(By Paige Nienaber) Last week I introduced you to the term “Tangible” in relation to charity drives. If I text a $10 donation to some link, can I visualize it being delivered to people in need? No, of course not. Even the stations sharing the link have no idea how much money they helped raise and where it went. So, it’s not tangible.
If I buy $10 in diapers, drop them off in a parking lot, and watch them go into a truck with other donations, can I visualize them being delivered to people in need? Yes. Because the station tracks the journey to the disaster zone and shares photos of the supplies being handed out. That’s tangible.
Which is what KS95 in the Twin Cities did with Hurricane Helene.
Wes and Crisco posted from their drive south including asking the audience what good road trip snacks there are. That got 55 comments – which is 55 comments more than “Charli XCX’s new fashion style has people talking!”
KS95 is a monster and they’re a monster because they’ll pause the fun for a second and do something tangible.
And now on with the Dumpage.
Steal ‘Em Before You Can Buy Them
Clichés were meant to be busted. This was originally done by KDWB where they “hacked into Ticket Giant” and downloaded tickets.
If you can’t pull off that kind of theater, just present it as “the boss” has a desk load of tickets and you go down to their office while they’re out at a five-hour lunch, and pilfer a few and come back to the studio and give them away. Video of the theft is essential.
EVP
One of the morning talent expressed his admiration for The Bert Show and their Halloween repertoire of paranormal stuff. Like ghost recordings. If you could land a local “investigator” to do a hunt and then come in with photos and audio, it would be fantastic.
Tarot Thursday
Halloween is, in fact, a Thursday this year so you COULD get a tarot card reader and take them around to workplaces to read listeners.
It could also be Terror Thursday and scare the crap out of people at the station.
Post Your Ghost
Halloween is in full effect, as the kids like to say. We’ve solicited costume pics. Pet costume pics. Pumpkin pics. Decoration pics. So what about soliciting pics of the supernatural from your listeners that they’ve captured at home and work and events?
Turkey Spice Latte
We’re Radio. Pranks and jokes are in our DNA and we should never just limit ourselves to April 1st.
A good starting point is fake products or fake services. Dave Ryan once spent a morning discussing The Phlarmy, the hottest toy of the season, and got a dozen “listeners” who called and were trying to find the last available one in town. “My nephew Timmy will be crushed. He’s been asking for one since this Summer and when I finally got around to shopping, they’re sold out everywhere. I think my husband is going to fly to Gulfport, Mississippi because we just saw on the news that a store there found two unopened pallets of them.”
Toy and box stores in Minnesota and Wisconsin were flooded with calls asking if they had any remaining Phlarmys.
So, why not have a client (make them up; never, EVER use real businesses) like Cool Beans Coffee Company come in to serve the morning show with their new turkey spice latte the week after Halloween? Their business location needs to be at the corner of two streets that don’t intersect.
Downcounts
Most New Year’s Eve countdowns have zero hooks and sound exactly the same. Wired in Philly, when they were in the process of beating Q-102 in less than six months, did The Cracked Out Countdown and just jumped around the list. #14 into #28 into #4 into #21. Why? So that they didn’t blend in with the wallpaper. If you feel obligated to do the traditional countdown, then play around with the name.
Also, I worked at a station where one of the talent had a montage of #1 songs from the previous decade, and every year he’d add seven or eight songs to the tape. The contest element was to listen at midnight for this to play and write down every artist and title and enter them for a drawing. Wildly successful.
Creepy Dolls
My friend Jane has a very valuable heirloom doll that I have to be honest, I’d never be able to sleep in a room where it was: I’d be afraid of waking up and it would be there with a little chainsaw, revving its motor. And God Bless the Silly People because 93Q in Syracuse has turned it into a promotion.
Show Us Your Pink
Back to back 93Q where they’re having people submit photos of themselves Pink’ed out for tickets to this Sunday’s Pink show.
Fact Check Friday
Again, you really need to be cautious in the next four weeks. People are a tiny bit touchy. But, like B96 in Chicago with their TV spot, you can address it by addressing elements of it.
Like Terry, Bill & Steve at 96X in Edmonton where they’d have the morning show producer close the show by highlighting all their factual errors. It could be done as a show closer on Fridays.
Social Media Juice
My brother, Dr. Brett, entertains us with tales of ER horror at Thanksgiving and his one word of medical advice: you never want to have a medical procedure named after you. Like, “Ramirez slid into 2nd HARD. He may be out for the season and have to have another Greg Strassell.”
So the always fun people at Radiowave 96.7 asked, “What would your medical procedure be?” A ‘Paige Nienaber’ would be Tylenol PM and ice for my foot after tripping over a dog in the dark. They did it as a phone bit but could just as easily be done on social media.
Paige Nienaber insults/consults more than 100 radio stations on Fun ‘N Games (Marketing & Promotions). Find him at CPR Promotions. Read Paige’s Radio Ink archives here.
