When I walked into the National Religious Broadcasters convention this week I had no idea what to expect. Mainly because I have never been to one of their conventions. Until I started consulting I hadn’t worked directly with religious radio stations and since then I’ve been trying to make it work scheduling wise for a few years, but there was always a conflict. This year it was here in the Metroplex at one of my favorite hotels, the Gaylord Texan in Grapevine, so I made it a point to stop by. I’m very glad I did because it was a lot more than I was expecting. I’ve been told my convention recaps go a little long, so I’ll try and hit a few of the highlights that stood out to me and end with my big takeaway.

The Gaylord Texan is a great hotel to host a conference at. It’s right next to DFW airport so it’s easy to get to, it’s reasonably priced considering how nice it is, the food is great and there’s enough fun things to do that you never have to leave the resort unless you want to. It overlooks Lake Grapevine but, unfortunately it’s still a little too cold here in north Texas to hop on a boat and hit the water. However, it still makes for some nice views from your room or the patio of the Glass Cactus lounge and night club (obviously not as hopping as usual because this was a religious convention but still worth stopping by). To rest before heading back to Frisco I did stop for a quick drink at the lobby bar, which the helpful bartender mentioned features a mural that’s a Remington replica.

Religious broadcasters have clearly gotten the message that we all have to be cranking out considerably more content to compete in our modern era of segmented media fighting to get the attention of an audience whose attention spans shorten by the day. There were a row of new media companies actively capturing, and I assume live-streaming, high quality audio and video content outside the exhibit hall, and that continued when I entered. I’m not sure if it’s something the NRB actively encourages, but I’ve never seen so many exhibitors creating their own content within their booths at a broadcast convention. Even the 10x10s had two chairs, a couple mics, a camera or two and some lights setup. The larger booths had stages and a PA setup at the back of their booth or multi-person furniture right in the middle. As usual I made a point to walk around and look at the latest gear. At B&H Photo I tested the Zoom PodTrak P8, a small-portable audio mixer Zoom has released to compete with Rode’s popular Rodecaster. I liked how the Zoom sounded, the option of it being battery powered and the $299 price tag. At the Sweetwater booth, a place where I’ve purchased music equipment for years, I entered their giveaway to get a free t-shirt and discussed how a lot of the broadcasters I know are starting to utilize their site more because of how much we’re all using the prosumer gear for DAWs, audio interfaces, USB mics, video switchers and a whole host of other things. Sweetwater is also a good follow on social by the way because their staff posts funny content.

MAIN TAKEAWAYS

My friend, and Radio Update contributor, Gary James was also there and he shared his big takeaway. “Over the past 3 days I’ve seen and heard AI quite often.  The faith-based market is continuing to embrace AI to deliver the message through Talk and Teach formats and Contemporary Christian Music.  There is a strong interest in expanding the faith based programming to the Spanish speaking markets.  The big challenge for most operators is developing a reliable, cost-effective way to deliver content to affiliates.”

Admittedly my schedule wouldn’t allow me to stay for the entire three-day convention, but even in the few hours I spent at NRB this year it’s clear to me that this is a convention worth attending for anyone who works in religious broadcasting in any capacity.

I was surprised by how many new digital media companies were on-site for NRB. I assume that’s because its significantly cheaper and easier to start a digital broadcast company now than it’s ever been. Obviously, it’s way cheaper than starting and maintaining a traditional media outlet like a radio or tv station because of our built-in hard cost.

So, my main takeaway from NRB is that it will be a very interesting year for radio and television as we see which of these new outlets will break through and how much of our market share we will allow them to take by not matching the volume of their content or being more interactive within our communities to re-establish the importance and value of traditional, local radio and TV.

If you were at the convention leave a comment below with your thoughts or email them to me at andy@radiostationconsultant.com or editor@radioupdate.com.