To unfriend or block, that is the question

 

Image via CrunchBase

We have each found situations where we are annoyed with people we are connected to on Facebook. They either post too much, post TMI (too much information) kind of stuff, or stuff we find offensive or goes against our own beliefs. What can you do? I have seen many people use the "block" feature to remove them from their news feed. I think that can be a bit harsh... There are several options you can use to remove posts from your news feed. You don't need to block people... you can:

1.  Remove them from showing in your news feed. Just go to their profile, hover your mouse over the "Friends" button (it is checked when you are friends) and a drop down appears. In the drop down "uncheck" show in news feed. That way you are still connected as "friends" but don't have to see the stuff they post all the time. There are more options if you click on "settings" just below "show in news feed".
2. Hide the stalker side bar on the right by clicking "hide sidebar" in the bottom right corner. This will help keep you from seeing everything your friends are posting and commenting on.
3. You can hide specific posts by hovering the mouse over the upper right hand corner the post you want to hide. A little drop down arrow appears, and you can click "hide post".. I generally do that after each post I read. You can also use the option to report the post to Facebook if it is spam. When you are viewing comments on a friends post, when you hover over the top right corner, the option appears to report that specific comment as spam.
4. You can use the block feature, but then you cannot contact each other at all through Facebook (you can't see them, they can't see you, unless you log out or create a new profile). So this is good if someone is belligerent or posts useless stuff all the time and has no social value at all (spammers) and you know you will never have a need to connect. But if its just because they "post too much" or "post opinions you disagree with", I suggest one of the first three options...

Facebook has a lot of features, you just have to poke around to find them. Feel free to ask me. How do you manage your Facebook News Feed?

Tuesday Talker Tips: #3 Is One a Lonely Number?

Like an athlete, to be a successful talk host you must train! Going for a daily jog is good for the mind, body and spirit but that is not what I am getting at with my talk host tips. We are thinking outside the box to make you think, act like and be a successful talk host. This is an ongoing series of radio talk host tips for those of you new to the format and even for the experienced pro.

Sometimes doing a show solo can seem lonely. You're talking, but maybe the phones aren't ringing. When you are doing your talk show, remember that your audience is just one person. You are talking to one person. Your job is to connect with that one person listening. You might think this advice is counter-intuitive, but it isn't. If you focus on talking to one person, sitting at their kitchen table or driving in their car they will feel drawn to you to keep listening. If you are speaking as if you had an audience in an auditorium, your listeners will be more apt to change the dial. People listen because they feel a connection. We make connections by being personal. Speaking to an audience in an auditorium, you are less apt to be personal. Speaking with one person at their kitchen table, you are more likely to connect personally.

A couple things you can do to focus on talking to one person, when you have no guest and no one is calling in, is to:

1. Have a mirror in front of you. By looking at yourself, you can see the facial mannerisms you make while speaking. Believe it or not these do carry through the airwaves. we will discuss these more in another post.

2. Have a picture of someone you care about deeply and look at that picture while talking. Actually speak to the picture. Again, it may sound corny to do, but the more you personalize your delivery, the more tuned in the listeners will be.

Do you have any experience about these tips that you can share with the other readers? Please comment below.

Are these tips helpful? Would you like more? Subscribe to the blog via email or RSS to get them as they are published. You'll get these tips weekly and throughout the week, I'll provide you important insight about broadcasting you should know.

Bring your audience back to your website

I have been saying this for a long time. I wrote an article about this, that was published on AllAccess.com in 2011. It is great to use Social Media to connect with your listeners. As a matter of fact, it is necessary. But the most important place for you to be on the web, is on your own domain; on your own website. As a station manager, you need to make sure your station's website an interesting place, a place your listeners want to visit everyday. With the content your staff is sharing on other Social Media websites you should always, or at least most of the time, bring your listeners back to your website. That is where you can monetize and control every aspect of the experience.

I am not the only one that thinks this. Brett Slatkin, Googler and co-creator of PubSubHubbub also believes this is the best way to curate content.

