Stiller is one of the lucky few who has been afforded the opportunity to work at the radio station to which he grew up listening: Federated Media’s Active Rocker, WBYR/Ft. Wayne. He joined the staff about three years ago and worked his way up to APD, a position he held for a year. Stiller then became interim PD in May 2007 before being given official PD stripes in September. Though that’s only a short time at the helm, it was enough for him to be voted FMQB’s Most Promising Rock Programmer in our 2007 year-end poll. Therefore, it was time to catch up with the young PD and find out more about what has made The Bear so successful in his short tenure.
With less than a year as PD under your belt, is there anything about the job that has surprised you?
Yes, regardless of whether you’re in radio or working at McDonald’s, the aspect of managing people is hard. When you’re fully responsible for a staff, regardless of whether they’re deejays or clerks at a gas station, they’re still people. It wasn’t something that was surprising as much as it was something I had not really thought about. And therefore, I had to brush up on my people management skills. It’s a busy job and a lot of times you just say, “Look, we need to do this – do it.” You’re in the heat of the battle, but you need to take time out of your schedule to make sure your staff is happy. That’s really important.
What is your programming philosophy for The Bear?
The goal is to win, and to do whatever that takes. My programming philosophy is that we’re not only against radio. We need to program a radio station that is better than some TV shows, better than an iPod or a YouTube video, as well as better than every other radio station in the market. We’re vying against so many things for people’s time that you’ve got to think outside of radio. We’re up against all forms of media and it’s a level playing field. My philosophy is to be nice to everyone, from sales people to listeners to co-workers to bands. We have cool jobs. We’re still in the people business and that will never change.
How much of your programming is gut and how much is research, chart numbers, sales figures, etc?
It depends on how much music is out there. If we’re swimming in a sea of good music and core bands for the format, or core bands to this radio station specifically, then it doesn’t take any gut. But there are times, in the slow times, that that’s pretty much all it is. Especially like January when we’re fishing and going through all the indie bands and the baby bands and looking to see which one we might be able to help in the development process. We do use research; we have Web-based research weekly. We take it into every single music meeting and we do acknowledge it. Unfortunately SoundScan doesn’t have a report for just Ft. Wayne so I don’t rely much on that, but I talk to our local retailer, which has four stores here, to see what’s selling in their Top 10.
Are there any stations or PDs that you mode yourself after?
I look up to anyone who is still doing it successfully and has had the ability to change and still stay on top. The people I model myself after are the PDs that I’ve worked for. I’ve been fortunate, and I’m thankful for the people who have taught me along the way. I take the best qualities out of them, and kind of push them together to fit me. One is Ken Wall who now programs the Alternative in Tulsa. Corey Dietz was my first PD, and Cindy Miller taught me a lot. I’ve gotten a lot from all three of those. But things change so fast that you’ve got to stay flexible. I don’t even model myself after what I was doing two years ago, and I hope I never get like that. If I do get too set in my ways it will be a tougher road for me.
On the flip side of that, you are part of a younger generation of PDs. Is there anything that you perceive as an “old school” way of programming that you think needs to change?
The two things that stick out are, in this format particularly, the fake radio voice. I hated that. I understand it for its purpose back then, but now, people want reality; they don’t want fake people. For the most part that problem has been addressed at all the radio stations nationally that I listen to when I’m streaming. The other thing is the “less is more” philosophy. I’m not saying cut out personalities, but listeners are getting hit from every angle, from billboards to online advertising to commercials on this radio station. We tell our jocks to develop a personality, but don’t feel like you have to hit a homerun every break. In the ’80s and ’90s it seemed like that’s what turned people off from radio, and that was before the Internet and satellite existed. Jocks just talked too much about things that didn’t matter. I am of the ilk that people can get their music elsewhere, but that’s still the biggest piece of the pie on the radio. People come to your radio station for music, even though they can get it on their iPod, because iPods don’t tell them what’s new every week. We have that angle. But I do buy into the “less is more” philosophy without completely cutting out personality. I think there’s a balance.
The one last thing I would like to see completely gone is any strain of thought that you don’t need a full-time Web administrator for your site. I’m guilty as well – it still gets pushed back from time to time in my day-to-day duties. And it’s just that important; it’s not even an option. To me, updating the Web should be equal to doing production. Every air check, I check the jock page to make sure there’s updated content, and that’s helped out tremendously. It’s just a no-brainer. Everybody is online, and now we’re responsible for entertaining and informing on the Web under the same content rules that we try to go by when show prepping.
