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By Steve, March 29, 2010 5:13 am

Considering a job in radio?

* Many broadcast employees have erratic work schedules, sometimes having to work early in the morning or late at night.

* Entry-level jobs in news or program production increasingly are requiring a college degree and some broadcast experience.

* Employment in broadcasting is expected to increase by just 7 percent over the 2008–18 period,

* Keen competition is expected for many jobs, particularly in large metropolitan areas, because of the large number of jobseekersattracted by the glamour of this industry.

Check out the Federal Bureau Of Labor Statistics’ facts on their website and you might decide that car sales is more promising, yet the upside to our great business for those of us who know it well still far outweighs the risks and demands.

It gets into your blood.  That’s obvious too.

Source: Jaye Albright’s Breakfast Blog

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By Steve, March 24, 2010 3:41 pm

Do your emails include a sig line? Probably. And I bet your email signature line looks something like this:

Laura Smith, General Manager
Acme Radio Group
Sunnyville, Texas
WSXY 100.1 – WERT 92.5 – WVBV 102.5

Here’s the thing: Every email you send is a chance to insert a little ad into your recipient’s email inbox. And because it’s part of your email signature it won’t be seen as spam!

Here are a couple of better signatures:

Laura Smith, General Manager
Acme Radio Group

If you’re on your computer, you can listen to our award-winning stations right now! Click a link and listen live:

WSXY 100.1 for Country: http://www.wsxy.com
WERT 92.5 for Oldies: http://www.wert.com
WVBV 102.5 for Jazz: http://www.wvbv.com

and

Laura Smith, General Manager
Acme Radio Group

Look for WSXY, WERT and WVBV at the Sunnyville Community Center June 10 at our 7th annual Indoor Family Adventure Party! Click here for the schedule: http://www.schedule.org

and

Thomas Ganes
Program Director, WERT 92.5

Want a good laugh? Listen to the WERT Clean Joke of the Day every weekday morning at 7:15. You can also get it on the WERT Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/wert

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By Steve, March 21, 2010 10:31 am

This could be a handy copy writing/press release tool. HubSpot’s Gobbledygook Grader evaluates your written content and checks for use of gobbledygook, jargon, cliches and over-used, hype-filled words. You’ll receive a grade together with a full report.

By the way, Dan O’Day’s got a fix for Gobbledygook.

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By Steve, March 11, 2010 6:49 pm

From TVSquad.com:

“Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution,” the reality series in which the famed British chef attempts to spark change in the West Virginia city that the Centers for Disease Control named the unhealthiest in America, will air on Sunday, March 21 in the 10 p.m. slot followed by repeats and new episodes every Friday. The show mirrors his attempt to revamp the British school food program. This time, it chronicles the chef’s attempt to “plant the seed” of change in Huntington, W.V., the same town that scorned his help and drove him to the brink of tears. Here’s just a taste of the town’s reaction to his offer to help. I’m shocked that the guy in this clip was spitting hamburger crumbs at Jamie as he refused to eat “lettuce”.

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By Steve, March 7, 2010 4:18 pm

Since your station’s likely playing everything from music to commercials off of computer, there’s never a bad time to ask your engineer if everything’s backed up.

The theft of an estimated $10,000 in equipment included the hard drive that contained all the Perry Broadcasting station’s music, says KSWO. KJMZ jock Joe Biggs says “I actually had to hook up my laptop and played some music off of there.” GM Joy Chapman says it’s been a trying year, starting off with the loss of the tower during an ice storm. The burglary at the East Lee Boulevard studios happened early Friday morning, and the culprits made away with computers, monitors, TVs, webcams and two transmitter tubes – tubes the station was using to get back up to full power. The police are offering a cash reward through the “Crimestoppers” program. More at Radio-Info.

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By Steve, March 4, 2010 8:07 pm

From Full Throttle Country:

1) Keep away from “square pegs in a round hole”. If it don’t fit, don’t force it. Stay away from out of life group information and bits. Today’s listeners are more wired into other mediums and media than most air talent. They can smell phony a mile away. You can talk about Taylor Swift and Rascal Flatts on Top-40, but talking about Kesha and Jay-Z on a Country station makes no sense.

2) Make sure news, traffic and weather all tie in as part of the show and not distractions. Weave these elements into the show and production to avoid bumps and snags. Especially if the traffic and news delivery is weaker than the morning show. Quick hand-offs without all the noisy beds and intros. Don’t bring attention to long strings of talk.

3) More short calls over song intros between stop-sets. Use the intro time between and after stop-sets to air calls. The short intro will cause you to edit and get to the point without a thesis.

4) Become aware of the :30 rule: If it goes past thirty seconds it better be good! Get to the point quickly — no old school set-up that drags on forever. This has got to move from element to element fast and without snags. They occasions of listening are shorter and more frequent — There is no TSL with the PPM.

5) Outward not inward. Morning shows massage each other’s egos and this will not grow the audience and the life group. Like politicians, morning shows can sometimes be out of step with the audience and life group. Be in touch with what listeners are talking about.

6) Conversational tones with peaks and valleys for high points and emotional points. Why do air talent talk in the same tone most of the time with no change in their inflection? This is theater of the mind and acting — it’s not announcing. Get excited and get emotional.

7) Play hits — never drop powers. PD’s, don’t let the morning show play with the logs any longer. Never let a morning show edit the log. You will get every story in the world to why two inane titles played back to back. Don’t let it happen. We need to play concentrated hit titles in the PPM-world.

8) Be honest, no more fake. Disc-jockeys doing mornings won’t cut it and un-trained morning show professionals will give way to syndicated personalities or talent from other dayparts coming to mornings. Playing games and contests mixed with music and contrived content will fail.

9) More change and surprise. Mundane and boring will be perceived as such. Make marks by being in touch with their interests and work to find out what perks their interests.

10) Talk about what interests the audience. Timing is everything — hit it early, often and get off it before it becomes yesterday’s news. Talk to people, join organizations, talk to your kids’ teachers and parents, make it mainstream and make it happen. Never blue or crass, but off the wall and unpredictable. Just because it’s on the Internet doesn’t make it cool.

Is this list missing a commandment? Add a comment.

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By Steve, March 1, 2010 1:42 pm

From PewInternet.org:

In the digital era, news has become omnipresent. Americans access it in multiple formats on multiple platforms on myriad devices. The days of loyalty to a particular news organization on a particular piece of technology in a particular form are gone. The overwhelming majority of Americans (92%) use multiple platforms to get news on a typical day, including national TV, local TV, the internet, local newspapers, radio, and national newspapers. Some 46% of Americans say they get news from four to six media platforms on a typical day. Just 7% get their news from a single media platform on a typical day.

More…