One day your website is rolling along, pumping out stories. The next, a legal letter lands in your inbox: pay up or get sued for that “innocent” image somebody right-clicked from Google. The fine? Could be thousands. The stress? Off the charts. And yes, even if the image was buried in a three-year-old post that nobody’s read since the Obama administration, you’re still on the hook.

Stop trying to force your air talent, sales team, social media strategy, and community outreach into a single web page with five dropdown menus, local news, pop culture updates, sports, and a traffic cam link. Instead: Build a second website that’s branded differently but powered by your station’s (and your sister station) content, personality, and reach.

Digital isn’t the enemy of terrestrial and it’s never been an either-or proposition. The best creators are excelling at both and leaving everyone who chooses to only focus on one in their rearview mirror. The sooner we can get more radio talent thinking this way the better it will be for the overall health of our industry.

Successful YouTuber David Pakman, who has 3.29 million subscribers, puts it this way, “The advice I give everyone is to figure out how often you can do it, daily or weekly, and then fully commit. This is more important than which camera or light you buy, how to do ad sales or anything else because it all flows downhill from there.”

We’ve all seen stations that treat their website like a digital afterthought—just a lonely “Listen Live” button and a blurry logo. Meanwhile, they’re out telling clients how crucial it is to invest in their online presence. That’s like a car mechanic driving around in a rusty clunker. It sends the wrong message.

In just a few short years smart glasses will replace smart phones as the dominant technology people are addicted to. This change could happen as soon as five years from now but will certainly happen within ten years. Just as smartphones changed the game for media, smart glasses will as well. Here’s what radio as an industry can do so we’re ahead of this change instead of being behind it. 

Whether you run a single station in a top 10 market or multiple radio stations in a mid-size market, or really anything in between, there are some critical ways you can up your B2B sales strategy — and you might be surprised to learn that it has to do with marketing!

In Ep 30 TV producer and director John Reynolds showcases his work on a segment for his "South Bend Locals" series, which features a band called The Bergamot. Reynolds emphasizes efficient production and the ability to create multiple pieces of content from a single session, illustrating how he produced both an interview/documentary piece and several standalone live performance videos.

Your station is already the voice of your community. Or you want it to be. So… what if you also became the online destination website of your community? That’s exactly what smart broadcasters are doing, and you can do it, too, with help from Local Beat.