Because I have a general company name, and blog often, my consulting site tends to show up well in Google searches for people who are new to radio and looking for a consultant. So, I’m accustomed to fielding a lot of questions from people outside our industry that on the surface seem pretty basic to anyone who’s been in radio for a while. However, they’re often eye opening. Since I’ve been doing this my entire life it’s kind of refreshing to get a glimpse into how people see our industry when looking at it with a fresh set of eyes. Especially smart people who’ve been successful in other industries. Often, they have great ideas for creative programming and promotions or new management or sales strategies worth trying. But, one major misconception they tend to have is that radio’s main purpose is to inform the public because after all we are licensed by the government for doing so. The truth is, that while informing the public is certainly one of the things a radio station is responsible for, especially during a disaster. Our main priority is to entertain the public.

While this misconception is most prevalent in news talk, lately it tends to be present regardless of the format people are wanting to do or even the kind of station they want to buy or start. I fully understand why people would think this way. Everyone seems to long for the days when radio and television stations were filled with personalities that were unbiased presenters of the facts, leaving it up to the audience to form their own opinions. That sounds great in theory. It’s more wholesome and probably better for our democracy. It’s also boring, doesn’t attract a mass audience or even keep the few that stumble upon it listening very long. The simple fact is, no station I know of in the history of radio, or TV for that matter, has won a competitive ratings battle by focusing more of their efforts on informing the public instead of entertaining them.

But why? Because creating winning radio is at it’s core is a math problem. Most people still mainly listen to terrestrial radio in their car. The average American spends just over 60 minutes in their car per day. The bulk of that being the 52 minutes per day they spend commuting to and from work. Historically most people have shown they would prefer to spend the majority of those precious minutes being entertained rather than informed. So, if a station has more service elements than entertainment elements within that hour they’re going to lose to their competitors. That’s true no matter how localized those service elements are. If stations have long-winded, rip and read DJs that add nothing to their content and never engage with their audience, they’re going to lose to their competitors. If a station is selling dollar a holler spots leading to long, crowded stopsets, then they’re going to lose to their competitors and struggle to sell and keep advertisers. Because none of those things are entertaining unless they are done by professionals who are trained, experienced and willing to put in the extra effort required to make them all entertaining. 

One of the great things about radio is that its an industry filled with passion. Passion for specific types of music, passion for certain political positions and passion for social issues that personally hit home. So, it makes sense why people are drawn to the idea of starting a station to serve their passion. However, there’s a reason passion projects are a luxury reserved for the wealthy. That reason is, they rarely ever make any money. Radio is a business, not a hobby and passion doesn’t pay a power bill at a transmitter site or employee paychecks.

What do you think? Is entertaining more important than informing on the radio? Comment below or email me at Andy@RadioStationConsultant.com.

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