Get more listening across days in the same daypart. For example, your morning show should invite listeners back for a specific reason (a listener benefit) to a particular time the next day.  Nearly half the audience does not listen to most stations 4-5 days a week.  For an audience familiar with your station, it needs a reason to listen another day.

Invite listening tomorrow with a specific reason for listening.  It could be a benchmark, content, music feature, contest, guest, etc.

What event or feature can hook the audience for one more day (tomorrow)? With an established benchmark, promote it when it airs again at the end of the on-air content. Chances are the listener enjoyed listening to the feature and will listen for the next installment. “You’ll do this twice daily; listen to the next Impossible Trivia at 7:20 tomorrow.”

Vertical Listening

Promote what occurs in the next break, next hour, and later in the day.  It’s all about setting appointments – giving people a reason to come back (or stay with you).  Pay attention to behaviors that change listening, like getting in the car or entering the workplace.  Few can listen continuously; they have a life!  Give those listeners a reason to return once they reach their new location.  Work on increasing listening occasions.

Avoid generic phrases like “later today” and “sometime this afternoon.”  These are not effective.  Give specific times so the listeners can set an appointment and not have to wait.  “Win $100.  Listen at 10, 2, and 4 today.” (The Dr. Pepper ad.)

Recycle Listening

We’re all familiar with the need to recycle the audience to other dayparts, but many talents still think of the audience as hearing their entire show as a single event. That’s fiction. The average morning show turns over its audience 4-6 times in four hours. Listeners have a life—they tune away and come back continuously.

There are ways to stretch that listener’s time. Promote a feature (content) or contest to bring listeners back for the next hour (or next break). “Win a free tank of gas today at 3.”  Time spent listening is also about increasing listening occasions, not just expanding the listening duration.

Pic AI generated by Creatopy.

John Lund is President of the Lund Media Group, a radio programming consulting firm with specialists in all mainstream radio formats. Did you find this article useful?  You can leave a comment below or email John at John@Lundradio.com.