On the agenda were the challenges of the current economic climate, the opportunities arising from new media and new technology and creativity. Topics that are very relevant to the readers of this blog too….

The general perspective is that the overall economic climate will remain bad for some time to come. This will have a severe impact on the advertising income, traditional the main source of income for radio-stations. Advertising will move more and more to digital and on-line media, as those are relatively cheap and have very good accountability.

On the other hand for music radio stations, these new media and distribution challenges have some serious issues that comes with those:

• The recession will put pressure on advertising income in the ‘core’ business…
• New media and on-line distribution rights for music are still in the infancy phase and the music industry and rights organisations are developing the models as those happen. This creates a challenge for commercial radio station owners as it is difficult to plan the business around uncertainty…
• Advertisers and media agencies are not that familiar yet with new media and tend to stick with traditional mass media and the advertising models around those…
• New media and on-line distribution adds additional cost to a radio station and the limited revenue that comes from those is not immediately covering these cost…

In my upcoming posts I will share more on these individual challenges and how those impact the business and what might be ways around those issues.

The advantage of a recession sometimes is that you will have to think smarter and smarter to make your business work and innovation and creativity are key…

Over the past 6 months or so, I’ve been involved in a research project with the BBC. We’ve been looking at what listeners and fans do online. The project investigated notions of interactivity; it looked at the ways in which fans of specific presenters express their fandom online; it examined the things that fans of radio soap The Archers do in order to connect and discuss their favourite show; and my bit, with Professor Tim Wall, was about specialist music online.

Specifically, we looked at three things:

1) What do specialist music fans do online?
2) What does the BBC do for specialist music fans?
3) How do BBC staff think about specialist music provision?

The findings, I think, are quite interesting – and a summary of the project is being published on the BBC Radio Labs blog.

But one of the things I found most interesting was the notion of ‘orientations’ that we noticed among BBC staffers. There were clearly people who thought about the online world as a central part of what they did, and others for whom the broadcast was the thing – and anything that the radio station did online was simply there to extend and reinforce the brand.

Now, these orientations are not polar opposites, and lots of people had a mix of both orientations, but people were predominantly facing one way or another. And in fact, we considered both of those to represent missed opportunities.

Now, of course, what the BBC does for specialist music, it does so for reasons of public service, and we go into some detail on that in our report. But it got me thinking about radio personnel in general, and the ways in which they think about the online environment.

If you’re the kind of music radio person with a broadcast orientation, all the internet is to you is a bigger transmitter. Or it’s a kind of a trap that you lay out there in the world, and when people stumble into it, you can grab them and pull them in to your broadcast programming.

If you have more of an online orientation, you may consider the medium on its own terms, but may not be making the most of the music programming which, if your station is doing anything right, is where all the real action is.

The trick is to step outside both of those frames and consider your station as a media organisation in a broader sense.

You are particularly good at media that uses sound – music, speech and effects – but a holistic view of your organisation as ‘media in general’ encapsulates both the online experience and the broadcast one, so that these can work together with a common goal in mind.

In the case of the BBC, it’s specialist music for public service. In your case, it might be music and entertainment for commercial purposes. Or information and debate for community purposes. Either way, the cognitive step outside the two orientations into a wider media perspective allows you to think about broadcasting and the internet, radio and new media, as part of one coherent thing.

And when you begin to do that, a lot of the problems facing radio in the 21st century begin to melt away, and a lot of really interesting opportunities emerge. I’ll be talking more about that idea here on New Radio Strategies in the coming months.

I will be the first to admit that there is nothing genius in here – for the most part, all these pillars are common sense, but that doesn’t make them any less important! And as stated above, I have changed these pillars many times throughout the years, rotating different ones in and out bur for the most part they have expressed the same things. So with all that being said, here we go…..

1. The Right Music – An obvious one, of course, but it needs to be said that if the music isn’t targeted towards your core listening audience then nothing else on this list will matter.

