The talk host was extremely frustrated.  He had recently done what he and his team thought was four great hours on the Chinese Tiger Mom topic.  The show seemed to have it all – lots of great calls, tons of emotion, several different angles on parenting, and great forward momentum.

“We were all high-fiving at the end of the show,” says the host.

Alas, when the PPM data arrived, those four hours were among the host’s lowest rated of the week.  Compounding the host’s frustration, another topic from that week – Do you let your dog sleep with you? –  scored both his highest and lowest ratings of the week – during the same hour.

“So, what am I supposed to learn from this?” asks the host. “I know that getting a lot of calls doesn’t mean lots of listeners, but this sure sounded like a great show.”

We’ll answer the host’s plaintive cry in just a minute.  But the big lesson here is for Program Directors. As Arbitron itself preaches, the real value of PPM data is its ability to identify patterns.  One-time topics really can’t be judged accurately in PPM because the results are based on an unreliably small sample of meters.  Thus, programmers probably should not share PPM results on such segments with the talent.

On-going topics, on the other hand, can be effectively analyzed with PPM.  A major market PD offers this great example.  His radio spider-sense told him that listeners weren’t all that interested in the subject of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.  So, he tracked the PPM results from numerous Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell segments across several weeks and various shows. (This is why it’s important to keep a PPM diary of topics, guests, et cetera).  Sure enough, those segments significantly under-performed.  The PD shared those results with his air staff, and they dropped the topic.

Now, about that Tiger Mom topic.  Why did it fare so poorly?  That’s hard to say without hearing the show.  Maybe the topic was at odds with the station/show brand.  If listeners come to the station for political talk, a parenting topic might have been a turn-off.  Maybe listeners were tired of hearing about Tiger Mom, whose story had been all over the media for days.  Who knows?   As for why the dog story did so well and so poorly, again, that’s hard to know.  Maybe the segment went too long.  Maybe listeners liked the set-up and hated the calls.

This case study does raise the question of how much time should be devoted to any one topic.  I’ve always believed length should be organic – the conversation should last as long as the topic is unfolding in a compelling way, whether that was three minutes or three hours.  But this example demonstrates just how much is at risk when a host devotes an entire show to one topic.

Here’s a good critical summary of the Wilson/Blade kerfuffle from the Toledo Free Press.

He could hold an audience.

What made the historical Jesus of Nazareth stand out among the itinerate preachers working Galilee back in the day?  It was more than his message.  Jesus was a magnificent communicator with a gift for connecting with and engaging his chosen audience, according to theologians and historians interviewed for the Frontline documentary “From Jesus to Christ.”

Jesus focused his ministry on the rural farm population. Every parable and metaphor he used was based on that audience’s daily experience of scratching out a living from the soil.  His acolytes were equally adept at making this connection.  As Harvard Divinity School Professor Allen Callahan notes, the story of the loaves and fishes is one of the few Jesus stories that makes all four Gospels.  “I don’t think it takes rocket science to figure out why that story is so endearing to poor people. That’s dinner and a show.”

Jesus’ ability to engage the audience is demonstrated by the parable of the mustard seed.  “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches.” 
Religious scholar and former priest John Dominic Crossan notes that Jesus was thus comparing the Kingdom to a huge weed that is toxic to some animals – a plant that farmers try to contain.   Why not compare the Kingdom to the noble Cedar of Lebanon?  Because, says Crossan, that’s exactly what the audience expected to hear.  The mustard analogy, on the other hand, got audiences thinking and talking to each other — and to Jesus.

Even talkers who don’t have a message of eternal salvation can learn something from Jesus’ technique.  Are you speaking in terms your audience can relate to?  Does your presentation make them think and react?  Or are you just another predictable itinerate host wandering the radio countryside?

This article first appeared in my News Talk Edge newsletter.  Subscribe for free HERE.

A couple examples:

- We continue to insist that actualities are critical to newscasts.  But are they, really?  Soundbites from politicians, city officials, witnesses, et al, seldom add to the listener’s understanding of the story, and take up time that might be better used to deliver another item.  Remember, Paul Harvey never used sound.

-  Given what we’ve learned from PPM about listener tune-in, should every talk radio station in the market present news at the top and bottom?  How about, oh, say, 20and 5o?

- Is our story selection up to snuff?  How many stories still get done just because the anchor’s mind was strapped into a straightjacket by a journalism school teacher who hasn’t been in a radio station since 1979?  (Answer: Way too many.)

With radio in survival mode, it’s not realistic to expect the issue of newscast quality to get much industry-wide attention.  But listen to your own station’s newscasts over the next few days with fresh ears and I bet you hear at least a couple things that could use a re-think.

Doug McIntyre

Red Eye Radio host Doug McIntyre gets my nod for Most Insightful Speaker at this year’s Talkers New Media Seminar.  During a panel discussion about the challenges facing talk radio, McIntyre said:

“I’ve always thought of doing talk radio as an actor doing Shakespeare.  We all have the same words to work with, so the difference between a good performance and a bad performance is what the host brings to those words.”

