What Do You Do With A Song That Everybody Likes?

I have a question. I'm not asking it here for the first time. I'm in the middle of a discussion with one of the best programmers in the world about this. Perhaps you, dear reader of this blog, could help us out.

Here is the issue: A song came back from a music test with only 5% of the respondents giving it a "love it" rating. That put it in a tie for 532nd place. On the other hand, the song was ranked #6 for number of "like it" responses. And there were exactly zero "don't like it" responses.

So, perhaps we could say that nobody disliked it, nearly everybody liked it, and only a few people were passionate about it. Or can we put it that way?

One other bit of information: The song's "type" was a perfect match with the center sound of the station. It's music fit rank was #5,  meaning that it was classified by the music test respondents as being the same kind of music as the music at the very center of the format.

I don't want to bias you just yet by giving our opinions on this so far. But it is an important question, because it makes us consider:

1. How important is "love" or "favorite" versus "like it"?

2. How much are we to be guided by playing favorite songs, versus playing songs that nobody dislikes? (Yes, I agree that is a variation on question 1).

3. If a song is the "right kind" of music, do you give it extra credit? And if so, just how do you do it?

4. With such a song, what do you think you'd do with it?

5. What factors matter most? What might contribute most to deciding it is a power, a secondary an occasional spice/filler song, or it isn't played at all?

Email me: scasey@upyourratings.com with your opinion. Please help me write the follow-up to this post.

Thanks!