Understanding Social Contesting and Promotions

Loyd Ford wrote a great article at www.radioink.com today about using social media for contesting. He makes some good points and his advice is very good. I disagree with him that social media is not advertising. Everything we do is advertising and sales. We want to promote ourselves in everything we do. We are selling ourselves to our audience, to our customers, to our co-workers, to our bosses and even to our families and friends in an on going basis. However, what I think he meant was that we should not just be posting commercials about ourselves. People don't want to read commercials, they want to read content. He is right that social media is about engagement. And contests are one way to get engagement. However I think he left out something very important that everyone seems to forget about: The Rules.

Just as a radio station has contest rules, social media sites have rules regarding running contests and/or promotions using their platform. It is very important for station managers, program directors and promotion directors to familiarize themselves with the rules regarding promotions/contests of the Social site they are using especially if they do not have someone running their social media. No one wants a call from Facebook or Twitter Legal, nor do you want to wake up to find out your page or account has been shut down for violating the sites terms of service. Familiarize yourself with the social platform rules. If you are uncertain, and don't have a social media manager, make sure you are doing things right by running your contest by your own lawyers, who also should be familiar with these rules.

Facebook has strict contest and promotion rules found here: Facebook Rules. Twitter is more friendly to contests and promotions: Twitter Rules.

Every station should have a social media manager either on staff or contracted. And I am happy to assist you. I can even show you how you can get an ROI from your social media channels.

What is your experience using social media to run contests?

Tuesday Talker Tips: #2 Training your body

Like an athlete, to be a successful talk host you must train! Going for a daily jog is good for the mind, body and spirit but that is not what I am getting at with my talk host tips. We are thinking outside the box to make you think, act like and be a successful talk host. This is an ongoing series of radio talk host tips for those of you new to the format and even for the experienced pro.

Are you doing the necessary things to train your body to be at maximum efficiency while you are doing your show? Not that you are doing anything physically strenuous, especially sitting for 2-3 hours per show but your body does need care in order for you to perform your best during those hours on the air. It has to be trained to support you. Yawning, belching, smacking your lips because you are parched are all no-nos. No one wants to hear those noises, and microphones tend to amplify them. So, make sure you get a good nights sleep, make sure you do not eat less than an hour before your show and PLEASE do not eat during your show (unless it is part of the show and listeners know that). Finally keep a glass of water close by and don't be afraid to sip it but don't guzzle as that will cause belching! Also, no soda/pop/carbonated drinks less than an hour before or during the show either. That carbonation can sneak up and out at an inopportune time!

Do you have any experience about these tips that you can share with the other readers? Please comment below.

Are these tips helpful? Would you like more? Subscribe to the blog via email or RSS to get them as they are published. You'll get these tips weekly and throughout the week, I'll provide you important insight about broadcasting you should know.

Tuesday Talker Tips: #1 Training Your Mind

Like an athlete, to be a successful talk host you must train! Going for a daily jog is good for the mind, body and spirit but that is not what I am getting at with my talk host tips. We are thinking outside the box to make you think, act like and be a successful talk host. This is an ongoing series of radio talk host tips for those of you new to the format and even for the experienced pro. Subscribe to the blog to get these tips as they are published. Also get my opinion on the radio industry and more directly in your email.

Being knowledgeable about your topic is important, so reading up on it is obviously one way you should be training your mind. However there are things you subconsciously do that can undermine that knowledge and make you sound less than intelligent. I am talking about verbal pauses, the "uhs" and "ums".

You need to train your mind to not verbalize that your are thinking, and possibly stumbling over what to say next. It is better to be silent for a moment than to sputter verbal pauses. Training your mind to not allow verbal pauses is not too difficult, but it will take a lot of practice.

You should already be recording your shows and have a neutral party listen and critique you. Remember, getting critiqued is a good thing. It helps you understand your weaknesses and helps you develop them.

Listen back to your shows yourself and listen for the patterns of when you make those verbal pauses. Make note of those instances and provide yourself with strategically placed reminders of what not to do. For example, maybe you make verbal pauses just before you introduce your guest. On the introduction bio sheet of your guest, make a note "no verbal pauses" as a reminder to yourself. Don't be rigid about practicing, as you will sound rehearsed or mechanical. Also don't draw attention to your verbal pauses by saying something like "oops verbal pause there, sorry".

It could be very helpful to have notes strategically placed where you generally look during the show, as a visual and constant reminder.

More tips to follow!