What are you doing with your Web site that is vital to listeners?
Video is definitely number one. The main thing I look for is: Can you cross reference something from your show and get it on the Web site? That gives us an opportunity to go from being a straight audio medium to a visual medium. Maybe not simultaneously, but nonetheless, if I’m talking about a guy who has seven heads that was born in India, now instead of just saying it, we also have the ability to put that picture of the guy with seven heads on our Web page. Then you stay consistent via your personal jock page. Before you would have to get that picture from CNN or hope to catch it on the news. Now they can come to us for that, so you should mirror your jock page as much as possible with your on-air content. Also, the staff is all on MySpace. Two years ago we all did MySpace pages and we looked at it as a free online billboard. There was no investment from the company or budget or anything like that, obviously. I recently added up all the views from MySpace that everybody on the staff and the radio station’s MySpace site has, and it was like 250,000. Over the past couple of years, that is a huge success and a way to capitalize on a tool that just fell into radio’s lap.
Since you do the midday airshift on top of programming duties, what is your secret to time management?
It’s organization front and back, and the use of as much technology as you can. The two best tools for me have been calendars, and I have three-day-planners: one central, one for promotions, and one for appearances. With time as short and as crunched as it is, you’ve got to stay focused. Then, a laptop is a necessity since there are things I’ve got to do at home. I rely as much on technology as I can. Also, I voicetrack most days from 10 a.m. to noon. It’s tough, but my personal philosophy is that if you have to use voicetracking, it’s better to voicetrack middays on a Rock station than nights.
Rock music tends to ebb and flow. Do you feel like the genre is in an upswing right now, or a lull?
I think it’s been solid for years. There’s always stuff out there, and it’s only getting stronger. You have to search at times – you have to look a little bit deeper to find what you’re looking for. I’m fortunate that I’m with a company and surrounded by people that give us the ability to go with something musically if we find it. I was at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame a couple of weeks ago and they had a Doors exhibit, and they had a radio interview with Jim Morrison. They asked him about the state of Rock & Roll back then, and he was saying Rock’s been dead for years. So there’s always going to be people saying that, and I don’t agree with that. For us to sit here in 2008 and think back – he said Rock was dead then, and then all of a sudden here comes Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, AC/DC. The bottom line is, it’s more of a frame of mind than a true situation. There’s always good Rock music out there, and there’s always the next band, and there’s always people working to make sure that those people get seen and heard.
What newer bands are you excited about right now?
Sixx:A.M. was a bit of a surprise to me. The reaction has been really large. I like those guys a lot.Avenged Sevenfold has a chance to stick around. Hurt – I really hope that things work out for them. They’re unique, they’re very good live, they’re a complete package. Egypt Central – I like those guys a lot. They’ve worked for us here extremely well. We’ve had three songs from them test Top 5.
What is the best way for a promo person to work you on a record?
The best way is e-mail. I love conversations, but they’re just as busy as we are. You can play phone tag for a month, and then what’s accomplished? Nothing, even though we’ve tried to touch base. There are certain reps that send out e-mail updates weekly. I read every single one of those, and I’ve actually adopted that theory to doing that with my staff. It’s such a good way to keep me completely informed, all in one place, on all your music, one time a week. And that way, we don’t miss each other while playing phone tag. It’s not that I never want to talk to them, because that’s not true. But too many times in the past year I have played phone tag for a month, and then we both lose. I do the same thing with my staff on a weekly basis. It’s amazing what two or three paragraphs in an e-mail can clear up. It keeps everybody focused on the common goals that week.
If you could change a few things about the record/radio relationship, what would they be?
All this paperwork is ridiculous. I know it sucks for them too, but I can’t even keep up on the paperwork. I know it’s no fun for anyone. It seems like it stifles a lot of ideas before they even get off the ground, because it’s such a busy world nowadays for everyone that it can instantly stall something before it has a chance to work. Good opportunities to tie-in bands and station events and promotions are lost.
Otherwise, I like the record/radio relationship. I just wish everyone had a little more time. There are a lot of interesting people on both sides of that coin, and fun people to talk to whether it is about radio and records or about their last vacation. But developing relationships is a little tougher and takes a lot longer than it did five years ago, because we’ve both got five minutes to talk, so you’ve got to talk shop.
** QB Content by Mandy Feingold **