2. The Best Talent – This is NOT an area to skimp on. There’s a reason why certain talent demands big dollars. Because they’re worth it. The whole “you get what you pay for” thing. Back when Mel Karmazin ran CBS/Infinity radio he responded to those who questioned him about paying Howard Stern, Don Imus and others so much. Mel responded by saying something to the effect of, “you’re looking at it wrong – it’s not about how much I’m paying them, it’s about how much they’re MAKING for me.” Nuff said.

3. Unique, Compelling, Exclusive – The “Holy Trinity” of content creation, ESPECIALLY these days where there are unlimited choices for consumers. Any content that you create for your channel, station or platform should have these three elements – uniqueness, compelling-ness (to coin a word) and exclusivity. Sirius and XM got into a bidding war for content because they each wanted content that was unique, compelling and most of all, exclusive. The ONLY place to get Howard Stern was on Sirius; the ONLY place to get Oprah and Friends on radio was XM, they each competed for exclusive sports rights and so on.

4. Think Strategically, Act Tactically – Every station should have its own strategic plan, which simply put is a document that identifies what the overall plan for the station is. Like I said, simple. At its essence, the plan identifies what the station’s three (or so) key elements are. These three elements are the key positions that the radio station is trying to own. Once those are articulated, EVERYTHING that is done on the station has to support one of those key elements – whether it’s imaging, DJ talk, events, promotions and everything else. Once that’s in place, the tactical plan is created. The tactical plan is the document where all of the station tactics are articulated – each of these tactics should support the strategic plan. Sounds simple, and it is. But it’s surprising how many times it’s not done.

5. Specialty Programming – This is an extension of the point above, as specialty programming is a tactic that is deployed in order to carry out the strategic plan. However, it is a pretty important tactic and therefore gets its own number. It is critical for a few reasons, the first of which is that because whatever it is that is created will (hopefully) be good programming for the radio station. . Secondly, the promotion value of the show can’t be overestimated. The specialty program is something specific for your station to promote across dayparts, on the website, in e-mails to the database or elsewhere. Instead of saying, “hey, listen to our radio station ‘cause it’s great…” if there is a specific specialty show to promote the message becomes, “Listen to ‘Most Wanted with Ben Jones’ every night at 7…” (An actual show on Virgin Radio U.K.). And this becomes even more important when promoting across a platform, say like a satellite radio platform.

6. Promote, Promote, Cross-Promote – This ties in with the item above – Promotion is everything. Across dayparts, across channels (in a multi-channel environment), on the website, in e-mail blasts, in outside advertising, wherever, whenever. Promote specific things – shows, jocks, events, contests, whatever. Just promote it.

7. You Have Left the Box – (Think and Re-Think Everything) – You know that proverbial box you’re always hearing about? Not to be cliché about it, but really, take a look at everything you’re doing with a fresh perspective. Don’t necessarily throw out the rulebook (cause there ARE some really useful ‘rules’ that have been established), but re-evaluate EVERYTHING. Look at everything you do and your reasoning behind doing it with a fresh set of goggles. What do you see now? The landscape has changed drastically over the last few years and is still evolving. Make sure you are adapting.

8. It’s More than the Music – Okay, if you’re a music station the music is obviously super important (see #1). But don’t stop there. If you do you’re dead. What does your station do that is SO compelling that someone would rather listen to that rather than their iPod? Are your jocks compelling? Are they babbling idiots or do they have something to say? Do they relate to your audience?

9. Make it a Production – The importance of great production, or imaging, can’t be overstated. At its best, great imaging can go a looong way to communicating to listeners what your radio station is all about. It can convey the brand essence of your station in a way that is creative, exciting and pleasing to the ear rather than seeming intrusive to your audience. At its worst it is annoying, intrusive and sounds like a commercial. Be on the right side of that divide. Make it cool. Make it in tune with the brand essence. Make it fit with the strategic plan. And make it short – you know, attention spans and all.

