McVay Media President Mike McVay

In these rapidly changing times in the radio industry operators need to arm themselves with as much wisdom and fortitude as they can conjure up in order to keep pace. Cost-cutting initiatives are simply not enough. It needs to be balanced with creativity, resourcefulness and pure enthusiasm for your medium. McVay Media President Mike McVay shares his insights on where the industry currently stands and offers some thoughts on what lies ahead and how to improve moving forward. 

by Mark LaSpina

In these rapidly changing times in the radio industry operators need to arm themselves with as much wisdom and fortitude as they can conjure up in order to keep pace. Cost-cutting initiatives are simply not enough. It needs to be balanced with creativity, resourcefulness and pure enthusiasm for your medium. Sometimes an outside perspective is all it takes…enter Mike McVay, the well-respected President of McVay Media, whose firm’s reach spans multi-formats including CHR, AC, Country, Rock Alternative, News/Talk, Sports, Oldies and more. McVay shares his insights on where the industry currently stands and offers some thoughts on what lies ahead and how to improve moving forward.

If you had to give a current state of the business address, how would it go?
We have an amazing inferiority complex among the leaders in our business. Every piece of research you see indicates that radio audiences are still solidly strong, and in some cases, growing. Unfortunately, we belittle our product, to newspapers, of all media outlets. Think about that for a second. We tell newspapers that we’re a shrinking business and that individuals listen to less radio today than ever before, and so on. NEWSPAPERS! They’re the business that’s closing its doors. They compete with us for advertising revenue. We’re telling newspapers that radio is dying. Those folks can’t move their content to the Internet fast enough. Here’s the good news about newspapers “bad mouthing” radio …no one under-40 reads it!
America has too many radio stations. Canada never bought into the “more stations better serves the community” concept, and despite their own economic hardships they’re out-billing U.S. stations on a per capita basis. It would make any CFO grin ear-to-ear. My point is that as broadcasters “slave” stations or combine products, and they will, we’ll see costs come into line and product (content) will improve. I am a strong believer in radio. The folks that whine and continually long for “the good ol’ days” need to go on-line, Google a well known singer/songwriter from way back in the 1970s namedCarly Simon, and listen to the lyrics of the song “Anticipation”…”THESE ARE THE GOOD OL’ DAYS.” Who is to say that we’re not enjoying the best times of media history, right now?

Given today’s current economic condition, how can radio maintain a “glass half-full” mentality?
I am very positive on the situation we’re in, given this economy. McVay Media hasn’t been immune. We’ve had to make painful cuts, too. The question we’ve been suggesting stations ask themselves is “What are you doing to prepare for the recovery?” Phil Zachary, the President of Curtis Media, is the first person I read about making that comment. It’s true. McVay Media is ready for the recovery. Right now there is a total disconnect between ratings and revenue, but when the money comes back, we’re going to be ready to help stations grab great big handfuls of it.
We really aren’t in the worst economic time of the last 100 years. This is a media-generated recession. We started it by exaggerating the seriousness of the situation. Don’t misunderstand what I am saying. We could have had a worldwide financial disaster if the former President hadn’t acted and if Congress didn’t bailout the banks. Fortunately, what they did WORKED. Really! They stopped the banks from letting-down. Everything else, (bailing out the auto industry, etc) is about politics. Suring up the banks that overextended themselves was the responsibility of the government because it was the government that forced the banks to make unsubstantiated loans. There are businesses that are thriving. There are businesses that need customers to continue to stay in business. Find them and sell them advertising.

What are some of the ways radio can better expose and distribute content?
We need to start viewing what we do as “distributing content” and stop thinking of ourselves as “radio people.” The AM, FM, HD2, Internet, Satellite, SMS-Texting, etc, are all distribution outlets. I won’t say the name of the individual, but a well known and high profile broadcaster recently took me to task for our Internet initiative, with Spacial Audio, to help “bailout” the broadcast community by offering free Internet consulting. What we’re involved in is consulting entertainment and advertising/marketing businesses. Radio is an important part of that, but we have evidence that the difference between some stations hitting their 2009 budget or not, will be the Internet. I never knew that the word “broadcasting” was limited to radio. We’ve moved beyond big towers in cow pastures. We all carry personal communicators. The reality of the situation is that the world is closer to the talking wristwatch that Dick Tracy wore than it is to the fashions of that cartoon strip.

What advice would you offer today’s up and coming programmers?
Be a “Content Manager” or a “Brand Manager” versus being a “Program Director.” The job has changed significantly. Understand history so that you can learn from the mistakes of others and work tirelessly to achieve your product goals. The book “The One Minute Sales Person” by Ken Blanchard says, “When I give my customers what they want, I get what I want.” In this case the audience is the customer. When the audience gets what they want, you will get what you want. By the way, don’t inflate your self-worth by thinking that what you’re presenting is science. It is entertainment and information.

Do you sense there is more outsourcing happening within the industry?
I believe we’ll see more stations looking to syndication for their programming. I’m depending on that happening, which is why we now have an Internet division and our own syndication company.

