Date Posted:
03 | 20 | 05

Counter-Programming In A Market That's Been Jacked

Has your market been Jacked? Get back to the basics with good old fashioned Counter-Programming - and then some.

While these new "Jack" stations market themselves using the slogan "playing what we want", shape your station's identity by proving you play what listeners always say they want: REQUESTS.

I don't know about your market, but I sure as hell don't hear requests in MY neck of the woods. Sniff sniff...? Yep - that smells like an opportunity to me too.

  • Voiceguy: "MIX - Playing what YOU want since 1991."
  • BED...
  • Air Talent: "Today's Best Variety Mix 1029, hello...?"
  • Listener: "Hi, I'm calling to make a request...
    I'm dying to hear _____________"
  • Air Talent: "Absolutely! Thanks for the call"
  • START THE REQUESTED SONG.


Notes:

Don't start the request till the listener finishes requesting it. End the phone call and start the record. Come on, how can you already be playing a 'request' if the listener hasn't yet requested it? That's cheese.

"While these "Jack" stations market themselves using the slogan "playing what we want", shape your station's identity by proving you play what listeners want."

Be real.
Don't tag it with yet another Mix 102.9. To use a TV analogy, More Simon, less Seacrest.

Be real.
Play it once every two hours, indefinitely.


Yada Yada Yada:

P.S. Any station who uses this - please send an email to "thatguy at thisisthebox dot com" just to say hello. Thanks.

P.P.S. In case you're curious, 1991 is when Mix signed on in Dallas TX. A mostly autopilot sounding Jack FM signed on there a few months ago.

P.P.P.S. The real goal here isn't even counterprogramming... that's just a nice bonus. The real goal is to make the damn station feel alive again... to help rebuild the connection between listener and station.

Seacrest, OUT :)

Colophon:

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Think About It:

  • Polarization: Are we fighters rather than thinkers?:   Maybe after terrestrial broadcasting gets hit by a disaster of its own making we'll see change. Pushing talent off the airwaves and dumbing down our product makes it easier for other forms of entertainment to become our disaster.

  • Don't Blame The iPod:   Radio did not begin as a music delivery medium. This is an era we have allowed ourselves to get stuck in.

  • A Raindrop And The Flood:   Radicalism comes in many forms. The idea of "my country right or wrong" is both radical and dangerous. I dare say it is more traitorous than patriotic because it does the country more harm than good. Bad ideas are like a cancer, and a body that gives in to cancer dies.

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