10. Events – Another ‘more than the music’ element that is critical to the success of a station is events. Partner with cool existing events. Create your own events – be creative, think BIG, be unique. And make sure the event is a good strategic fit for your station. And then of course, promote it! The promotional value of events can’t be overstated – again, it is something specific to promote – and gives all listeners a sense of the ‘bigness’ of all that’s happening on the station/platform. Even if they’re not interested in that specific event, they’ll take note of it.

11. Artist Involvement – Get the Artists involved – through interviews, performances, endorsements, guest DJ slots, hosting a show or other creative ways. This is another area that people can’t get elsewhere – on their iPods or their customized Internet radio channel. The only place that can deliver the artists directly to the people is your radio station! You have to build the relationships with the artists, managers, record people, roadies, whomever; it is imperative that your station delivers the artists to the listeners.

12. The WOW Factor – This is kind of the catch-all. Even if you do everything technically ‘right’, does your station have that ‘it’? Does it reach out and GRAB the listener and entice them to listen? It better. There’s a great scene in that movie “21” when the main character is interviewing for a scholarship to Harvard Law School. The kid has a 4.0 GPA, has aced the law school exam and is a perfect candidate in every regard. The only problem is, as the dean tells him, is that there are 72 others just like him! So, the dean asks him, what makes him stand out and his application ‘jump off the page’ and rise above the rest? What makes his story so compelling? So the same can be asked for your radio station – what makes your station so damn compelling that listeners will say, “WOW”?

13. Communicate – Sounds silly and cliché and basic, but again, sometimes things are cliché for a reason – because they’re true. Communicate externally and internally. Make sure everyone at the station knows what the plan is and make sure everyone listening knows exactly what you stand for and what you’re all about.

Yes! I couldn’t agree with him more.

At its essence, radio is about the communication between the listener and the person on the other side of the mike. That person plays the music the listener wants to hear and provides information about the songs and the artists that keeps the listener plugged in. Additionally, that person provides a sense of companionship and community for the listener. Radio is the social network with a voice.

So as I sat there thinking a bit about radio and the definition of radio and of how radio is evolving, I began thinking about satellite radio. I listen to a lot of satellite radio here in the U.S. and I must say that there are many things I either hear for myself, or hear about through cross-promotion, that get me excited about listening. Things that give me the sense that the “true mission” of radio is being fulfilled there. I’ve written a few times before – here, here and here – about my fascination with and fondness for these “micro-channels” that both XM and Sirius do. To me, these channels kind of sum up what the benefits of satellite radio are for the listener, providing a snapshot of the best that satellite radio can offer.

The other day while I was driving home I tuned into one of Sirius’ such channels, the all-Springsteen “E Street Radio” channel. As luck would have it, I stumbled upon the beginning of an hour that featured a guest DJ, something that the channel regularly does. However this hour wasn’t featuring just any guest DJ, it was none other than long time member of the E Street Band, pianist Roy Bittan. I sat there in my car captivated as Bittan not only played songs that featured his playing – songs in Springsteen’s catalog as well as those by other artists – but also as he discussed in depth the particulars about each track and why it was so special to him. It was pretty incredible radio – hearing Bittan introducing “Born To Run” as he spoke about his first ever gig with the E Street Band back in 1974; about how the classic piano-outro on “Backstreets” came about; how the sessions for Meat Loaf’s “Bat Out of Hell” album came to be and his experiences in the making of that classic album; how he came to record with David Bowie and his experiences with recording the “TVC 15″ track; about how the band recorded many of the tracks on “The River” in a live fashion and many others. Now keep in mind that each of the songs he played during the hour I’ve heard a thousand times – but hearing them with the context he provided enabled me to hear each song in a different way. Powerful stuff.

As I was driving along and listening to this incredible hour of radio, I was thinking to myself, “This is exactly why I subscribe to Sirius. I couldn’t hear this type of radio anywhere else.” And yes, it’s just one small example, for I don’t pay $13/month so I can hear Roy Bittan do one hour of radio. The fact of the matter is that the hour of radio I just described above is representative of not only what is happening on the “E Street Radio” channel, but what is happening on many other channels on the Sirius platform not to mention with what’s going on across the XM platform.

