Still Hope For Terrestrial Radio

Few radio stations will ever come close to the kind of numbers and audience loyalty that WBHJ/95.7 Jamz in Birmingham has -- #1 or 2 12+ for about 11 years; #1 18-34 for 24 straight books; #2 or #3 25-54 for 22 straight books ... which is decent, I guess...

They've pretty much found an equation that combines three elements into a juggernaut of ridiculous proportions.

1. They're fun. They do stupid stuff. They don't take themselves seriously. I can name six April Fool's bits that they've done that are better then anything most stations have ever done

2. Their contesting, whether it's weekend or ratings contests, is always great. No cookie-cutter stuff. No Secret Sounds or Birthday Games. Jaw-dropping stuff. Only possibly Jamz in Phoenix will have a better Spring promotion. I ran their bit past a dozen stations; 11 said "No, we can't do that" and came up with lame, bogus excuses. Birmingham is going to do it and it will be HUGE.

3. Except for WPGC when Jay Stevens was running it, no station in radio is more tapped into their community. Period. They don't have listeners. They have fans. Try beating a station that has fans. You can't.

Chris Patterson, the Promotions Coordinator, came up with an idea last year called Jamz Corps, a monthly event with legions of listeners volunteering to go out and do a project. The first couple were paid for out of the Promotion Director's pocket. They now get $300 a month from McDonald's and $300 a month from Home Depot. Other clients pony up and donate needed materials.

They've cleaned up projects. Cleaned up parks. One afternoon, with 150 volunteers, they landscaped, painted, fixed, cleaned and re-habbed a school in a pretty sketchy neighborhood. I have pictures if you'd like to see them.

They got listeners participating. Not just using them as background music in a car. When you can get listeners to actually get off their butts and help (not call a radiothon), you are in the upper 1% of radio. A f***ing iPod can't do this. XM can't do this.

Q102 in Philly used to do something similar when the Parks Department got a budgetarial gutting. Every couple of weeks they'd go out with listeners and clean up a playground, paint the courts, put up new hoops, fix the fencing ...

It's hard to beat a station that's tapped into the community. STEAL THIS BIT.