A Reply to Fred Jacobs on Radio's Social Media Value

On Fred Jacob's blog today he talks about social media "friends with value".

At a time when most radio brands are doing a reasonably good job of amassing “likes” on Facebook, the missing piece is connecting with these fans to achieve this outreach goal. Keeping in mind that most stations are scrapping for every available marketing dollar (and often coming up short), taking advantage of your “audience’s audience” just makes sense.

And now thanks to Google Wildfire, we can even calculate the ROI of brand advocacy and outreach programs.

This is somewhat misleading. After all, what station is actually running a proper social media channel to convert their own listeners into fans of their advertisers? So, first let's understand the difference of "influence" and "value". If you are tracking the virality of your station's posts, you are tracking "influence". If you are tracking specific ad campaigns that you are running on your social media channel for your advertisers, then you are tracking "value". But stations are not currently running ad campaigns for their advertisers on their social media channels. From my observations, stations are only interested in reposting the latest memes.

Sites like Klout and PeerIndex have been measuring influence for several years. And national brands are clearly interested in the influential social media leaders. But influence is not enough. Influence itself does not bring home the bacon. You can have a highly influential social media leader following you, but you have to know what they are influential about, and be selling something in that niche. If Lady GaGa tweeted that Pennzoil was on sale at Autozone, would her followers really show buying power? The same can be said of a station's audience influence. Will the station's influence and it's audience influence alone bring home the bacon for the brand?

Stations actually do not need followers with influence. What stations need to do, is a better job of connecting their followers to LOCAL advertisers through their social media channels. Of course using the "influencial listener" model, stations even have an opportunity to connect LOCAL non-listeners to THEIR advertisers, if done properly. But stations are not connecting their listeners to their local advertisers. Instead, right now stations seem more concerned with reposting the latest memes (no ROI there), and that is a misguided use of social media for radio stations because it does nothing for the station's advertisers. If I were an advertiser, I would ONLY advertise on a station that would actively bring their social media followers to my business or at a minimum, my website (not my Facebook page).

I can actually show stations how to get an ROI with their social media. I've written about it in Radio Ink and Allaccess. Contact me if you are interested in a free evaluation.

Updated here: http://blog.cabradio.com/2012/08/radios-social-media-value-or-influence.html

Social Media: Infographic History

I came across this infographic and found it fascinating. It would be cool to add what came before Compuserve in terms of any media; i.e. morse code, radio, TV, etc.

Social Media – A History (Infographic) was designed by KarimDesigns.com for Cendrine Marrouat

Suitable replacements for Ping.Fm #socialmedia

Have you been using Ping.Fm for your social media dashboard? Seesmic has announced it will be discontinuing Ping.Fm and has created a replacement called Seesmic Ping. However Seesmic Ping will not be as robust out of the gate, only supporting a select few popular networks (Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn).

This decision to shut down Ping.Fm may have left you feeling ignored, and minimalized as a customer. If you looking for a suitable replacement? Try one of these:

SocialOomph - Free Trial

One reason I like SocialOomph is having the ability to schedule not only social updates but blog posts as well. Another amazing feature is the ability to vet your followers so you can determine who to follow back. SocialOomph is probably the most robust because there are so many more features you can use, such as aggregating rss feeds to post to a blog. Very cool.

HootSuite Pro - Free 30 Day Trial

What I like about HootSuite is the UI. It is very easy to use, and you can have multiple channels for multiple services open at the same time. You can also add team members and assign customer/client/follower responses to different members. For example if a Facebook post comes in about a technical issue with the order process, you can assign it to your IT admin. If someone is just complaining about your product or service you can assign it to customer service.

Sendible

I have not had the opportunity to use Sendible. Their free version is just the trial version. But I have been following their blog and they have some very cool features and a good social media team to help you.

Sprout Social - Free 30 Day Trial.

SproutSocial is another good social media dashboard that is probably comparable to Sendible.

Most social media dashboards do have free versions, or a free trial at a minimum, but to get access to the real robust features you will have to upgrade to a paid version. There is one that is basic, but works like Ping.FM did. It is HelloTxt.com. It has been around almost as long as Ping.FM. The difference HelloTxt has from Ping is that it also pulls in your social media channels similar to how FriendFeed.com works. Except when you push a message out, you can easily select which networks you want it pushed to.

