Wednesday, June 19, 2019

24 Jun Wednesday, June 19, 2019

This Week in The Lund Letter:  
>   Perfecting your music clock
>   Connecting with listeners
>   Developing your personalities
>   Mobile internet use increases…plus other Trends

Lund Programming Clinic: The Music Tune-up

Music is the #1 reason people listen to FM music stations.  One place to improve your music is the actual clocks you assemble for each hour in your music software.  The hourly clock represents how listeners “sample” your station.

+   Look for obvious problems like a cluster of all current or all older music.  Each 15 minutes should be representative of your format.

+   Fill songs should be in drop positions.  You want to lose the weaker songs, not the best-tested titles.

+   Are some clock hours overfilled with songs you will never play?  Drop them!
Prime hours deserve prime songs.  Take your lesser songs to the hours with less critical mass.

+   Use proportional and random positions to break predictability.

+   Look for any hidden clock rules that may be leftovers from past PDs, like specific artist, era, or tempo filters.

+   Stopset markers can reset rules in scheduling.  You can control tempo more effectively with the first song after each stopset or an hour-opening song.

+   Check clocks against each other for balance and consistency of your sound.

Coming next week: Controlling Music Rules and Policies

Is Your Music On Target?

Who is managing your music software?

Playing the right songs and managing your music software controls are vital to a station’s success.  Lund Media can assist you with a comprehensive music review and software tune-up.  We’ll conduct a complete analysis of your active playlist along with every aspect of your music software – rules, clocks, and rotations.   We also provide a quick turn-around.

Capitalize on the very thing listeners want most – the best researched music played in the best rotation for your target demo.  Email John Lund for details and a timetable; mention you saw this in the Lund Letter, and receive $500 off the cost of a one-time music review and follow-up service.

Lund Talent Coaching: Connecting with Listeners

Fifteen ways to better connect with listeners in the morning (or any talent shift):

1.   Have a “Morning Outlook”
2.   Sound local and relatable
3.   Be funny; have fun in the morning and make your listeners smile
4.   Relate to the music – the one thing the audience has in common is their affection for the music you play

5.   Make your prep service material your own – personalized and localized.
6.   Be prepared and armed with tons of show prep
7.   Talk about what your listeners care about (music artists, interesting stories)
8.   Create pictures in the listener’s mind – so vivid that they remember your show

9.   Be yourself
10.   Every break should have a purpose, a goal
11.   Sell the “Basics” with energy and comprehension
12.   The show should flow from break to break and not be a series of unrelated topics and breaks

13.   Be interesting, memorable, and fascinating
14.   Don’t put people down
15.   Be likeable – no matter how far you want to go, no matter how wild your act is, let the audience see something in you they like

Talent Coaching next week – 15 more ways to connect with listeners.

The Importance of Prep

Radio personalities who systemize their approach to prepping and presenting their shows realize improved performances and higher ratings.  Want to know the benchmarks that listeners like most?  Utilize the Lund Radio Personality Guide to improve show planning and execution.  The Lund Consultants coach and develop talents for improved performance and higher ratings, and this stylebook has all the tools and insight to execute a great show.  

  
Lund’s Top 3:  Develop the Air Staff
  
PDs should conduct frequent talent coaching sessions, and more often with the morning talent(s). Consider these guidelines for analyzing performances and offering guidance:

1.   Talents are actively involved in the station’s website and social media efforts. This goes beyond simply having their own separate Facebook page and Twitter.

2.   Time checks are abundant in morning drive as well as frequent weather. Morning talents provide the info listeners really need to hear at the most logical times for listeners to use that information.

3.   Music is “on the money,” perfectly programmed by the software and hand-edited with precision as the log is generated. It’s and listener-compatible song to song, hour to hour, shift to shift, day after day. The talent is familiar with the music and relates to songs positively.

Next week, more ways to help develop your on air staff.  For more Top 3 lists, check out www.lundradio.com.


Promotion of the Week: Babysitter Certifications

Work with local hospitals where babies are born to teach older siblings of the new babies the babysitting basics.  Teach childcare techniques (diaper changing, safe holding, etc.), basic first aid skills, and life-saving rescue skills (CPR, the Heimlich, etc.). Include an “I’m a big brother/sister” shirt and a prize pack with information packets and a couple things just for the kid (sponsors can put their logo, etc., on the bag holding the items).  Get some sound bites from the kids for on air.  This is not a way to promote childcare by children, but helping older siblings to be responsible around new babies.

Do You Need A Great Promotion?

Our Summer and Fall Promotions Guides outline every programming and sales promotion you’ll need for the months ahead.  Over 100 audience-building promotions, contests, sales promotions and show prep ideas will make your stations sizzle right now and through summer … and help the sales staff lock in new dollars.

Order our Fall Promotions Guide now and receive the Summer Promotions Guide free.   Order here to get both guides.

Lund Trend Watch:

Mobile Consumption Increases

The average American’s mobile internet usage will rise to 930 hours per year by 2021 according to Zenith Media’s Consumption Forecasts report. As of now, we spend 800 hours – by another measurement: 33 days of the year.  Since 2015, Zenith’s reports have shown an average growth of 13% per year.  The increasing time is attributed to quicker smartphones, improved mobile internet service and larger and larger smartphone screens.

Content watched on a television is still the leader with an average 167 minutes of viewing every day in 2019 (about 1,016 hours per year).  In 2019, radio consumption is at 55 minutes per day according to Zenith.  Cinema gets 3 minutes per day (the average person sees an hour and a half long movie once a month in the theater), newspapers are read for 11 minutes each day, and desktop internet usage is at about 40 minutes per day.  Mobile is expected to see a surge in growth with the upcoming availability of 5G services but will be tempered by smartphone saturation not bringing in as many new consumers as in recent years.

A Waste of Time and Space

At least 3.4 billion fake emails are sent every day worldwide according to a study by Valimail. Anyone who checks the numbers on the spam or junk folder in their email account probably won’t be surprised by this number.  Are your emails being delivered to listener’s spam folder?

Subscription Fatigue

It strikes again.  It’s not just for streaming video or music services.  Online news is feeling the burn as well.  Most consumers don’t want to pay for online news.  The number of people who are willing to pay has only grown slightly in the last few years according to the Reuters Institute’s annual Digital News Report.  When asked if they would rather spend their money on online news or a streaming video service, only 12% picked news.


Programmer’s Planner:

July 1: Canada Day
July 4: Independence Day (a 4-day weekend for many)

Summer is the time for county fairs, festivals, and other fun activities.  Be involved in local celebrations.

Next week in the Lund Letter: Is your music playing by too many rules?

Thanks for reading
The Lund Letter
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About Lund Media

For over 20 years, the Lund Media Group has provided programming, music consulting, operational guidance, and research to broadcast stations throughout North America and overseas. With specialists in every format, the Lund Goal is to help stations get more listeners and keep them listening longer.

Call John Lund for more information about how the Lund Media Group can help your stations achieve more listeners, higher ratings, and more revenue.
Phone: 650-692-7777.
Email john@lundradio.com.