NPR calls them “car moments” – radio programming that is so compelling that you sit in your car to keep listening even after you reached your destination. The Roy Bittan guest DJ program provided me with a “car moment” as I sat in my driveway to listen Bittan introduce the last of the songs he was to play for the hour. And truth be told, I would have sat there in the car for another hour if he had kept on going – and that is the true testament to the power of great radio.

That makes Pandora’s new app the third most successful in the iPhoneverse. Pandora can sadly not now be received in the UK because of our obscenely restrictive copyright restrictions, and I truly regret not being able to listen to them any more. They are, for me, the best webstreamers by far. The iPhone hookup got them 180,000 new users in three days. They claim a new user every two seconds. This is BIG stuff.

So what do we take from this? I think we are finally seeing another conjunction of new technology, audience, demographics and circumstance. You need ease of use; you need attractive programming; you need affordability; and you need someone to spot the gap and fill it. This is uncannily similar to events in the 50s when Rock and Roll and Top 40 Radio came together.

This may be a huge step forward. I hope so; Pandora deserve it. I still won’t call it radio, though. In my luddite book, radio still involves someone communicating with you. I’m sure Pandora have an adorable detailed and fantastically well-connected database, the fruit of their very savvy staff. I’d kill to be able to play around with it. But I can’t relate to databases. I still want to hear from real people. But if I was living permanently in the US, Pandora’s app would be enough to make me get an iPhone.

I’ve written about these satellite radio micro-channels before here and here and I hate to sound like a broken record, but I will.

Investing in creative, compelling programming pays off.

Sirius just announced that Coldplay will take over one of their channels (Alt Nation) for ten days beginning Friday, June 13th. The launch of the channel, Coldplay Nation, coincides (shockingly!) with the release of the band’s “Viva La Vida” album which will be during the channel’s 10-day run. As is stated on the Sirius website, Coldplay Nation “celebrates the June 17 release of Coldplay’s new Viva La Vida with Chris Martin and the band’s personal introductions to songs from the new album. You’ll also hear music from throughout their career, artists who influenced the Coldplay sound and current favorites.”

This cuts to the heart of what radio has to do to succeed – create programming that is unique, compelling and exclusive. If listeners are given a compelling reason, they will listen and become fans of a radio station or in the case of the satellite radio providers, subscribe to their service.

Coldplay is one of the biggest bands today with one of the most anticipated new releases on the horizon. If you’re a Coldplay fan, the channel is great news for you because you get to listen to a channel that is running what you consider compelling content. Those who aren’t Coldplay fans may not listen, but they will hear about it (thanks to cross-promotion) and they will get the message. The message being that one of the globe’s biggest artists is doing something big and something exclusive for the service that they subscribe to. Sure, it may not be an artist that they’re particularly interested in, but nonetheless they are once again reminded of the fact that “cool things are always happening here” thus subtly giving them additional justification for subscribing to Sirius – which is critical during this time where every cent of discretionary household spending is analyzed for potential reductions.

With Viva La Vida being their 4th studio album, Coldplay doesn’t have the catalog to support a channel for an extended period of time like Sirius’ other micro-channels, such as Springsteen’s E Street Radio, Jimmy Buffett’s Radio Margariville, Elvis Radio, Siriusly Sinatra or The Grateful Dead channel, but that’s hardly the point. With the announcement and imminent launch of Coldplay Nation, Sirius has scored a coup and like George Bush can proudly say “Mission Accomplished,” although without the irony. They’ve sent the message to fans of Coldplay, to non-fans of Coldplay, to subscribers of Sirius and to potential subscribers of Sirius.

This is nothing earth shattering, in fact it’s extraordinarily simple. But then again, most things are. Invest in programming. Be creative in the programming. Offer something compelling and unique and people will respond, even in this day and age of changing consumer habits, declining radio listenership and of serious questions regarding the relevance of radio to people’s lives.