In any case, we will be reviewing why radio stations should be using a social media dashboard and how to train your staff to use them effectively once you havce decided which one to use.

Please leave your comments and/or questions! they are greatly appreciated.

What is social media

This is a question some people like to answer with "networking online". Partially true. I think goes deeper than that.

Social media is such a broad concept right now. Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google Plus, etc. all fall under the social media banner. But social media is what radio has been doing for decades: connecting people. You've heard many radio enthusiasts, radiophiles as I call myself, say that radio was the original social media. I'm not sure about that. But I will say radio was one of the original social media conduits.

The basic concept is that social media gives people another way to connect. People originally connected by congregating in the town square, or on the town green. Churches also held a place in the social connect space. When the telephone was invented it gave people a way to connect without leaving home! What a concept!

The interesting thing about phones that some may not remember is the party line. This was where several people shared the same phone number, but would hear a different ring so they knew when it was for them to answer. For example, the Smith's would get 2 ring intervals (ring, ring, pause, ring ring) and the Jone's would get three ring intervals (ring, ring, ring, pause, ring, ring, ring). Some rings were longer or shorter than others to make patterns (riiinnng, ring, riiinng ring). But each customer on the line would hear the ring and could discern if it was for them based on the ring that the phone company assigned to them. Quite interesting! Of course back then, the phone rang maybe once per day per customer. Obviously that system no longer works and is one reason why everyone has their own number now.

It stands to reason that since most people are naturally social, they would sometimes all get on the phone at the same time and have a party! Fast forward several decades and we had three-way calling. I remember hearing about some girls that maximized this concept. One girl would conference in a friend on a call she was having with another friend. That friend could in turn conference in someone on her three way line, and so on. The modern day party line.

Of course there were also the pay services that popped up for late night TV viewers looking for people to talk to. Some of you will remember those 900 numbers to call and "connect". And this is what I associate social media of today with. It is a way for us to connect with people we have not met in person, yet maybe have similar interests. Yes, social media is the modern day party line. Face(book) it, it's true.

Radio broadened the reach of conversations. People listened to the radio because that is what everyone did. And when there were fewer channels to listen to, people shared in the experience while they were not in the same place with each other. People bonded listening to the radio even though they were miles apart. They were entertained, they laughed, they cried, they rejoiced and they mourned. And people of certain generations can tell you when they were listening to the radio when specific events happened. They would discuss what they heard the next day with their co-workers. Radio was and still is a social conduit.

So, what is social media? It is people connecting. If you connect with someone through the Internet, you have just participated in social media. Did you subscribe to a news list, send an email, join a message board, or join a social network? It is all social media. The media is the form or tool you used. The social aspect is simply the fact that you are likely connecting with another person on the other end.

Here we are in 2012 with new tools for social media on the Internet and there are thousands of self proclaimed experts on what social media is and how to make money capitalizing on the concept. (Incidentally I do not think I am any where near being an expert on a phenomenon that is but a few years old) What they aren't telling you, is that you have been doing social media all your life just without the Internet. It's true that the Internet is providing useful tools to reach more people at a faster rate than with traditional media. But is it really working that way? Not for most. Why? Well, that is one topic I will cover in this space in the future.

What I want to leave you with today is the knowledge that social media is not a get rich quick system. It can help you reach targeted goals faster than you would without it; even making some seemingly overnight successes! But if you really want success, you need a plan, a separate social media plan. All business owners should have a business plan, a marketing plan, and now a social media plan.

How can radio tap in to the revenue stream? It's quite simple. Do what radio is known for: connect with people. More on that in this space as well. While you wait for more of my insights, tell me what challenges you are having with your social media. Connect with me via email: charlieprofit /at\ cabradio /dot\ com.

Breaking: Rush announces his retirement

Rush Limbaugh announced his retirement sAying "it's been a great run, but the other half of my brain would like some exercise now, so I've been talking with some peoPle about staRting a liberal arts museum." Upon hearing of the news Sean HannIty quickLy released an announcement stating he is "not interested in Limbaugh's time slot". Fred Thompson has been tapped to Fill in as Limbaugh's replacement until a mOre permanent hOst is found. We wiLl keep you poSted on the developments.

