It's the Environment!

There is a widespread misconception about what music radio is.

This misconception is pointing us in the wrong direction. I think:

· Music radio is not music discovery.

· Music radio is not music choice.

· Music radio is not music variety.

· Music radio is not hearing songs in the order you would like to hear them in.

Music radio is about creating an environment.

We can’t be an iPod. Guess what. We couldn’t be an 8 track tape, either.

But we’ve got some kind of groupthink thing going on that is turning many music stations into bad iPods. And let us be perfectly clear: We can’t be a good one. Get over it, please.

If we’re not an iPod, then what is the role of music radio?

The role of music radio is to provide an environment.

It is Not About This

It is not about 10,000 choices. It isn’t about the long tail or the short tail, because it isn’t about the tail at all. It is an ecosystem. It is about the tribe. Music is a large part of the tribe’s identity.

It is not about them programming their own songs. People who have time to program their own music, like people who called into radio stations to make requests, just aren’t right. The aliens that abducted them did some damage before they were returned.

It is About This

People want to belong. They want to know what other people know. They want to participate in the human experience.

They share music with their friends. That includes the chance to sing along, be inspired by the lyrics, learn the dances, copy the clothes, go to the concerts, listen to music together, and more. They belong to the tribe.

They learn what is #1 with the tribe. Our challenge is to know what is #1 with the tribe, too. We need to understand the tribe, and maintain credibility.

They learn what the tribe thinks is important. We must know that too, if we are to join the conversation in progress.

People don’t pick their friends because they are exactly like them. No, they are only similar, and the tribe members challenge and change each other. People change their values in order to belong. If we are part of the tribe, we get to be change agents too. They want this human interaction, and they can welcome it from us. Jocks who speak with authority? Yes. But we have to know what we’re doing.

People want to hear the songs that matter. For whatever reason they matter. It is our job to know what they are.

People want to hear from credible people who live in the same world they do. They can’t get that from an iPod. But sadly, they can’t get that from today’s “standard” music station. There is no listener environment.

What We Are Doing Today

We try to eliminate negatives. Shut up the jocks. Honestly, that is understandable. To actually develop an air staff that can stay in close touch with the environment that the listeners crave is very hard. And you can get, to a point, a boost from simply eliminating bad content. After all, the music itself represents untold millions of dollars of effort by teams of professionals.

But you can get that on an iPod.

But we don’t’ really eliminate the negatives.

We interrupt the only product we have left (the negative-free songs) with insanely long commercial breaks. And we air promos that sound like we never got past Star Wars lasers or the guy that voices Monday Night Football.

And sadly, we often put on a contest only because [insert advertiser here] wants to sell them some stuff. We should not be surprised when things like this stretch our credibility, then break it. It used to be that a program director could veto a contest that violated the expectations of the listeners. Now, we act as though the tribe we want to belong to is a tribe of one. The “one” is the advertiser we’re supposed to plan a promotion for.

Jack, when it works, is an environment. And the people for whom it works believe that it is part of their tribe. The rest of the music stations are often so bad that for just that little bit of environment they will put up with all kinds of music that they don’t like. I’ve done the research. Trust me. It isn’t pretty.

But we don’t really work hard even on the music.

And that is the other thing. We don’t even get the “iPod” idea right. We are doing far less research than ever before. The quality of that research is at an all time low. There is no real analysis (I excuse myself on this one).

We learned in 1990 that looking at test scores without any thought to how songs relate to each other is simply wrong. But today, I new generation of programmers are doing it again, because it is easier than discovering the musical part of the station’s essence and then training young program directors so they learn to manage the environment that is being created on-air.

So we’ve given up on human communication, personality, entertainment (beyond the song), information, education, expressing honest emotion, listener involvement, understanding the conversation and participating in it, being extremely topical, accessibility, and training.

And we want to blame it on the iPod.

Two Paths Forward

We had, and I think we still have, two paths.

1. Keep cutting back. Shrink our way to greatness. Tom Peters is wrong.

2. Create an environment for our listeners. This will take talent, training, head count, research, creativity, and it will cost so very much more than what we are doing today. And maybe we can’t add enough value for 50% profit margins. Maybe we can only do 40%.

I’m kidding about the 40%. Because I think Seth Godin is right. Your radio station is the Trojan horse. We suck them into the club (or more truthfully we join their club) and only make 40% doing it. But then we move the 100,000 local listeners off into 100 different directions that appeal to 1000 people each, and connect them to our local community and advertisers in a way that nobody knows how to do well – yet. And we make an extra 40%, and the 80% total makes what is going on in radio today look silly. Then, the on-air product will just be the tip of a big iceberg.

What is ironic is that large radio companies could be in the best position to locate and develop the best ideas. They can elevate the average station’s quality through training and mentoring. They can invest in the future by developing programming ides on HD channels, experimental Internet stations, and tap into their large talent pool for other experiments in audience interaction. Large stations could settle for 40%, and with the other 10% raise the barrier to entry so high that nothing can compete with radio as a companion and a portal to the rest of the listener’s tribe, and a link between that tribe and the local advertisers.

We can be an environment, a way for people to participate in the human experience. By playing the music of the tribe. By joining the conversation of the tribe. But first, we need to understand the tribe.