School Closings

It’s time.  NOT do start doing them (yet), but to set up your radio station’s plan and organizational structure for how you’ll handle school closing announcements when they start to happen in late fall.

Contact every school district in your metro area and find out how they notify parents and media when changes happen in their normal schedules.  Come up with forms and web addresses now that will allow you to be first and “right” with ALL the info that your listeners need.

The days of reading lengthy lists of every single school in a radio station service area are long gone, replaced long ago by the crawl across the bottom of the TV screen that made it so that even stations giving the info every five minutes were boring to listen to and yet still most often were beaten by the video screen.  Now, the Internet has displaced morning TV in its leadership role, reopening radio’s opportunity to be “the official school closings radio station” by giving just enough major info to drive listeners to your website, email database/mobile text sign up and social pages to alert them immediately of precisely and only the facts they want and need.

It’s a lot more to accomplish and plan for than the old days, but the opportunity is bigger since every piece of it can also be sold.  For that reason, you’re actually probably getting a LATE start, but you’re not “tardy” yet.  Even if you can’t find a sponsor for all of this in 2014, creating the “(Brand) School Closing Center” this year and working hard to own that image locally will make it easier to sell for what it’s really worth next year.

If you announce school closings on air, place them in alphabetical order, so the list is easy to follow.  If someone who goes to Andrew Jackson school hears you announcing a closing at Martin Luther King School at the start of the list, they will know that their school is open today.

Does your station have a meteorologist or a weather person?  If so, their voice would be perfect for any promos you do for the “(Brand) Official School Closing Center.”  Promise that during bad weather days, you’ll “double” the number of weather updates.

Finally, if you give any school closing updates after 8 am, give the “new” ones FIRST before going into the alpha list you’ve been doing all morning.  Parents who are listening at work will have to make special arrangements for their kids and they’ll appreciate the special treatment.

The key point:  now that this info is available in so many places, from school phone trees and national internet sites, the local medium making it easiest, the most "usable" and high touch WINS.

Weather (Or Not?)

Everyone has a smart phone, so why bother with time checks and weather forecasts?

Sure, we can all hit the screen of our mobile device and get the entire week's forecast.  Yes, it can be set like an alarm clock and it has the time, day and date right there.

So, you should stop doing those things on the radio?

If you do, you simply communicate to your listener that the things they "need" each morning aren't important to you.

Yes, I know it gets harder since "double time sells" (7-10, 10 after 7) probably don't make any sense today.

And, telling me the obvious (clouds today, cloudy tonight, most cloudy tomorrow, considerable clouds tomorrow night) is just a waste of my time.

The basics still apply, but the way you do them, who does them and how can't be as rote and repetitive back when radio was the only source.

Bad Weather

The following story is being used here as an excuse to rant again about a pet peeve of mine. It probably won't be the last time I blog about what a lousy job most voices on the radio do relating weather updates.

Last week a client GM sent along this RBR report and asked:

"So does this mean things have changed so much that we should just dump weather and play more music? Don't know if I totally buy this? This is awful for radio."

Michael O'Malley, always the voice of reason, points out that things may not be as bad as it appears. "Too many questions we don't know about the survey question or sample including what context this is asked in? A poll of who? How was the question phrased? Did they have more than one choice? RBR leaves all that important-for-perspective info out."

However, O'Malley adds: "It's no secret though that for music stations with 18-49 making up at least some substantial portion of the audience composition, the interest in all services continues to decline - markedly so if they're 'formal.' As a listener I can find out about the news, weather and last night's lottery numbers on my smart phone while listening to my favorite song on my favorite station and not have to wait for anything formal. Doesn't mean radio has diminished in my estimation (I'm there for the music, fun, talent, etc), just that I'm not using for these particular services at the moment. We don't see that aspect reflected in this article either.

"'Breaking' however is another story; the interested in 'breaking' is significantly greater. We've also known for a while that TV has taken over in the kitchen vs. the bedroom and car. Be long on organic and short on formal. Program for how I'm being used right now."

That very day, I played morning show airchecks of every station in a client market for for our cluster's crew so that we could all talk about things we must do to stand out and be better. Weather was pretty much the same on every station in town except one (the CHR, the jock did a great job briefly relating it and making it fun). Everyone else was 30% chance of precip, considerable clouds, blah blah.

Everyone agreed after listening, radio's voice tracked approach to weather has become irrelevant. The cluster Operations Manager/PD, as if to make O'Malley's point, pulled out his smart phone and showed that he can get current conditions, temp and even a ten day forecast anytime he wants it.

Yet, we all continue to talk up the same old weather jingles with the NWS forecast verbatim up to a call letter stinger at the end just like radio did decades ago.

Most of us, face it, are pretty much "average" at most of what we do and that is no longer acceptable with anything in a multi-media world of ubiquitous information, choice, personalization, micro-local and customization.

If we can't do info differently and exceptionally, let's stop wasting listeners time with drivel.

How To Do Weather Reports

Ask NOAA's National Weather Service or The Weather Office's Environment Canada and their advice will be to read their official pronouncements verbatim, word for word.

And, lots of us do just that, making every radio station's forecasts almost identical: "Partly cloudy today, some clouds tonight and considerable cloudiness tomorrow."

What the heck am I supposed to do with that info?

Then there's Canada: "a mix of sun and cloud." Now, there's a forecast that has to be 100% correct at least 12 hours every day!

1. Please, people, read those formal and official weather predictions from your government officials and carefully understand what they mean to your listener in the next few hours.
2. Put the written forecast away and tell me in your own words - as few words as possible - what I need to do about what the meteorologists are saying is going to happen out there.
3. Unless there's a major weather emergency, brief and clear is better. I can boot up my computer and get to weather.com before the meteorologist gets it out.

Can we just say "Sunny today 78, Clear 55 tonight and Sunny maybe 80 tomorrow"??

One sign that you're doing weather correctly: it should take about six seconds versus the 30 or more the average personality (and, I do mean "average" in the worst possible way) takes to do it.

Why Have One Emergency Radio When Two Would Be Better?

It's time to ramp up your bad weather preparedness tools and education on air, and the Department of Homeland Security has a great reminder of how key radio can be at those times.

Lasting positive images are built (or lost) at those times, since it only works if your station has a plan to be there for your audience whenever the weather turns bad.

Every business needs a "bad weather plan," especially every radio station.

Include in that plan imaging to reinforce element association to "dependability" and "reliability." Station association to "trust." Encourage listeners to "use" the station with a weather-related call to action "when you need to know."

But, don't promise it if you can't deliver on it, 24/7, especially during the upcoming bad weather months.