Media Production 1 Flashcards
Call letters
Legal name of the station.
- 4 letters
- Canadian Stations assigned CF, CH, CJ, CK
- must broadcast call letters every hour
Format
The kind of content or music played by a radio station
Station ID
A voice with sound or music underneath.
Ex) You’re listening to Hot 103.1.
Splitters
Short “bits” or announcements between radio segments.
- Includes Personality Splitters (free reign to do whatever you like, as long as it’s appropriate for radio)
- About 15 seconds long
- Mentions the name of the station
- Fits with the brand/format
Canadian station owners
- Bell Media
- The Jim Pattison Broadcast Group
- Golden West
- Evanov Radio Group
- Corus
- Rogers
What is CRTC and what does it do?
Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications
• Regulates all radio and TV broadcasting in Canada
• Covers cell phones, cable, internet
• Creates and enforces rules (ex: how much Canadian content a station must play)
• Governs station formats
• Approves format changes through licensing
Numeris
• Measures listenership
o Portable People Meter (PPM)
o Diaries (logging which stations you listen to over the course of 2 months)
• Age, gender, income, shopping habits, occupation, etc.
• Sample small portions of populations
Radio management jobs
- General manager
- Program director
- Assistant program director
- Music director
- Sales manager
- Promotions director
General manager
In charge of the whole building and all stations within.
Program director
Runs one station in the group.
• Hires + fires staff
•Does performance reviews and air checks
•Makes programming decisions.
Assistant program director
Assists the Programs Director. Sometimes in charge of small stations.
Music director
Chooses the programs and music for the station. Is an on-air host.
Sales manager
In charge of the sales department.
Promotions director
Runs promotions, contests, etc
Sales
Sells advertising space for all stations in building
- Cultivates and maintains positive client relationships
- Serves as a go-between for client and creative
- Commission-based wage
- Sells space on station websites as part of package deals
Production
Records, edits, and produces audio
• Ads, promos, splitters, IDs, bumpers, returns
Creative
Writes all ads produced for station group • News, weather, traffic tags • Copywriters • Produce 8-10 scripts a day • Web ads
Traffic
This person “traffics” finished ads to their assigned placements on air
• Uses a computer program called Wide Orbit
• Coordinates between creative, sales, and client to ensure ads play at right times
Promotions
Plans and executes contests, live remotes, and related events
• “Street team”
• Writes proposals to clients asking for contest prizes in exchange for sponsorships and ads
Web
Creates and manages content for station websites
• Designs station creative (ex: billboards)
• Video production
• Web design, content management systems, coding
News + Sports
More common at news/talk stations
• Compile and read hourly
• Reporters go out to gather info/interviews/clips
On-Air Host
Performs quick “talk breaks” in between music
• Talk shows on variety of topics
• Usually 4-hour shifts
• Preps content, voices ads, appears at promo events
• Most public employee of the station
Why do stations flip formats?
- Low-rated stations have limited shelf-life (must become profitable within 2 years)
- Formats lose popularity over time (ex: the many changes of 94.3)
- Changes in management/ownership
Media speak
- Reach: how many people are exposed to a medium
- Frequency: how often people are exposed to a medium
- Effective reach and frequency: increasing exposures – is it working?
- Marketing and media measures: brand loyalty/brand share
- Scheduling
How do they price radio stations?
Reach x Frequency = Gross Rating Point
Edit suites
- Unidirectional microphone that only picks up sound from one direction
- Best possible sound quality
- Allows you to record as much as needed
The field
- Background noise/no control
- Crowded/stressful
- Venue likely not ideal for recording sound
- Often can’t have someone repeat themselves
Why use real sound?
- Brings listener into environment
- Lends authenticity to your piece
- Tells story through nat sound
- Tells story through others (clips)
Clip
Quote for radio – audio of a person answering a question. Usually cut from a longer interview recorded in the field.
• 10-20 seconds
• Can lend emotion
• Relevant/interesting
• Brings something new to story
• Identify the speaker right before or right after the clip
Nat sound
Natural sound recorded in the field. Must identify sound immediately after playing it on the radio.
Gonzo journalism
- Form of reporter immersion
- Story is told from perspective of reporter
- Doesn’t need to be objective
- Accurately relate an event or experience
- Personality is as important as story itself
Board Opping
- Radio stations have employees called “Board Ops”
- Using sliders on the mixing board to mix voice, music, and SFX
- Playing sound files over host’s voice
- Answers phones and puts calls to air
- Mixes “by ear” while elements play
- Plays songs that relate to content
Who listens to radio?
