As a Promotion Director, my self-imposed job description was to “give the talent stuff to talk about.” It might be a contest. It might be a charitable event we were tied into. It might be an event. But just “stuff” to fill in between the music.
When I look at a station’s site and all they’re promoting is the app download, it tells me that they don’t have a lot going on.
The flip sides to that would be 93Q in Syracuse and Y94 in Fargo. They always have at least two promotions to talk about. They’re pretty amazing examples of content that should be on your radar of brands to follow.
In the meantime, on with the Dumpage:
Canada Day/4th Of July Vehicle Music
There are going to be literally too many parades to be in some markets. It’s just way, way too easy to get out in front of a LOT of people. As great as having the SUV in the parade is, you should be blasting music. Can you reach out to a car stereo place and see if they’ll loan you some speakers to either place on the roof or facing out the back door?
Also, either bump the spots or have a playlist on a device that you can dump into. This comes from a guy who blasted a commercial for Yeast Guard at 10,000 people at the King’s Mountain Christmas Parade in South Carolina.
Lotto
One of the stations just got an insane number of lottery tickets. They’re going to do the Blizzard Of Tix. Ten listeners each get ten seconds blindfolded in a wind machine to grab as many as they can.
Flight Attendants
Next week and the holidays are the time of year when a lot of people who travel MAYBE once a year fill the airports. One of my favorite morning show people has flown for Delta since 2007, and she says everyone dreads this time of year.
There was a social media post bouncing around yesterday from a flight attendant with advice for the occasional fliers. It was actually spot ON. So if you have a flight attendant in your circle of friends or staff at the station, get him or her on. It’s great advice that might help save some listeners some headaches.
When The Ticket Sales Are Slow
One of the Cumulus clusters had a Country concert last weekend, and tickets were slow.
Better than a personality or a recorded promo? “Listeners.” Have them sell the show. For the week up to the show any social media post got at least one “listener” asking about tickets and where they could still be purchased.
On the air? “Listeners” talking about how much they missed live music, or where they were going to eat, or who they were going with, or the last time they’d seen the artist… just creating excitement and anticipation.
Pre-sales jumped, and they got close to 1,000 walk-ups the day of the show.
“Listeners” > Promos.
Dibs On Sibs
The evolution of morning show contesting has stagnated over the past decade with the Big Five contests pretty much being done by some station/s in every market. The rest are almost totally unremarkable.
Dave in Minny has done so many one-and-out contests over the years that they just blur together. “Dave, remember when you did ‘Naked On The Roof’?” and he’ll just give me a glassy stare. “Powerball For Britney” was awesome. One time contest to dance on stage with Britney Spears. Great contest, and they moved on.
What if you did a week of Celebrity Sibs? Post a pic and the first listener to tweet with a #(station)sibs and the correct answer wins.
Let’s start, shall we? ID her and get a Perfect Gentlemen cassette single from the prize closet. [email protected]
Splash Mob
Back before it got tanked, Wired 96.5 was kind of a monster. They did some really fun stuff. One of their “just out of left field” bits was to have the station get infested with scabies, so it was going to be sealed and pumped full of poison from Friday PM to Monday morning. So they opened it up, found a listener who had a pool and a nice house, relocated live for the weekend, and invited everyone in Philadelphia down to crash their pool.
What if on a REALLY hot day, the AC at the station broke, and from about 8 am until 6 pm, you went to a listener’s backyard pool and invited the community?
Splash Job
Quite a few stations have done community service days once a month, at least during the summer. Find a park or community center or playground or school that needs cleaning, fixing, painting, and repair, and invite the audience to come down and help. Spend several hours working together and then get fed and liquid-fied by clients.
Could be done as Splash Jobs. Come. Help. Everyone is welcome.
Solve The Case And Roll To The Show
In 2020, I started delving into the case of a guy that I’d gone to school with who had disappeared along with his car in Florida when I was 18. And this brought me into the world of “web sleuths.” And there are a LOT.
One of the reasons Fugitive works is that it sucks people in and engages them.
Q-102 in Cincy does Q Clue, and one round had listeners trying to solve the mystery of Taylor Swift’s missing cat. The prize? Four tickets to her show and a limo, which has a perceived value of about a million dollars.
Insta’Jams
As KDWB has discovered when they first started doing Pajama Parties for Valentine’s, listeners in PJs will get them more views in the following 72 hours than most stations get in a calendar year. Over 2 million.
So, IF you had a decent concert ticket or experience, there’s your bit. Instagram hashtagged mirrored selfies of yourself in your PJs, with random shots being selected to win.
Cut The Cord
One of the stations has an apartment to give away. Okay. That’s cool. As exciting as doing remotes with an entry box could be, I believe they’ve settled on a promotion to find a college graduate who has settled into a high degree of comfort, ie: is living at home and doesn’t appear to have any motivation to move on in life.
They’ll show up with talent and promo people… and boxes. And quickly excise this person and relocate them, with basically no notice, to their new home. They’ll help him (“him” is assumed) get moved in and leave him with a fridge full of Hot Pockets.
Obviously, I’m Offended
Michael Martin and I once did a weekend contest that played off “Win It Before You Can Buy It” and did “Premature Etickulation.” AKA, the station was giving out tickets quickly and way before most stations did. Kiss 102.3 in Albany got ahead of graduations in that market with a weekend ticket contest.
