This week, we've got six great, new ideas for you that can help you get engaging content on air fast.
Each of these ideas is designed to get your listeners talking, and each one offers the added benefits of creating powerful recall for your station and generating terrific social networking applications:
All have a track record.
All work in the morning show (and/or across the workday).
All are easy to execute!
#1 - THE WORLD'S FASTEST GRANNY
Anytime you do something new on air with 'old folks' or kids, it will get a reaction. "World's Fastest Granny" is a morning show stunt you could execute as part of a major event in your market, but it can also be simpler as a stand alone using 'mobility scooters.'
In its major event form, RET 2fm of County Kildare in Ireland had a tremendous success with this stunt in November of last year. Soliciting names on air during its "Breakfast with Hector" morning show, the station was inundated with nominations of grandmothers from all over the country to take part in a Grand Prix event that was staffed with instructors from the nearby Mondello Park Racing School. These instructors worked with each of the ten granny finalists before they competed against one another for the title "Fastest Granny In Ireland."
When all was said and done, the three fastest grannies had posted times that their professional tutors from the racing school would have been proud to post themselves, and the winning granny was only two seconds behind the time posted by the fastest instructor!
#2 - A "WIND UP" TO RIP OFF
Even if you are not "famous" for these, here's a great "wind up" angle from SAFM, in Australia.
In this case, the wind up comes in the form of a "gotcha" call that SAFM presenter, Rabbit, made on air with Carly Ray Jepsen in studio using the lyrics to her song "Call Me Maybe," but the possibilites in terms of what you might do on your station are practically endless. To listen to Rabbit's gotcha call with an unsuspecting guy who hires out wishing wells in Australia, just click the play button immediatley below.
#3 - MOTHER OF THE YEAR.......of the week
For Hot AC's, AC's or even Gold Stations, this is a great weekly tactic. Listeners nominate their mothers and explain why they feel that their Moms deserve to win the weekly award of "Mother of the Year."
There are any number of individual slants your station can put on the contest, but here's a twist that Mix 101 in Australia put on the contest via the "Chrissie & Yumi 3PM Pick-Up" page on its website:
Being a mum is tough and we all deserve a medal or trophy or an award for the things we do on a daily basis, but here at the 3pm Pick-Up we want to acknowledge our shortcomings. Those times where we may not have gotten it right but we made it through the day.
We want to celebrate those mothers that are trying their best but get it wrong from time to time!
Tell us your stories ...
#4 - WHAT'S IN THE BOX?
The idea here is quite simple - put a prize in a gift box, wrap it, and then allow your listeneres to "shake" the box by playing back a recording of it being shaken so that they can guess what is in the box from listening and from other clues that you give them (i.e. size and weight etc.). Drive listeners to your website, and run additional clues via other forms of Social Networking.
Click here to see an example of how one station is running this promo, or click the play button below to hear one of the sounds heard by station listeners.
#5 - THE FACE
This idea is very short and sweet, but it can be a great, web driven morning show campaign. Forget The Voice (or use this as a spin on The Voice for your morning show) ... the idea is, can you guess who is the best singer on looks alone????
#6 - A PET PSYCHIC
Here's another very simple idea that can get your listeners engaged with your station and talking about your morning show for weeks to come. See if you can find a pet psychic in your market, and then sit back and have fun getting your listeners to call in so that the psychic can speak with them and their pets ... and, of course, to "channel" our dearly departed pets!