I’m Just Sayin’….

I’ve written before about why I think satellite radio is great – here and here. Basically it boils down to the fact that the satellite services can take advantage of the fact that they have the Power of the Platform.

And while that’s all still true, I want to take a brief break from discussing radio “strategery” or any other serious, well thought out concepts or points about what makes radio (especially satellite radio) tick. I just want to talk about the experience of listening to radio as a listener.

Here in the States, we are just coming off the three-day Memorial Day holiday weekend. It’s the weekend that officially celebrates the men and women who have given their life in service of our country while also serving as the unofficial kick-off of the summer season. Over this weekend, radio stations traditionally do something “special” and this weekend was no exception as stations trotted out their countdowns and what not. But what made me stand up and take notice was something that one of the Sirius channels did – it reinforced to me why I was a Sirius subscriber and why I thought satellite radio is a powerful medium.

For the record, I’m a Bruce Springsteen fan – a big one. I spend a lot of time listening to Sirius’ “E Street Radio” channel – a channel which, as you may have guessed, plays nothing but Springsteen music. The fact is that even though I have all of his music loaded up on my iPod and can play any Bruce song that I want at any time, I still really like listening to the E Street Radio channel. One of the reasons for this is that I enjoy the serendipity of it all. I like hearing ‘random’ songs – songs that I wouldn’t dial up on my iPod, but for some reason I enjoy hearing when the channel plays it. But another reason I like the channel as much as I do is that they play stuff that I don’t have! Since they’re officially sanctioned by the Springsteen camp, they have access to lots of things that I only wish I had.

So over the Memorial Day weekend, E Street Radio featured nothing but live Springsteen shows. Shows from all different time periods and from all different tours. Shows with the E Street Band, without the E Street Band and solo shows without any band; basically everything a Springsteen fanatic would love. And as great as all the live shows played were there was one that stood out in particular. It was a benefit show recorded just over two weeks ago at a small 1,500 seat theatre in New Jersey. In addition to the intimate nature of the show, what set this show apart was that Bruce and the band did something they have never done before – ever. They played two of their classic albums, Born to Run and Darkness on the Edge of Town in their entirety. The songs were played in the exact same order as they appeared on the original albums. People literally paid thousands of dollars to be at this show and a mere two weeks later we were hearing it on the radio. If you’re a Springsteen nut, hearing this was nothing short of incredible.

From a fan’s perspective the whole weekend was awesome. I didn’t change channels once throughout the whole weekend – and I’m a constant channel-changer. And even though gas prices are through the roof, I did some driving around I didn’t really have to do because I didn’t want to miss anything. That’s powerful. And that’s the power of the platform. The fact that Sirius could do this is due to the fact that they have a Springsteen channel to showcase it on. And the only way you can have a whole channel dedicated to one artist is when you have a platform enabling you to provide this kind of variety.

So that’s it. No serious strategy discussion, insight into programming mechanics or anything else like that. Just observations from a listener who spent the weekend listening to something he really liked and was damn glad about it.

I’m just sayin’.

As he pointed out, now that social engagement is moving from being a destination to a feature, it’s a big opportunity for radio.

Indeed.

Terrestrial radio has done a lot of things wrong in recent years but a way for them to get back in the game and re-establish their relevance is to make sure this is not an opportunity lost. Radio ain’t dead, but it’s broken. It’s critical for radio to re-engage listeners in new (and old!) ways.

And the whole ‘social thing’ is a big opportunity to re-engage.

Back in the day, the great state of New Jersey had an advertising campaign designed to promote tourism (and if there was any U.S. State that needed a campaign to promote tourism, it was New Jersey – Bruce Springsteen and the Jersey Shore not withstanding). The tagline of the campaign was New Jersey and You – Perfect Together! Taking creative license from the Garden State, I propose a slogan which applies to the topic at hand: Radio and Social Networks – Perfect Together!

