Monday Memo: You Will Save the Aircheck
By Holland Cooke
Consultant
May the Fourth be with you today, as DJs and talk hosts are bumping with Star Wars music. And with Mother’s Day looming, here’s a tune that can be a wake-up call for forgetful listeners this Friday and Saturday – and a topic for Sunday’s show if you’re live-N-local then.
Got a mom in your family? Make a fuss. She earns it, every day. And if your mom has passed, I suspect that you have found – as my brothers and sisters and I have – that she never really leaves you. And THAT is a call-in/text-in topic that always clicks: “The best advice she ever gave you?”
You will hear stories. Some are so laugh-out-loud familiar that you may finish the caller’s sentence. Other callers’ tearful reminiscences will hit a nerve.
Emotion drives engagement. The most shared moments aren’t the clever bits that jingle-out. They’re the ones that connect. When listeners hear someone choke up talking about Mom’s advice, they lean in. That’s the magic of radio: real people, real time. Whether it’s “Star Wars Day” or “Mother’s Day,” what keeps radio relevant is what keeps it human: shared moments that make listeners feel seen.
And set a reminder now: Same bit for (and approaching) Father’s Day, June 21 this year.
Holland Cooke is a consultant working the intersection of broadcasting and the Internet. Follow HC on Twitter @HollandCooke and connect on LinkedIn
To quote a radio friend, “Some talk show hosts think the news of the day only exists to serve up interesting fodder for their shows.” Many media practitioners, whose jobs encompass letting their audiences know about the pain and suffering of “others,” feel personally exempt from experiencing a connection to the talking points of poverty, ignorance, violence, and injustice that they eagerly collect (and even welcome) as fresh “content” for their platforms. It’s all just “material” to them.
Stations I work with are confronting a generational revenue issue: Local direct retail business owners who are Baby Boomers are retiring. And their heirs are moving the radio dollars that built their parents’ businesses to search engine optimization and elsewhere-digital. The narrative we present them: “Radio is ‘a reach engine’” for the digital content people their age personally favor. In this mode, the station feels less like “your father’s Oldsmobile;” and more present tense. Many of these next-generation businesspeople are avid podcast listeners, and that presents an opportunity.
TALKERS magazine associate publisher) Matthew B. Harrison, a work designed for today’s news/talk media environment where audio, video, screenshots, and quotes are not just supporting elements – but serve as the actual content itself. This technique has become particularly prevalent on YouTube and even cable news/talk TV but increasingly appears in audio form as what used to be called “actualities” – sound from another source.
book explains the legal concept of fair use not as a permission structure, but as a legal defense raised after copying has already occurred – an uncomfortable but essential distinction that underpins the entire analysis.
My notes from a real useful session with Amazon’s Andy Slater, Audacy’s Michael Biemolt, and YouTube’s Neha Taleja, moderated by WTOP’S John Wardock.
with the station across town anymore. It’s competing with 50,000 news brands, nearly half a million podcasts, and an infinite scroll of feeds that never sleep.
As a newly minted program director (remember them?), I found the 1980 “NAB Radio Programming Conference” downright enchanting. New-tech cart machines (remember them?) would FIND the splice! And after the cart played, a flashing light saved careless DJs from accidentally playing it again.
In a 
Time Spent Listening to podcasts has now surpassed TSL with spoken word radio. And both are fraught.
The rise of independent, talk show-style political commentary on YouTube has created a new class of media actors who do not see themselves as broadcasters, journalists, or publishers. They see themselves as creators. That distinction is real in terms of identity, tone, and platform. It is not real where it matters most: liability.
Assessing the hourly threat to the very existence of the medium of radio is a popular hobby among conventioneers. The audience levels for radio are astonishingly constant since 1970, but according to “radio people,” they are living at the edge of a volcano. Spotify radio, SiriusXM radio, Pandora radio, TuneIn radio, Internet radio, there are all kinds of radio! General Motors wants to throw AM/FM radio out of the car as in “do you really need radio in the car?” Radio’s response to the in-car-removal threat is by promising non-stop typhoons and hurricanes.
In “
In 1952, the success formula for today’s radio was discovered and put into practice by two hungry entrepreneurs: Todd Storz and Gordon McLendon. Both men owned dying radio stations in medium and major markets. The industry was suffering from a lack of purpose or solutions due to the advent of television which drove the migration of hit network radio shows to television. Lucille Ball, Bob Hope, and Gertrude Berg were on radio first.
Good News/Bad News: Fender‑benders, slip‑and‑falls, and other “injuries caused by the negligent, careless, or reckless actions of others” will always happen. That’s the good news…for personal injury attorneys. Their bad news is that supply WAY-exceeds demand, and their advertising reflects it.
In ongoing discussions about the dwindling relevance of radio in the modern world, the medium is grudgingly defended as a reliable “first responder” during times of public emergencies.
of modern-day media Sterno.
The recent shutdown of CBS News Radio isn’t just another media headline – it’s a wake-up call. A clear example of what happens when decisions about our information, our communities, and our voices are made in corporate boardrooms disconnected from real life.
If you work in radio, you’ve heard every flavor of AI anxiety. Some fear it will wipe out jobs. Others treat it like a super shortcut – cranking-out spots, promos, and proposals faster and cheaper. Kate O’Neill’s 
Let’s start with what NOT to do, The 7 Deadly Sins Of Small Business Advertising:
Small businesses often underestimate their greatest competitive edge. It’s not price. It’s not selection.
Unless you live in Hawaii and Arizona (except the Navajo Nation) or American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, your clocks will change when we “Spring Forward” on Sunday 3/8.
Talk radio has a long incredibly successful run of shows about sex.
AI is now embedded in the modern newsroom. Not as a headline, not as a novelty, but as infrastructure. It drafts outlines, summarizes complex reporting, surfaces background details, and accelerates prep for live conversations. For media creators operating under relentless deadlines, that efficiency is not theoretical. It is practical and daily.
Your prospect – or, worse, an existing advertiser with cold feet – says “We tried radio. It didn’t work.” Often, the copy is the culprit, because it’s inside-out.
If you work in radio, you’ve heard every flavor of AI anxiety. Some fear it will wipe out jobs. Others treat it like a super shortcut – cranking-out spots, promos, and proposals faster and cheaper. Kate O’Neill’s “
radio industry (and its related fields) seeks to connect with and develop a next generation of professional practitioners as well as engaged audiences. TALKERS is honored to again provide financial support, encouragement, experience, and advice to the dedicated organizers of this very special event.
I am pleased to be speaking this weekend at the IBS New York 2026 conference in New York City. Thank you, TALKERS magazine, for being the presenting sponsor of this important, timely annual event along with the Intercollegiate Broadcasting System (IBS).