How true.  Every host (general topic or sports) wakes up to the same pile of stories and issues.  The best hosts filter that material through the prism of their own worldview, life experience, emotion and talent.  The most intriguing prisms result in the most intriguing shows.

Too many hosts today are coasting on the content.  They focus on predictable story angles, take ridiculously obvious positions, crib from Rush and deliver shows no more compelling or thought-provoking than a political conversation with your neighbor the opinionated corporate accountant.

Some of these hosts probably just aren’t very interesting people — that’s going to happen when you keep cutting the budget line for “talent.”  Others maybe haven’t been coached on how to tap into their true selves.

Whatever the reason, we’re putting on too many weak performances in the talk radio theatre.

Newstalk 106-108

“Exclusive content podcasts allow the client to have exactly what they want, i.e. their own show,”  says Newstalk Sales Director  Cera Ward. “We tend not to give them full editorial control, however, they are happy their sports coverage will not be interrupted by any other topics, ads or promos.”

The podcasts are hosted by members of the Newstalk 106-108 sports staff along with prominent analysts from other media outlets.  Ward says the big-name commentators add credibility and boost client demand. The podcasts contain unique content that never airs on the radio station. The Heineken podcast was a preview of rugby’s Heineken Cup. The Ford podcast focused on soccer’s Champions League.

Does anybody listen?  Seems so.  According to Ward, Newstalk’s Champions League podcast is currently #2 overall on iTunes in Ireland — #1 in the sports category.

Key Point: These podcasts were not added-value.  They were sold as stand-alone products in a package that included a modest number of on-air promotional mentions. Another Key Point: Newstalk staffers get paid to produce the podcasts.

Ward says sports appears to be the most salable podcast content. She sees Ireland’s legal betting parlors as her next big prospect.  Podcasts, she explains, allow the oddsmakers sponsor sports content while avoiding the restrictions placed on their broadcast advertising by the Broadcast Authority of Ireland.

Give tremendous credit to Talkers publisher Michael Harrison. Despite the weak economy and radio’s on-going woes, this weekend’s event drew a sell-out crowd of syndicators, programmers, producers, hosts and aspiring hosts to New York City from as far away as the West Coast. Indeed, the crowd was so big that some events were shoulder-to-shoulder SRO.

The mood was… interesting.  I picked up notes of uncertainty, optimism, resignation, weariness, determination and a hint of sadness at the complete realization that the Old Ways truly are dead or dying; that radio has changed forever — for worse and maybe, one day, for better. In his opening remarks Harrison told the assembled that he’s not yet committed to a 2011 New Media Seminar. The day of the “big radio convention” may be over, he said.  And unlike last year’s event, where there was a lot of rah-rah about the Glorious Future awaiting audio content creators just around the corner on the Internet, this year’s attendees and speakers seemed a bit more subdued on that topic, acknowledging that it will likely be quite some time before there’s serious digital dough to be made.  Again, Harrison summed it up best, saying that Talk is in the middle of an uncertain voyage between its present and future.

There was a bit of good news about the near-term future.  A panel of PDs and consultants predicted a small increase in talk jobs in 2010.  Nobody thinks laid-off hosts will be re-hired in droves, but there are some new opportunities cropping up around the dial thanks to the current sport-radio boom and the rise of FM talk.  The syndicators say their ad sales are picking up nicely and most of the station-level folks reported that things are certainly better than they were just a few months ago.

As always, the best part of the NMS was the people; being reminded how many smart, funny, talented, caring men and women work in this business — both on-air and off.  I cherish every minute with them.  That’s why I stay up waaaay too late at these confabs.  If Michael Harrison takes a pass in 2011, maybe I’ll have the industry over to my house.  Hey, we’ve got a pool — and working air conditioning.

Michael’s list of forbidden words is designed to make WGN’s newscasts more conversational and PPM friendly.  Honestly, there isn’t much new here.  Anyone who worked in a Clear Channel talk radio newsroom during the Michaels-Gabe Hobbs era, knows this list by heart. (I certainly do.)

I give Michaels’ list my highest rating: Read It and Heed It.

Thanks to Tom Taylor at Taylor on Radio for the heads-up on this story.

Claire Byrne: Troublemaker

American broadcasters justifiably complain and fret about the FCC’s content regulation. But here’s a reminder that it could be worse.  A lot worse. Dublin-based  Newstalk 106-108 was recently censured by Ireland’s version of the FCC because morning co-host Claire Byrne called spinster singing sensation Susan Boyle “a freak” and “not right in the head.”   The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland called the comments “inherently offensive,” “disrespectful” and (my favorite) “not editorially supported.”

Newstalk was also found guilty of hosting a “one-sided” panel discussion on an issue related to Ireland’s role in the European Union.  While the station faces no fines or other immediate consequences as a result of the BAI censures, such actions no doubt have a chilling affect on the already mild version of talk radio practiced on the Emerald Isle.

On the flip side, a Newstalk guest recently let loose a full-throated “Bullshit!” in the middle of the broadcast day, and I’m told that incident will likely bring no grief to the station.

So, they have that going for them.