(Excerpted from Randy Michaels’ FUNDAMENTALS OF RADIO PROGRAMMING.
There is a hierarchy of importance in any radio station.
What is most important about your radio station?
The Product?
No.
Bottom Line?
No. The most important thing is your signal.
If they can’t hear you, it doesn’t matter.
You can put together the greatest radio station anyone has ever conceived, but if people can’t hear it then it isn’t worth it.
The first thing you do when you program a radio station is look at who you cover, where the signal is strong.
The signal, by the way, isn’t that circle they have on the map in the Sales Department. “Signal” is a very complex thing.
How much signal does it take for the average radio to work? There’s no good answer to that.
In the absence of any other strong signals, .5 millivolts may be killer on FM.
But if you have a very strong transmitter next door, you can have what’s called desense. Cheap radios have their internal amplifiers all turned down by a nearby strong signal. A car radio hears it while a clock radio doesn’t and a Walkman doesn’t.
You have signals that cause intermodulation, which spoils the reception of another signal. As you think about your programming, you should know a lot about your signal.
There are neighborhoods where it’s good and neighborhoods where it’s bad. Radios where it’s good, radios where it’s bad.
When I go to a market for the first time, I drive around with a dozen different radios. I go through office buildings, I listen in different neighborhoods on different kinds of radios and really try to understand the signal.
The signal is first & foremost; that’s your Distribution. Procter & Gamble knows you can’t buy Tide if you can’t find it on the shelf. It’s all about Distribution.
If you don’t have the best signal in the market, doing too well can be a problem. Because if you do really well on a secondary signal, somebody with a great signal can take your position just because they’re easier to find on the dial. There are dozens of examples of this.
Signal is the most important thing. If they can’t hear you, it’s a problem.
When I was building Jacor and later Clear Channel, I started with transmitter power. I didn’t care if the format was Religion or Polka or whatever. Just give me the biggest transmitter. WLW/Cincinnati was the first radio station I was a part of buying, and it was bankrupt. But I wanted the 50,000-watt transmitter.
It all starts with the signal
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I will be more aware of The Signal. Thanks Dan.
I reread your NOTE and I think I did Violate it a few days ago…I apologize…Can you have King Kong and TarantuLoyd return to base?
I thought I was the only PD that
Traveled all over the coverage area with different radios.
I get really strange looks from office workers as I go from human stall to human stall.(Don’t they look like the little pins in the 4h buildings at fairs)
Just give me a good stick, and I’ll do the rest…
That’s why Randy has done as well as he has. He understands the fundamentals of this game, and realizes that with out a strong foundation, the rest of the equation doesn’t really matter.