Brian Wright “Listeners Speak”

Here is a grouping of focus group comments of real listeners over the last two years talking about their relationship with radio. I hope you catch the fact that listeners are almost always focused on the emotional connection they have with their radio station(s) of choice and the local people on the air. To them, relationship with the personalities is a primary reason to listen in the first place.

• “I think there’s a certain feeling of investment with some shows. You spend time listening to a certain person on the radio, laugh at their jokes, play the games or join the discussion, you might even have interacted with them directly a few times… all that goes to forming a sometimes passionate bond. So when something happens to them it’s not much different than if someone were to insult your best friend.”

• “My favorite DJ was fired after 14 years at the station. It feels kind of like you have lost a friend.” The new guy doesn’t relate at all, I think he wired in from some other part of the country.

• “You get a lot of lonely and sometimes vulnerable people listening to radio. I’m sometimes that way. People will defend their favorite personality, singer, band etc. just as you would do a friend.”

• “People where I work seem to treat the radio as their life support system and they regularly tune into the same station and I am so fed up of listening to the same music over and over, but they seem to love it?”

• “I will always go to the mom and pop station where I can hear the people talk about things that are going on around me. That makes me feel informed and comfortable. Satellite and streaming services are too cookie cutter for me and they don’t have local people on at all.”

• “I listen to Spotify. It’s much better than anything on AM or FM radio. I used to listen to radio, but they replaced my favorite host with some guy from out of town. I still don’t know why they did that. That guy was like my friend.”

• “Some radio people love to hear themselves talk. I don’t like that very much at all. I just heard a lady the other day on a different station that sounds friendly, you know, like someone I can connect with.”

• “I love it when a DJ tells a funny story about what happened to them or one of their friends. I can relate so much to what he is saying. He could be my brother because he acts just like him.”

• “I just dumped satellite radio because I found myself tuning back to my local station for school closings, weather and other stuff. I just hope they don’t get rid of the local guys for someone out of town like other stations have done”

The most powerful listener benefit there is right now is to illuminate the investment you are making in the listener’s life. This type of imaging-execution needs to be prevalent on your radio station(s) on an hourly basis. The most powerful way to do this is with listeners themselves extolling this benefit. While your competitors are deemphasizing this for one reason are another, you can race ahead of them.   

Brian is a 30 year radio veteran who has successfully served many companies over the years as Program Director, Operations Manger and VP of programming and consultant with Wright Media Group. For the last 15 years Wright has enjoyed building alliances with scores of stations in the US & Canada helping them grow in ratings and revenue.  Contact Brian at brianw6187@aol.com.