4 Ways To Manage Your Crisis Via Facebook

A radio station should be ready to react to any crisis, whether it be a natural disaster, a media driven event or something in the social media realm. This post from AllFacebook.com is a brief plan all radio stations should have in place. Keep in mind, not only should the social media manager be ready, but the Program Director and even General Manager should be privy to the plan. Click the link, read it and put it in place. Remember the Boy Scout Motto: Be Prepared.

Click here to read the article: 4 Ways To Manage Your Crisis Via Facebook

You comments are appreciated.

Taking A Page Out Of Social Media

Here is my latest article that was published on AllAccess today August 16, 2011

Do you give away free ads? Not bonus spots based on a purchased schedule, but truly free ads? Probably not very often. Admittedly, there is always the free plug here and there when you mention products tied in with the rest of your content. An example would be your morning show talking about the Old Spice guy, and the Old Spice marketing campaign that went viral sometime last year. But how long was that conversation? Did it extend into a  regular "thing" on your station? Are you still talking about it? Probably not.

Have you ever thought about how much free advertising your station gives away to Facebook and Twitter? It's astonishing if you do think of it. I am a social media geek. I love all the tools we can now use to market, advertise and promote something through social media.  But even I have my limit on being saturated with unintended ads for Facebook and Twitter.  Nationally it must amount to tens of millions of dollars, if not hundreds of millions if you took every mention on every radio station, TV network, and newspapers and applied the standing rate for such a mention.

Read The Rest On AllAccess

How to Set a Vanity URL on Facebook

I've noticed for a while now that many people do not know they can set a vanity url for their Facebook Profile Page. Facebook calls it a username. Let's first explain what a Facebook Profile is. A Facebook Profile Page is a personal account on Facebook where you can connect personally with your friends and family. You can see each others status updates, see what your connections are posting on other people's pages, share photos and videos, etc. This is really how friends can share what's going on in their lives.

This is not to be confused with a Fan Page, or what they are now calling a "Like" Page. Fan Pages were created for business entities, places, public figures, etc that could potentially have thousands and thousands of fans or customers. A Fan Page is a way for brands and public figures to communicate with their customers or fans without connecting personally.

A vanity url is where the string of numbers for the Profile or Page is replaced with something you choose. For example, my Fan Page is http://www.facebook.com/charlieprofit (be sure to click the "Like" button) and my Profile is http://www.facebook.com/charlieprofitreport. (You can also "Like" CAB Radio on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/cabradio). Using vanity urls is useful for branding purposes, or just to make it easy to give out to friends and family. It's much easier to tell someone to find you on Facebook with a vanity url, than to give out a long string of numbers.

How do you set up your vanity url? This is very easy. First make sure you have logged into your Facebook account. Then go to http://www.facebook.com/username. From there the instructions will prompt you to choose your username. It is permanent, so choose wisely. Make sure you do not misspell or make a typo. The process to correct a mistake like that is almost impossible. It would probably be easier to set up a new account, but then your history is not connected with the new account. If you manage any Facebook Pages with more than 25 fans, then you can also set the url for your Fan Page here.

I hope you found this information useful. If you'd like more information on what a username is you can click here: http://www.facebook.com/help/new/?page=897.

The Next Game Changer?

What do you think will be the next game changer for radio? Is it Social Media? Or is there some other technology on the horizon? As you know, a lot of people are talking about the necessity of using Social Media, but few actually explain ways how. It is one thing to tell radio stations to connect with listeners via Twitter or Facebook, which is what the "consultants" and "experts" are telling you right now. But few can do it successfully without a budget. After all, it takes manpower to create the accounts, then follow or friend people and respond to messages. Small and medium markets may have more of a challenge to maximize their Social Media presence. Problems I imagine some of the smaller stations encountering are having an intern or weekend person take on the Social Media responsibility, only to leave the station with no back up plan. 

The other aspect is revenue. Engaging with your listeners is not really generating revenue. Telling your listeners that you are at a remote can get them to come, but will it get them to buy? It depends on a few things, obviously. And this is not about the anatomy of sales. But there are things you can do to engage your audience with your sponsors to encourage a sale. But in order to make sure you can make some revenue, you need to be sure you are set up properly to manage your Social Media accounts. 

