Spring ahead to better brand and community building

March 31 is the day Spring 2011 begins. Now is the time to lay out your Spring and what you plan to accomplish for three months (and monthly in PPM markets). Any loose nails need to be hammered and pulled out. We use to call this The Disney approach. The park would always take out non-performing rides. The low ride out. It's time to look at how your handle social media and how the talent posts and replies. Are you still posting station liners or do you engage the listeners? Kris Daniels of Q-103 Louisville uses Facebook as a 2nd morning show to what's taking place on the air. Direct messages to her audience about reality, her life, music, weekend events, the listeners life's and more.

Is your imaging fun, compelling, brand inducing and to the point? - Are you using the towns and people in your community in the heartbeat of the station? Remember: Page after page of the same dribble doesn't cut through and help you build your brand. Have you looked at a map of your community and all of the distinct and different areas you could write imaging around? In Fresno we have a local community called Tarpey Village. At KHGE, we wrote local ID's - Serving Tarpey Village where Rebel flags and Hank Williams Jr. CD's are issued at birth. 

Is your morning show swinging for the fences or hitting grounders? Time to work with them to accomplish the main goals of any successful CMR morning show. Localism, topicality and listener interaction. The only liners they should be doing are natural, conversational breaks about events and promotions that are morning show focused. Stop music breaks and long thoughts about artists and songs. Contests need to be simple, listen for a contest trigger or simple call into win. Make sure the team knows the station goals and are part of the process. 

We'll cover more ground for Spring 2011 over the next few weeks.