Week of March 30, 2009

With the Spring Book upon us, has the engineering department listened to the processing of each station and each stream? Are there any technical issues in the studios? A studio not working properly causes morale problems. Make sure all signals are cranking at full fidelity. 1. On a scale of 1 to 5, how would your PD rate the overall sound of the station today? (Less than 4? Uh oh!) 2. How is the music? Is any research (music test) fully implemented? It should be by now. Have a great weekend!

The production department is the last line of defense for bad-sounding commercials. Get the weak copy, bad quality spots off the air or re-cut. TSL is hard to get. Don't make it any harder with bad commercials. Good luck to everyone! Here's to a "killer" Spring book! - P.S., it starts today!

You are not really planning to do one of those dumb, "Let's insult the audience" things on the air today ... are you? You know the ones who get FCC fines, advertiser cancellations or lawsuits? We just can't afford them in 2009.

This week President Obama offered a plan to turn in your old car for a tax credit. See here -- http://blogs.reuters.com/frontrow/2009/03/30/obama-wants-you-to-buy-a-car. Can there be new ad dollars for car dealers and your radio cluster? Now is the time to check.

When it comes to driving rate for national business, nothing compares to creating demand by selling local. Now that there is only one rep firm, it may get harder to drive share because they have 100% of the market. All ratings aside, make sure your regional rep has all the information needed to position your station. It may also be a good idea to offer as many different promotions as possible. Spots alone will not be enough to make you stand out. Creative makes money by standing out, whether local or national