How can you use Social Media without hiring a full team to manage your brand? You start by using some of the free tools that exist. When you learn how to use them to generate some revenue, you can then move up and use better tools that have premiums to use them, and maybe hire someone to manage it for you. But how do you get started? What tools are essential? I will cover three today. As you read this you may already be advanced past these basic tools. There are many more that I will be writing about, but felt I should build the foundation to a strong Social Media management strategy. I hope you'll agree and choose to share this with your colleagues.

1. Email - I know you already have this, as so much communication is still transmitted via email. And yes, email is still relevant and always will be. When you create your Social Media Accounts, you should use a "manager's email". I prefer using GMail because of some of the features that are easy to use, such as being able to forward, tag and archive messages automatically. So, in this "manager's email" account you would "forward" the social media messages to an employee or intern to handle, but you can also archive a copy in your email. This way you can also monitor the incoming messages, or at least have a record should the need arise. Using email allows you or your community manager to make sure the station doesn't miss any interaction with your followers. When you sign up for any Social Media account, make sure all email settings are checked. Yes, this means your email flow will increase which is why you need a unique account specifically for Social Media use, or at least a way to filter the messages to a specific folder or tag (as GMail uses).
2. A Social Media Friendly Web Browser - This is a time saver in many ways. If your station wants to keep up on pop culture and share that with your listeners through some Social Media sites, having a Web Browser that has Social Media elements integrated makes it easy. If your morning show is keeping up on Lindsay Lohan, it is so easy to pop onto Perez Hilton's site, and select the latest Lindsay Lohan gossip and share on your station's Twitter or Facebook page! If you are a sports station, you can click on any sports website and easily share the latest scores with the click of a mouse. These are just a couple basic examples. If you have a unique station, feel free to contact me and I'll show you what you can do. 
   There are 3 browsers that I recommend: Chrome, Firefox and Flock.
• Chrome is Google's web browser. It is very fast and now offers quite a selection of add-ons, or extensions that make Social Media management easy, such as the share button. 
• Firefox is created by Mozilla and has been around for many years and there are hundreds of thousands of add-ons. This is probably the most widely used browser for those into Social Media. 
• Flock is also created by Mozilla but was created for the Social Media butterfly. It integrates many tools right into the browser to make sharing easy. They recently made some changes and have a Chrome engine running it. 
3. A Blog - Ideally, each jock or announcer on your station should have a blog that is updated regularly. It does not have to be done daily, but weekly is good. What do you use the blog for? Simply put, it is written communication to your listeners of what is happening at your station. If you are a small station and don't have much going on, then talk about what's going on in the community. It can be your Public Service portal. Your announcer or jock blogs should be an extension of their personality on the air. They should be giving their listeners the information they want, such as concert updates, artist news or even artist history. Some thought should be put into the blog, and it should not just be ramblings, or mundane updates. All the blogs can then be automatically fed to your Social Media channels such as Facebook or Twitter, through a service like TwitterFeed or Ping.fm. This will bring traffic back to your site, which is what you really want. There are numerous blog sites that are free, and you can easily add a tab on your stations website to open up the blog page. Or you can use software like Word Press or Blogger to build your website. 

There are many other tools that I plan on writing about. I will also delve a little deeper into some of the Social Media sites that are out there and where you should have a presence. Hopefully you already have a Twitter and Facebook Page. Please understand the difference between a Facebook Profile and a Facebook Page. You'll want to set up a Page for your station, not a Profile. One reason is the limitation on the number of people that can follow a Profile (which is currently at 5000). Also, Pages were set up specifically for Pages. See this post I wrote for more info: http://blog.cabradio.com/2009/04/social-media-101.html. 

If you can't wait for my next post here, don't hesitate to contact me. Find my contact info here: http://contact.charlieprofit.com. I'm happy to give you a free consultation with ideas you can implement immediately. 

Don't forget to click to share and tell your colleagues to follow this blog. It only takes a minute, and you'll feel good about it! Comments are also welcome!

