meanwhile, great radio stations have long been more than musical commodities - they've stood for certain things in their listeners minds. And they've stood against certain things. In the mid-80's, when we all were concerned about the famine in Ethiopia, a universal issue, rock radio listeners still didn't embrace USA For Africa's "We Are The World". Noble as it was, it was a cheesy pop song and the presence of some real rock stars on it didn't overcome the Lionel Ritchie/Michael Jackson association. Meanwhile, Nirvana's hits may have gotten airplay on the CHR stations, but their grunge lifestyle was toned down into a mere teenage fashion statement for that audience. Their anger, dispair and rage didn't cross over when their music did. These are just a couple of off the cup examples - we could do this all day.

The great personalities have always been advocates for the listener - period! They weren't schills for clients, they weren't voices for hire, they presented their station and the station's attitude and lifestyle with passion and conviction. They meant what they said and they thought like we thought (or at least they convinced us that they did). So imagine the devoted active rock listener discovering his favorite brother in arms air personality is simultaneously gushing over Lady Gaga's latest stunt on the local CHR station. Or the CHR devotee finding that "hot" girl on his station every afternoon is also playing Brad Paisley songs on the country station each night. Suddenly, our industry's greatest advocates, the air personalities, are reduced to schills, mere company men.

All actions and decisions have unintended ramifications. Part of good, long-term decision making is to try to think these through and anticipate them. Unfortunately, when budgets are tight and the pressure is on, we have an amazing (and self destructive) ability to talk ourselves into thinking anything is a good idea. (Sure, I'll stick my head in the oven. That should cut the cost of our natural gas bill, since my head will displace some of the gas, right?) These are trying times indeed, and we're all trying to cut cost in every way we can. But often times the money we save in the short term is spent on another nail in our own coffin. And where's the wisdom in that?