So let’s get right to it – why are they perfect together? The fact is, at their core radio stations are and have always been social networks. In fact, they are the oldest mass-media social networks. (I’m sure the cavemen had their own version of a social network, but it probably involved cave drawings or something and sure wasn’t powered by technology!). Bound by music, lifestyle or point of view, a good radio station identifies, captures, becomes a source of entertainment and information for, and provides a voice and identity for specific communities of people. They do this by providing these communities of people with content that is important to them. Content that is relevant, interesting and exciting. Listeners to a great radio station feel like they are part of something – something bigger than themselves. They feel like they are part of a larger community of people who like what they like, who feel what they feel and who have similar experiences as they do. They feel connected.

It is about the power of the collective experience.

You know how a song always sounds better when you hear it on the radio as opposed to hearing it off a CD? There are a number of reasons for this, one being due to the serendipitous nature of it; but another is because of that sense of having a common or collective experience. It’s because as you sit there in your car listening to the song, you know that thousands of others – other members of this community – are hearing the exact same thing at the exact same time.

The sense of community is a powerful thing.

Great radio stations are community builders and community leaders. The essence of a station’s community (assuming the station is a music-oriented one) is the music, but it’s more than that. It’s the lifestyle the station portrays, it’s the language, it’s the imaging, and it’s the jocks – their attitude, the things they talk about, the way they talk about them and the points of reference they provide. It’s the whole deal.

Radio stations ain’t supposed to be jukeboxes. In fact there is probably an inverse relationship between the “jukebox-iness” of a station and its relevance and importance to people and how much “connection” they feel towards it. Call it the “sucky” equation.

Great radio stations – those with a low “sucky quotient” – get members of their target communities to place their trust in them by holding up their end of the bargain. Among other things, their end of the bargain consists of the following: providing creative and compelling programming; hiring jocks who know how to relate to and connect with people; creating ways for the listeners to directly interact with the radio station and by becoming vibrant members of the community. The members of the community look towards the great radio stations to be a guide for the community – a guide on musical tastes, on lifestyle on opinions, on trends.

When I think of great radio stations, I think of KROQ in Los Angeles. KROQ plays what would generally be termed as ‘alternative rock’ music, but defining them as purely an ‘alternative rock’ radio station doesn’t do them justice. They’re bigger than that. They’re the self-proclaimed “World Famous KROQ.” KROQ sets trends. KROQ oozes a lifestyle. They reflect the interests of the KROQ community while at the same time leading it. They have street cred. If KROQ says it’s so, it’s so. I remember a day back in the late 90’s when the Kevin and Bean morning show had Snoop on as an in-studio guest. Snoop? On an ‘alternative’ station? Yeah. The thing is, KROQ defines itself by a lifestyle rather than by a ‘format’. There’s a difference. A big one. KROQ understands who their core listeners are and then creates programming that group would appreciate, regardless of any traditional format boundary. That pertains to the music; it pertains to the jocks; it pertains to the imaging and it pertains to the guests they have on the air. Simple. Would the skateboarder kids in Huntington Beach think having Snoop on was cool? Yeah.

The point is, KROQ has made themselves the center of a vibrant community. They have served, led and engaged this community of people remarkably well. Sadly, most terrestrial radio stations aren’t doing this. But they can start. And for their own sake, they better start. The online social media revolution can serve as their wake-up call. The power of the online social networks is undeniable – and as pointed out by Dubber, it’s still evolving. So for radio stations to regain their relevance and importance to people’s lives, they have to figure out their strategy for riding this new media wave. First and foremost they can start by realizing that by having an existing broadcast signal and presumably a great deal of listeners, they already are social networks. Maybe they’re not strong, effective ones at this point, but that’s because their on-air product isn’t engaging their listener base. To improve the strength of the network they have to fix their on-air product. Invest in it, be creative in the programming, and all the rest. Once that is done and the station has an engaged listener base, they can further engage them by utilizing the web. This will require a lot of thinking. And a lot of work. But it has to be done. It’s show time.

