By Holland Cooke
Consultant
Remember the old Gatorade commercial? The “Be like Mike” jingle accompanied a montage of gravity-defying Michael Jordan dunks.
If you’ve heard Mike Hulvey speak, you know his birthday and blood type, because he told you, in his enthused trademark close: “March 4th and B positive!”
Before he recently hit-the-ground-running as Radio Advertising Bureau CEO and president, Mike was my longtime client when he ran Neuhoff Media. I consulted his news/talk/sports WSOY, Decatur and trained news people at other stations in the group. And the company’s “Media Made Locally” mantra was more than a slogan: “Nothing makes us happier than knowing that while our big corporate competitors are abandoning all the things we think make local media special – we’re doubling down.”
With broadcasters now so challenged by non-AM/FM audio competitors – and coping with cost cuts – the “Core Values” that clicked in these small Midwest markets seem like a prescription for stations everywhere:
1. Grit: “Stick with it.”
2. Community: “Give back.”
3. Innovation: “Think different.”
4. Excellence: “Be exceptional.”
In too many places now, a legacy call letter station is referred to as “the AM” within multi-station clusters and is bundled with music stations’ inventory… not the best sales model in Mike’s estimation: “The news/talk format offers endless opportunities to local clients.” Offered properly, these stations have “unique attributes and programming that lend itself to customize sponsorship and marketing extensions in any size market;” with otherwise “hidden gems that create opportunities for naming rights inside local sports and benchmark sponsorships as the local expert,” creating what he calls “lean-in listening that benefits advertisers.”
Live-N-local 24/7 seems quaint now, so we leverage imported programming, to make it sound more like part of the station’s own on-air family, rather than sounding like we’re an affiliate plugged-into the bird. The day Mike first introduced me at WSOY, I told the morning host: “We’ve got to get your voice in Rush Limbaugh and the Cardinals games more.”
Back to the future: With Monday-Friday syndicated talk programming mostly political, I asked Mike, “Could the sort of non-political shows that were such weekday winners for the late-great KGO and Buckley-owned WOR make a comeback?” His take: “I say yes. I believe that great locally targeted content is still a winning formula of success. While we as consumers have more choices than ever, we still crave information about where we live, work, and raise our families. While national political content has a very loud voice in the market, listeners appreciate those locally ‘world famous’ voices from where they live.”
Evidence, from the vault: 2-minute video, Mike explaining how winning radio is a relationship: https://youtu.be/wcsqrN7R7Ic
Holland Cooke (HollandCooke.com) is a consultant working the intersection of broadcasting and the Internet. He is the author of “The Local Radio Advantage: Your 4-Week Tune-In Tune-Up” and “Close Like Crazy: Local Direct Leads, Pitches & Specs That Earned the Benjamins” and “Confidential: Negotiation Checklist for Weekend Talk Radio.” Follow HC on Twitter @HollandCooke and connect on LinkedIn.