Your clients run ads on your stations to attract more customers. How many ads do you run on your stations to attract more listening? Listeners come and go. There are multiple listener occasions per day. The average time spent listening on one occasion is ten minutes. While they leave you, you can get them to tune back. Just ask them! Institute Radio Regularity, which has nothing to do with Metamucil. Rather, it is all about TSL. That’s based on listening duration and the number of listening occasions.
Coaxing More Time
How many times an hour does your station give a specific reason to listen longer or again? Consider these occasions that promote longer listening:
- An artist or song is coming up (after the commercials)
- An entertaining feature or benchmark is in the next quarter-hour
- Stream the station at work using the station website or app
- Use a Smart Speaker or mobile app to hear the station
- Win a contest (say when to listen)
- Hear morning show content (say when)
- Promote a quantity of music coming up
- Tease a weather or traffic alert
- Talk about an upcoming concert
Promoting ahead is often called teasing, and teasing is good.
“Work” Your P1s
Radio, like most businesses, has a core following. The radio business depends on its most loyal group of listeners. These are First Preference or P1 listeners, those who listen to your station the most. While they represent a fraction of your total Cume, they contribute as much as 75% of a station’s listenership due to the time they spend with their favorite station.
Use your air to market the station to its P1s and your total Cume. Extending listening to your station by ten minutes from a core listener is far easier than getting a new listener.
Devise an Internal Marketing Plan
Include these elements:
Your Brand Name should include your frequency. The more times you deliver your brand per hour, the greater the likelihood it will be remembered, which is essential in diary and PPM methodology. Saying your brand name 30 to 40 times an hour assures your listeners know where to find the station when they want to come back.
Your Positioning Statement describes the benefit of your format. The short phrase should be unique, credible, and beneficial. This sets you apart from your competitors.
Your Bonus Content (besides music) includes major station promotions, such as contests or events. It includes your website, station app, streaming, listening on smart speakers (and how to do so), listening at work, and reasons to join your listener database.
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John Lund is President of the Lund Media Group, a radio programming consulting firm with specialists in all mainstream radio formats. Did you find this article useful? You can leave a comment below or email John at John@Lundradio.com.