Radio and Records Closes

The news of Radio and Records, or R&R as it has come to be known, was not surprising but not expected either. Radio and Records opened it's doors in 1973. It became an industry beacon over the years and each issue was anticipated with great interest and excitement. I've read some managers had to lock the current issue up until they had read it before lending it out to other staff. However, the proliferation of radio industry websites in recent years has made it more competitive to get news and information out. Consolidation of the radio industry also has removed much of the healthy competition not only for listener market share, but also for the businesses that served the radio industry. Broadcast equipment companies, jingle production companies, etc have fewer customers to sell to. Yes, the number of radio stations to service are still there, but the number of (potential) clients has dropped. This affects the revenue to the related industries. As revenue drops, many companies suffering cut their ad budgets. This really is the last thing a company should cut, and radio sales executives face that challenge everyday. When these budgets are cut, the industry trade publications that offer you great resources of information also lose revenue. And so decisions need to be made. The economy hasn't helped either. With a bittersweet sentiment, the internet has made it more and more difficult for print publications to survive. But Radio and Records is indicative of how the radio industry is slow to adapt to change, and slow to embrace a progressive business model that caters to an internet/digital media audience. If the radio industry continues to be ignorant of this it will suffer the same fate as radio's customers (the advertisers) are becoming part of the internet/digital media audience (the listeners).

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Staying True to Local

I read this with interest:

Local stations' best hope may be to focus on what Internet radio can't do well, but which they themselves have largely neglected -- catering to the interests and tastes of their neighbors. If FM outlets can do that, they don't have to get left off the dial. If they can't, they won't be missed.

Rob Pegoraro - Fast Forward: Web Radio Hits the Road - washingtonpost.com

Many of us in the industry, whether we are sitting on the sidelines watching or some that are in the game have been saying for many years: If radio would focus on being local, it will thrive. Too many large groups have missed the mark. Being local isn't just about news, weather and traffic. And it is also not about a Saturday remote at the car dealership handing out t-shirts and bumper stickers. It is about listening to your audience and playing what they want, not what a small focus group likes. One station I worked at, we were required to write down every request that we took. Every one. Why? Because it gave the programming department a better idea of what the listeners wanted. Yes, there were a handful (literally a few) listeners that called in regularly with the same song requests, however it did not cause any great issue in creating a playlist the majority of listeners wanted. Does your station do this now?

Radio has such a better opportunity and is in such a better position than some other media to really help its local businesses using texting applications. Imagine this: Telling your listeners to text their location to you, using an app like BriteKite.com, when they get to the local grocery store. And when you get that update from them (because you follow your listeners back on the prefered social media network), you send them a coupon code for a free 2 litre soda that they can use right on the spot. You do this randomly. "Stay tuned, later this hour I have a coupon code that I will text to your cell phone for ABC Grocery on Main Street. But you have to tell me you are there using Google Latitude or BriteKite". Why use these location apps? So you know, or have a better idea of how many people are really at your customers store.

This is just another suggestion on how local radio can still survive, thrive and win!

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Social Media 101

Let's get one thing straight. If your station does not have a FaceBook (FB) presence, you need to get on it now. And I'll do what I can to help you figure FB and every other Social Media website out, if you stick around and subscribe. But I have to tell you, some stations that are signing up for FB are going about it the wrong way. They have signed up with a regular user account! Why is this bad? For a several reasons...

• FB frowns on users having multiple accounts
• FB intentionally created Fan Pages for businesses
• Advertising your Fan Page is more professional than advertising your Personal Profile page
• Fan Pages have analytics! Helloooo! Don't you want to know the demographics visiting your page?
• You can manage multiple Fan Pages with one account
• You can import your Announcer Blogs into a Fan Page through RSS feeds
  
• You can send a message to all your Fans with one click

Let's take these one by one. FB has strict Terms of Service and will shut down anyone with multiple accounts. So, if you have assigned the FB account to an intern, and they get caught, you lose your FB presence. Then you have to go through a bunch of rigamoro with FB to get it reinstated. So, best to play by the rules and limit the surprizes.

Face Book anticipated people creating multiple accounts; one for personal, one for business, one for hobby, etc. So FB came up with an alternative solution: Fan Pages. Fan Pages are for businesses, public figures and anything people can be a fan of, like radio! They are similar to a regular profile account, but there are differences.