I’ve spent a lot of time talking about social media over the past couple of months. So much so, that I’ve almost had no time for blogging. Social media’s the term now given to what was for a time known as ‘interactive media’ – until we all figured out that it wasn’t interactive in the sense of being able to actually affect the outcome of the content.

I attended a blogging conference in Chicago last week, and had a lot of discussions about this very issue, and at every opportunity, tried out the idea of radio as a social network for music fandom. I think there’s good work to be done here.

Chris Brogan brought up (in passing) the topic of music in social network sites, and the ways in which social networking needs to specialise in order to develop. It’s no good just being able to log on, make friends and build a profile anymore. Social engagement is a feature, no longer a destination.

Network radio – as in ’social’
And it occurred to me that what he was really talking about was an opportunity for radio.

Music Radio stations are, at least potentially, pre-existing music communities. People have self-selected into groups organised around a brand. The role of that brand, looked at from a social perspective, is to reinforce certain cultural values, reflect musical taste, and (most importantly) act as an source of opinion leadership.

That, I think, is where much music radio currently falls down. And I think this is where new strategies could come into play to help re-think music radio. Reflecting musical taste is prioritised, and making the most of the opinion leaders is downplayed because of what are now quite dated philosophies of music programming.

Not just a jukebox
Because emergent technologies increasingly allow for radio to act as a many-to-many medium, rather than just as a one-to-many medium, there is the opportunity for radio stations to draw upon the wisdom of the crowd and to reward and incentivise music taste-making. And this is an area in which radio has not already been beaten out by internet music servces. Because I think most online music services who cast themselves as ‘the new radio’ miss this one very important point:

It’s not just a jukebox – it’s a very human way of ordering, presenting and making sense of musical cultures. One that understands human routines, changing moods and preferences, why you might want to listen to something at night that you wouldn’t want to listen to during the day… and so on.

And likewise, I think there’s scope for radio to draw on the power of the community to generate and present metadata about the music that allows fans to make connections, develop new ways of engaging with the station output, and contributing more to the informational content about the music than simply “that was… this is… I’m… the time is… and you’re listening to…”

I’d be really interested in your thoughts about the ways in which this idea of community built around a station can be fostered – because I think this is one of the keys to the ongoing success of music radio.

Often, Songs can just up and change audience on us without our really realising it. It can take years, but the appeal of a Song never ever stays still. A glorious example of this was highlighted at a London conference last week. Here’s a link from the Guardian’s gossip column to illustrate. It cattily paints GCap chief exec Fru Hazlitt in a bad light, which is slightly unfair. The gist of the story is that Hazlitt mentioned Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’ as her favourite song. No big. But she was then followed by a speaker who demonstrated how research had this same song down as an all time audience turkey. The article failed to mention a few other facts, chief among which was that this was with a specific set of radio listeners in the US, and that this was live monitoring software. I must declare an interest here, by the way – the speaker was Philippe Generali, who heads up RCS, for whom I do a lot of work, and the research interpretation software he was demonstrating is, in my view, pretty damn powerful stuff.

Clever software apart, here is my point: ‘Dancing Queen’ has been through several lives, and it hasn’t stopped yet. And it’s got almost nothing to do with early adopters who bought the records, and almost everything to do with how the song has been used since then. From its first pure pop success, when it was comprehensively dismissed by music purists, though grudging acceptance for its pop craftsmanship, through reinvention as a camp classic with huge gay appeal, and exposure to new audiences through movies like ‘Muriel’s Wedding’ and the ‘Mamma Mia’ musical, through relentless airplay on Gold stations the world over… the song has changed audiences. Several times.

Many boomers who heard it over and over now can’t stand it; post-boomers, like Hazlitt, still love it; kids love it because it is ironic cheesy pop… and the listeners to a particular radio station in the US are pretty damn tired of it.

Like I said, several audiences. It’s up to us to work out who loves it, who hates it, and why. And after that, when to use it, and in what context. I’ll bet it sounds great on an all-Abba channel. Or a mid-70s pop channel.
It all depends on the context. Get that right, and you’ve cracked it.