People become loyal listeners to a station because of its Stationality. It is more than just having the right music mix. It is the Personality of the station. Saying it another way: What’s between the records sets the stage.
Watch the video on YouTube: Radio Drops #21: Stationality
The Sum of the Parts
Stationality. As in personality. Stationality.
I was going into my third decade in the business before I heard that word, and I was rather irritated I hadn’t thought of it myself.
The man who said it was the general manager of a major market station I was a consultant to. Our team had created a new style of country station that sounded nothing like the other two big country stations in the market. Both were longtime ratings and revenue leaders in town, with a somewhat laid-back presentation, and they sounded a lot alike. Their music was about 60 to 70% recurrents and oldies.
Our mix was 60% new hits, and our announcers were very quick and tight. It was like a Top 40 rock and roll station in sound and feel, but with country music.
About two years after the launch, the ratings and revenue had spiked upwards and everybody was happy. Our research guru said the station was as strong as anything he’d ever seen. And the manager said that was because we had great stationality: the personality, the style of our station, set us apart from the other guys.
Today, wow, competition is absolutely massive, coming at us from all directions. Listeners have entirely too many choices, all competing for our attention.
That’s what we all want. We want someone to pay attention to us, remember our name, remember where we are, enjoy us, and come back tomorrow.
To accomplish that, we have to give them something special. And that something special can always be your stationality, the sum of the parts. It means you’ve got to think all the time about what your radio station sounds like, and about all the things that are on it.
Stationality, the personality of your radio station. It’s as important as the music you select to play.
SW
Written by
Steve Warren
Steve Warren has programmed radio since 1964. He built MdB, the first music scheduler for the Mac, in 1987 and Music 1 for Windows in 1994, and is a founding partner of MusicOne.