When you advertise your FB page anywhere, it is more professional for a business to have a Fan Page, rather than a regular account. It's similar to the ideology that it is better to have a Top Level Domain name for your website, rather than using a Geocities website. Also, on FB you can target your ads to members in your listening area! By having a Fan Page, you can then analyze the demographics of people visiting. If you are a station that targets 18-24 females in Scranton, PA, you can target your FB ads to reach that demo! The analytics is one reason to have a Fan Page over a Group too.

If you have a cluster of stations, it is easier to manage all the Fan Pages with one log in, rather than having multiple log ins for multiple accounts. This saves time and effort. All analytics are measured from one log in, for each fan Page you have. And it is easier to remove people you have given admin privileges to.

Since the Fan Page is similar to a regular user profile, you can add applications such as an RSS reader that allows you to pull in your Announcer's blogs. You are probably already doing this on your station's website (or you should be), but the advantage here is that when a blog is updated, it can post to the Fan Page status, which in turn will show up on your fan's profile page. And, should a fan decide to leave a comment to that status, your fan's friends will get a link in reference to that comment, which will entice them to also see your station's Fan Page. This is set up in your favor! It is made to help you get more "followers" which will in turn create more loyal listeners.

And finally, you can send a message to your fans with a simple click. So, you can send out contest remonders, sever weather alerts, and special offers from your advertisers to your Fans. And that can be appealing to your advertisers. You can also use FB Connect on your website to connect your listeners to your Fan Page. At a minimum you should include a standardized FB logo and link to your Fan Page to make it easy for your listeners to connect with you on FB.

One final word on setting up your Fan Page, which actually applies to all Social Media sites you set up: Make sure there are multiple "administrators" for your communities. Seriously, your business manager should have access, just in case you need to change the personelle in your programming and/or promotions department. But, you probably knew that already.

Stick around and subscribe! Next we'll talk about Twitter!

Follow me and if you need any help with your Social Media integration, fee free to conact me at 860-506-3768.

Free Music!

I read Holland Cooke's article that was published today on Inside Radio. Holland shared the link through Face Book. You can read it here. This got me thinking, and ranting in my own mind! We've been hearing about the labels desire to tax radio stations for many years. After all, as Holland points out, that's what they do in other Countries. But will it really come to that here in the USA? Are the labels that hungry, to bite the hand that feeds them?

Well, we see what they are doing to Internet radio with royalty fees. It is really frustrating to see bands like Metallica on this band wagon too. After all, the ONLY reason for their rise in popularity in the late 80's and early 90's was due to "file sharing"; fans made copies of Metallica's music and shared it with their friends, and so on. That's how I was introduced to Metallica! (Sorry I won't link to them. They don't like to be shared.) But I digress.

The issue at hand is whether radio stations should pay the record labels for each song that is played. This is a model that seems to work in other Countries, so from the labels perspective why not here too? The problem with the label's theory is that we live in a different world now than we did 50, 25, 10 even 5 years ago! The proliferation of sharing information through the Internet is a different way of thinking and doing business. If you think about it, Radio is an anologous file sharing system. People get their news, weather and traffic information "shared" with them for free. And listeners get to hear "content" for free, whether it be music, talk, theater, etc. It has been with Radio's "file sharing" help that so many musical artists have been successful.  

The Internet makes it so easy now to gain an audience, and a following. If I were a musical artist, I would self publish. And I think there are enough good independent artists to keep music alive on the radio without the need for record labels. It is a matter of radio managers being smart and putting  more self publishing acts on their stations. With Social Networking, a station could easily find and add thousands of songs by independent artists to the play list and slowly weed off the dependence of the record labels.

It has to be said that Radio stations are just as guilty for allowing this dependence on record labels too. By eliminating music directors positions, and taking away the Program Directors ability to add music that the local audience wants, in lieu of some corporate mandated playlist! Some stations do have a Home Grown show. Why not put more of these local musicians in regular rotation? Radio has set itself up for this scenerio from the record labels. But threatening to switch to all Talk is not the answer. I think making an effort to find and play more independant artists is a more productive and more cost effective solution. Radio needs to understand that people now have a choice of what to listen to via the Internet, via iPods. But if you put your play list in their hands, and allow (enlist) them to find independent artists you will once again beat the odds.