Imaging

What we do between the songs and out of the spot breaks is one of the clear identifiers of our product.   Without it we are often just a limited collection of songs spinning around with perfect turnovers perhaps researched in the market or maybe drawn from a national safe list.

So often we just focus on our position - The Rock Station or Classic Rock for .... or Real Rock.  Then we let the creativity roll with lots of zaps, zings, and maybe a few clips or music hooks with the big voice.

In recent years with the advent of PPM and we got to see the quick trigger finger of the audience many stations went on an imaging diet scared that anything over 5 seconds was a tune out.  

We also often get pretty lofty with our claims and no doubt the BS indicator in the audience is at def con 5.

While the creativity and honesty is a big tactical issue in our imaging we also have to take a long look at the strategic side.  What are we really promoting - what are we really impressing on the audience?  What do we really want them to remember about our product and more importantly what actions do we want them to retain?  

No doubt you have a pretty long list of actions for them to increase their time spent with the station as well as the overall image you project to them.   Maybe you want to highlight your longer music sets, get them to listen more at night, listen more on the weekends, or keep your hot morning show in front of them and the competition.  Or maybe you want to use this time to build your position in the community or get more on the job listening.  

Do you have a real plan here or just a bunch of audio files spinning around in your studio system?  How much control do you really have over the plan?