With more and more stations using syndicated radio hosts, what does that mean for the future of developing new talent?
I am betting, financially and with a time commitment, that day-part-long programming is going to be a significant cornerstone of future programming. We’ve recently launched a new company, McVay Syndication LLC, that was created to enable stations to improve their product while cutting costs. If you can decrease overhead, improve the quality of your product and advance your ratings, why wouldn’t you broadcast day-part long programming? Our research shows networks haven’t been in a position this strong since the 1950’s. We’ve been fortunate to be involved with The John Tesh Show since it first moved from a weekend show to a full-length program. The facts don’t lie. In market after market, those stations that carry The John Tesh Show have seen growth and success.
The same can be said for the country formatted Whitney Allen Show, Kid Kraddick’s morning show, Matt & Ramona in the afternoon, Nudge-at-Night, Delilah, Blair Gardner’s After Midnight and more. Talk radio has been using back-to-back syndicated programming for years. Why do we in music radio have a belief that you cannot succeed with back-to-back syndication? The other fact is that, given today’s technology, you can play your own music and use national celebrities as your voice tracked talent.

What does McVay Syndication have up its sleeve in the near future?
We are about to launch, in association with the Elevation Group, a program with John Salley.
John’s the former NBA star who most recently co-hosted for Fox TV on The Best Damn Sports Show …Period. He’s a movie actor, television personality and was formerly the morning talent on The Beat in Los Angeles. He’s an amazing performer whose show is designed modularly to be delivered as 100% talk or to include music. It was created in a fashion that a station can insert music. Can you imagine a station having the ability to choose whether or not they want all talk or a mixture of talk and music? Content Managers (remember … they’re not PD’s anymore) should be more open in their thinking and “check their egos at the door.”

On the new media side, what do you think are the keys to interactive success?
It’s going to sound as if McVay Media is on too many fronts when I tell you we also have a division named McVay New Media.Daniel Anstandig is President of this company and he’s built a great team of aggressive and forward thinking young people. James Thomas, Jessica McVay and Sean Lozensky are the backbone of the team. We also have a number of “sellers and trainers” who are working to educate broadcasters on how to manage content and sell advertising on the marketing vehicle known as the Internet. The most important key for interactive success is to create a dependency whereby users want to visit regularly. That’s it. If you cannot create a sense of dependency, the NEED to be a part of the world social network, you will have a short lifecycle.
McVay New Media is working with Triton Digital as a training resource for them. The people at Triton are amazing. Neal Shore and Mike Agovino, the brains at the top of that company, came from broadcasting and national ad sales. They now own Dial-Global, are involved in representing the company M2O, and a number of other media and marketing businesses. They’ve broken down the walls of the various media and look at communication as a level playing field. I can’t even begin to explain the depth of their strategies as its broken-frame thinking and gibberish to the traditional broadcaster. 

Has extensive consolidation increased the demand for your services?
We’re in a “win some – lose some” situation. Consolidation has cost us some business, but it’s also helped us secure new business. It has forced us to become better operators, too.

What trends do you see for the future?
Consolidation will continue to occur, but within smaller groups. I expect the larger group owners will sell-off those properties that do not fit their corporate financial goals. One of my mentor’s always reminds me that we work as hard on a property in Los Angeles as we do on one in Minot. The difference is the rewards are so much greater in Los Angeles. Syndication is going to become a greater part of the average radio stations daily menu of programming. We’ve been consulting artists and singer/songwriters since 1997 in a division of our company headed by Marty Schwartz. Despite the fighting over music rights, we believe we’ll see a greater alliance with those that create music, even if that does not include traditional record labels. One doesn’t need radio to sell music, but radio certainly accelerates the success of a project and greatly magnifies the amount of music sold. We also expect that most operators will be hiring an iPD (On-Line Content Manager) to work in tandem with the PD (Content Manager) in cross pollination of entertainment programming. Big words for PUTTING ON A SHOW!

What are McVay Media’s strategies for successful radio?
The formula that’s best worked for us is one that focuses on your most beneficial content of the format, whatever that is, and everything else radiates from that center. If you’re a News/Talk station, then you must focus on compelling content that is consistent across all dayparts of your station. Your content must be relevant and your station must connect with the audience in a fashion that makes it a part of the everyday life of the listener. Music radio stations must focus first and foremost on music. The elements of programming are prioritized in this order as follows: information, personality and promotion/marketing. The information element is both what’s inside of the news and what is inside of the air talent’s shift. Personality is exactly that. If personality is one of the attribute’s your station is founded upon, then make the air talent on your station a priority. Stations that lack personalities are most vulnerable to the attack of the iPod. Promotion/Marketing is what you do last, once the product is right-on, in order to introduce your product to listeners and grow your cume.
I am not a fan of Niche formats. Niche formats garner niche ratings, and people act surprised when that happens, and when it comes to ratings, bigger IS better. This is even truer if you’re in a PPM market. Therefore, marketing is important. You cannot “save your way to success.” I also believe that voice-tracking CAN sound live and local. What you get back is greater than what you put in … if you at least make the effort to put something into the product. You cannot wave the white flag of surrender and expect that your station will be victorious.

What’s the biggest misconception about consultants?
That talent should be afraid of us. Obviously, just like there are “bad police”, there are “bad consultants.” However, many of us were on-air talent, so we love to coach on-air entertainers and encourage personalities to perform. Mike McVay doesn’t tell air talent to “shut up.” If I have ever suggested to a talent that they be EFFICIENT, it was that I was suggesting they get to the point. That’s it. We don’t have devils horns under our hair.

**QB Content By Mark LaSpina**