I love the radio industry, I have since my teenage years when I was listening intently to ensure that I was on top of the latest releases, I remember scanning through the frequencies hoping to find a station playing something that matched my taste in music at the time (alas unsuccessfully).
In the 1980's and 1990's radio ruled, it lacked the stuffy nature of the national and local press, it felt more accessible than TV and it was fast-moving and interesting. They had a fairly free run of things and recorded record figures with presenters earning huge salaries, so much so that the rumour is that Les Ross, breakfast presenter on brmb, could afford to buy his own full-size train to keep in his back garden.
But slowly things have changed. For me, as with most of my jobs, I came to radio after it's heyday. Nostalgia reigned, the good old days of easy commissions, crazy presenters and wild parties were long gone. When I joined the world of radio marketing the media landscape had shifted and the challenge was on to retain market share and fight for a slice of peoples time.
And yet the attitudes of many senior decision-makers within the industry still remain focused on trying to recreate what they had seen before, back in the glory days. Roadshows, Christmas Lights switch on's, school fetes, run partnerships, zany stunts many of these continue to be commercial radio standard marketing fodder. Except radio isn't as showbiz as it was. It's not as exciting when you see a presenter visit your school, businesses aren't so inclined to do favours and give free stuff in exchange for a five-second shout out, some radio groups are more alert to it than others, but as an industry there is a need to wake up and move on with some more modern techniques.
A former colleague of mine once said to me that radio doesn't have to be cool, it just has to be relevant, and she was right.
There are a number of mistakes made by stations now who still operate with a 1980's/90's philosophy. It's all fairly basic in the thought process:
FACT - Budgets are less than they were so don't expect the same results every time
FACT - Blagging favours only works so many times before you burn your bridges if you're not going to offer anything in return
FACT - If you conduct widespread audience research and then ignore the results because you're stubborn, don't be surprised if you're wrong
FACT - People consume media in a variety of ways now, don't expect listening behaviours to reflect those from 15 years ago
FACT - co-branding is not as powerful as solus branding
FACT - a logo at the bottom of a poster with 10 other logos will not bring listeners, nor brand association
I was able to attend a lecture from BBC Radio 1 boss Ben Copper, put on by the Radio Academy. Here I apologise for the blatant plagiarism, but he made a bloody good point, so simple and yet ignored by so many. Mr Cooper talked about the 'head down generation', a society where screens rule the roost. From the moment you wake up to bed our engagement with the world has completely shifted, and as a result so too has the way that we consume media and music.
Below is the simple graphic that Mr Cooper used to demonstrate this change. If you consider within this world how you might listen to a radio station compared to in the 1990's it is now very different.
Now, this is not to say that all marketing and promotion of the stations should be driven through digital channels, far from it. But, a minor digital proposition and reliance on 'old skool' methods very much feel like throwing a dart blindfolded, hope for the best.
I hope that radio doesn't slowly wither and die. I hope that some brave and innovative ideas are undertaken to promote stations and that realistic expectations are in place for what will be a shrinking market going forward.
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