- 27.4 million (ages 12+)
- 87% (radio’s weekly reach)
- 49% male, 51% female
Gugliemo Marconi
- First to achieve radio transmission at Signal Hill in Newfoundland
- Won Nobel Prize for his work in the field
War of the Worlds
- Broadcast Oct. 30, 1938 from CBS Studios in NYC
- Directed by Orson Wells
- 1st 30 mins structured as a series of news bulletins
- Caused mass panic
- Demonstrated the power of the medium/trust people had in it
- Happened before television (radio at peak popularity)
What is CBC and why was it created?
Canadian Broadcasting Corporation:
• Created to combat influence of American radio
• Started as a network for CN rail
History of CBC
• 1st broadcast Nov. 2, 1936 • Includes 5 networks o CBC Radio 1 o CBC Radio 2 o CBC Radio 3 (mostly music) o 2 French stations • Accessible to 99% of Canadians
Payola scandal of the 1950s
- Practice of receiving payment or other incentives in return for playing song on the radio
- Came to a head in 1959 with Congressional investigations
- Among accused: Dick Clark, Alan Freed
The Morning Zoo
- First morning show created in 1981 by Scott Shannon and Cleveland Wheeler (Tampa, FL)
- Over the top personalities, comedy bits, multiple hosts
- Most popular: 80s and 90s
- Widely copied by other stations (morning show)
Podcasting
- Started 2004 (Apple adds podcast support to iTunes in 2005)
- 2007-10: “big name” podcasts begin
- 2011-14: subscriber count exceeds 1 billion
- 2017: 67 million Americans listen to podcasts monthly
Bell Media
Introduced the idea of radio franchises
99.9 Bob FM
TSN 1290
103.1 Virgin Radio
Evanov Media Group
Energy 106
CKJS Multilingual group
Hot 100.5
Golden West
CVHN 95.1
Classic 107
Corus
Peggy @99.1
CJOB 680 Global News
Power 97
Rogers
- CITI
Kiss 102.3
Jim Pattison Broadcast Group
QX 104
94.3 The Drive
BAM Conference: Television
Megan Benedictson
Mike Koncan
Stef Lasiuk
BAM Conference: Radio
Tom McGouran
Drew Kozub
Pamela Roz
BAM Conference: Round tables
Mark Morris: Mornings with Beau
David Drake: 94.3 The Drive
Karly: Kiss 102.3
Jamie Dreward
Numeris Fall ratings
- CBC Radio One — 14.4 (14.2)
- 680 CJOB — 11.0 (10.9)
- QX 104 — 10.1 (10.3)
- 103.1 Virgin Radio — 7.1 (5.5)
- KiSS 102.3 — 5.4 (4.3)
- 99.9 BOB FM — 5.3 (5.7)
- Power 97 — 5.3 (3.5)
- 94-3 The Drive — 5.1 (5.2)
- 92.1 CITI — 4.9 (5.9)
- TSN 1290 — 4.9 (5.4)
- Energy 106 — 4.0 (4.0)
- CBC Radio 2 — 3.7 (3.1)
- Peggy @ 991 – 2.4 (3.2)
- Hot 100.5 — 1.3 (1.6)
- Radio-Canada Espace Musique — 0.3 (0.1)
- Ici Radio-Canada Première — 0.2 (N/A)
Four iterations of the CHIQ 94.3 radio station
Q94, Curve, FAB, and The Drive
Four iterations of CFPG 99.1
Cool FM, Groove FM, Fresh FM, Peggy @99.1
What makes a good presentation?
Grabs the audience’s attention
•Introduces the presenters
•Focuses attention throughout with vibrant slides (minimal text) and energetic presenters
•Flows cohesively from start to finish
Persona
Fictional person that represents a target audience
Parts of a radio presentation
- Name of station, logo, tagline
- Target Audience (persona)
- Potential Sponsors
- Programming & personalities
- Music playlist
- Conclusion – rationale as to why this station will be successful in Winnipeg
Presenting as a group
- After you’ve finished the presentation, have one person proofread it
- Watch for phrasing that is wildly different, grammatical and punctuation errors
- Triple-check spelling
Imaging
The audio representation of a station’s brand. Any audio produced on behalf of the station
How long should an audio clip be?
10-20 secs
Six steps to gathering audio in the field
Record Interviews Pick your clips Write your script Record your voice Edit voiceover Assemble!
Reporter immersion for radio
- Always Be Recording
- Turn on your recorder in the news room, car, walking into a building, as you are meeting your interview subjects…
- Record both ends of phone conversations
- Think of your interviews as conversations that you happen to be recording.
Building a resume and cover letter
- Customize your resume to emphasize your radio experience
- Also include your other sweet CreComm skills
- Address your cover letter to a REAL PERSON, not “Dear Sir/Madam”
Radio Demo
- Should be one mp3 file
- No longer than 3 minutes, tops
- Choose clips from your work that are relevant to the job
- Each clip should be 30 - 45 seconds
- Include station ID, intros, clips to add context
