We're all agorophobes, afraid of the non-radio world.
It is interesting how little radio "borrows" from outside itself. While programming 99X I was always curiously amazed how a such a large profitable medium, a large profitable company and a large profitable station refused to bring in outside experts in other fields. Certainly we could have learned something about marketing from some of the local ad firms we worked with everyday. As we designed billboard campaigns and television campaigns in-house, I was certain that there were competent professionals in the market that could have given us direction into better ways to communicate our message. Technologically, Cingular, Apple, AOL, Dell, Gateway, Napster, etc... were all at our disposal to come in and discuss the reality of the next generation of technology. Even the holy grail of marketing, Al Reis (of Reis and Trout) lives and works 30 minutes from the radio station. I understand that the expense of these experts is considerable, but what is the larger sin, to pay someone tens of thousands to develop a campaign that succeeds in attracting an audience, or to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on campaigns that fail to move the needle? What made the isolationism even more curious is that we have no problem hiring outside consultants to help us choose the right music to play even though this should be a programmers primary expertise, but we won't lay out the money to supplement a programmers decision making when issues of the brand message is on the line, something we are more in the dark about. Radio needs to get ideas from new people...non-radio people and new industries...non-radio industries.
Buzz words make my skin crawl
I read hollow quotes from programmers in trade magazines using all their favorite buzz words like, "We need to change our paradigms and do radio differently." "Paradigm" is a great buzz word. It is impossible not to sound like a creative maverick who is looking to the future when you use the word "paradigm". Rarely do I see these stations doing anything the listener would perceive as new. The truth is though that you cannot change your paradigm alone. Outside influences have to do it for you. You cannot voluntarily see the world from a different point of view. Your personal point of view is the only one you have. It can be changed, but not by waking up one morning and deciding, "today I'll see the world different." Why? Because our paradigm comes from a collection of memories and experiences. Therefore, you must rely on outside influences and ideas to broaden your view of the world. New ideas from non-radio disciplines. Now, realistically most of us won't ever have the financial resources to hire all the outside thinkers we would like, but we can still broaden our world view by paying attention to things we normally wouldn't consider to have anything to do with radio. What can we learn from watching a sports broadcast on television about how to keep people tuned in longer? What did the theatre companies do to promote their newest blockbuster movie that our paradigms would never have allowed us to conceptualize? Can we use it to learn another way to build cume? With what world view did the makers and marketers of a new car approach their product launch? Can we learn a new language to introduce our station to the listener that will have more meaning? How does an insurance company speak to it's consumer when you call to renew your policy? Can we learn from them how to train our staff to better communicate and demonstrate "customer service" to our listeners and clients? If you watch for these clues, you will inevitably see products that resulted from a world view, a paradigm, different from your own. A product, an idea or a joke that you think, "I couldn't have come up with that in a million years" or even "I wish I had thought of that first." We should try to dissect these ideas and see if they have an applicable value to our radio stations. Sometimes ideas can be directly lifted and used unchanged, other times just the kernel of an idea sparks a new way of doing things that revolutionizes some part of your radio station. Regardless of how or if you apply the ideas you see in other industries, just by looking for them, recognizing something different, and trying to understand the purpose behind it, you will succeed in expanding you paradigm. The outside influences will increase your base of possibilities to choose from as you examine your station. You will understand more variations of choice than before and make designs that reflect your new diversity. Your creativity is a pond of water (or in my case, a puddle). It can evaporate with time unless you regularly refill it with the rains of outside inspiration. My next career will not be Poet, but I think this crude metaphor successfully makes my point.
I've been spending my time trying to find ideas to "borrow" from other media and industries. I'll endeavor to share a few of those with you. Some are small ideas that can be lifted, other are abstract ideas that will need to be wrestled with to find out how to apply the ideas successfully to radio. Next up, I'll tackles some ideas I think are worth borrowing from the wide world of sports.
