Hi Jon,
As you're aware, I enjoyed you doing talk, and I wish you'd do more.  I get it..  time .

Someone many years pointed out that 98% of everything we do in radio, we do for our peers.  Let's face it, nobody sits in their kitchen marveling at  our ability to hit posts, or tunes away when there's a second of dead air.  I believe that attitude has hurt the evolution of radio, we had DAB, and we rebroadcast our FMs on it; we have the internet, and we put jock pictures and rebroadcast our stations on it, or subscribe to new services and use that as content.   I was never a better manager than when I was in a position where I didn't care about the money.  I knew I could quit and be a security guard, so it was the job that kept me going, not the compensation.

I understand the Pandora's box, but how can radio ever be expected to truly evolve when more responsibility is rewarded with more income, to a point where the Lexus and the kids in private school aren't worth giving up for a risky decision?  At 640, I put Gary Bell on-air because I knew if it went South, and I had every reason to believe it might, I figured we'd both get fired and go work at Dominion.  If I had been making serious coin, I would never have taken that chance.   The people I worked with weren't making much either, but damn we had a fun time making radio, and I'm not pretending that helped anyone pay the rent, but it went a long way to 'wanting' to show up for work.

How can radio as we know it ever hope to survive when the people making decisions can't or won't risk their career on a hunch and instead fall back on consultants or inaction?   

Or will we just see an endless stream of Ed Sheeran, Gotye, Time and temp and repeat, while out of work radio people yell about 'their' amazing solution being the magic bullet, which is same old, same old with generally a wider playlist and them picking up a paycheck.
 

Are you gonna do anything Extra when it comes to news at your stations now that there is a vacuum in local news with ctv cutting their local noon newscasts?

RadioActive wrote:

I should note that he's the second radio owner to grace us with his presence. He doesn't post often and hasn't in a long while, but WECK owner Buddy Shula has made his opinions known here in the past as well. 
 

Yeah, that went just great, lol.

ig wrote:

Hi Jon,
As you're aware, I enjoyed you doing talk, and I wish you'd do more.  I get it..  time .

Someone many years pointed out that 98% of everything we do in radio, we do for our peers.  Let's face it, nobody sits in their kitchen marveling at  our ability to hit posts, or tunes away when there's a second of dead air.  I believe that attitude has hurt the evolution of radio, we had DAB, and we rebroadcast our FMs on it; we have the internet, and we put jock pictures and rebroadcast our stations on it, or subscribe to new services and use that as content.   I was never a better manager than when I was in a position where I didn't care about the money.  I knew I could quit and be a security guard, so it was the job that kept me going, not the compensation.

I understand the Pandora's box, but how can radio ever be expected to truly evolve when more responsibility is rewarded with more income, to a point where the Lexus and the kids in private school aren't worth giving up for a risky decision?  At 640, I put Gary Bell on-air because I knew if it went South, and I had every reason to believe it might, I figured we'd both get fired and go work at Dominion.  If I had been making serious coin, I would never have taken that chance.   The people I worked with weren't making much either, but damn we had a fun time making radio, and I'm not pretending that helped anyone pay the rent, but it went a long way to 'wanting' to show up for work.

How can radio as we know it ever hope to survive when the people making decisions can't or won't risk their career on a hunch and instead fall back on consultants or inaction?   

Or will we just see an endless stream of Ed Sheeran, Gotye, Time and temp and repeat, while out of work radio people yell about 'their' amazing solution being the magic bullet, which is same old, same old with generally a wider playlist and them picking up a paycheck.
 

I think the easiest answer is leadership.   2 parts:

1)  a leader who understands radio and is confident in their ability to colour outside the lines.

2)  a leader who pushes his/her team to try new things.

Unfortunately, innovation likely has to come from the independents and develop a proven model that consultants copy and sell to the coprs.  In the corp world the risk isn't worth it, encouraged or rewarded.

RadioActive wrote:

Just want to thank Jon Pole for joining our little slice of Internet heaven. It's great that he would take the time to answer questions since I'm pretty sure given the growing size of his station group, he has a lot of other things to do. So my thanks. (Or should that be "MyFM" thanks?) 

Enjoy the Super Bowl Mr. Pole!

I should note that he's the second radio owner to grace us with his presence. He doesn't post often and hasn't in a long while, but WECK owner Buddy Shula has made his opinions known here in the past as well. 

We're really glad to have them both. 

You're welcome.  I've enjoyed the questions.   I love the radio passion here.

JON POLE wrote:

Tomas Barlow wrote:

I have a question, and I'm not trying to be a smartass, I swear.
What is the strategy for the music and the announcers on your stations? 
It seems like the announcers and music are just the filler between community information.
The music tends to be medium slow and the announcers don't seem to be directed to be personalities, and you can't find any mention of music or announcers on your websites.  The information is good, but why do the music and the announcers seem like such a low priority?  I don't listen to your stations because I don't hear a lot of fun happening to go along with the information.  I have never laughed or turned up a song in any of the times I have tried your stations and I'm a adult pop music guy.  If I could compare radio stations to breakfast cereals, too many stations are Count Chocula...  Lots of flavour but nothing of substance and My FM is oatmeal.  It's good for me but it's bland.  Why not add a bit of entertainment value to go with the local info?

The answer is its likely a bit of "different strokes for different folks". Our stations are hyper local, so yes the priority is the information and the music is the fill. In 20 yrs of research specific to myFM - why people listen ranks as follows:

1. Local news.
2. Music.
3. Promotions.
4. Announcers.

So we program exactly what they want. Our music is pretty much every AC playlist in the country.

Our "spice" tends to be "specialty news days" or our custom countdowns like "Songs you didn't know never hit #1" and our audience promotions.

The great Kevin McGowan (93.9 KOOL GM)) took over the morning show for a couple yrs. He was a master morning show host. No question better than any others we had. Funny thing - his show rated in audience satisfaction the exact same as every other host. Our audience is driven by the info and "friendly" voice with local content. So that's what we do.

That all said... I have heard many great bits on our stations that are fun and creative - but Iisten more than you do likely.

I don't feel I have heard a crazy difference from our announce team compared to other stations. I would put them all in the same category-ish. I prefer my team, but I'm bias.

If you have an example of someone I should listen to that's "nailing it" please share with the group. I'd love to check them out.

I appreciate the response.  Thank you.