No Performance Without Measurement
Whether it is your career or your life, measure whatever you want to improve. Use my flabby, overweight self as an example.
At age 54, my lifelong strategy of exercising off happy excesses somehow stopped working. I had traded my 6-pack for a keg! I began keeping score with a calorie app, kept up with running and yoga, and after 3 months I have lost 20 pounds.
To reach lofty goals set for your radio show or podcast, measure the steps leading you to success and you will likely get there.
For higher time-spent-listening, measure your teasing.
If your show has six content segments per hour and you tease three of them, give that hour a grade of 50. How can you get that to 100?
To improve your content, measure your preparation.
If your show plan sheet has six segments an hour and your show runs three hours, how many of those 18 segments are fully planned with the whole team before the show begins?
To increase your P1 audience, measure content choices.
How many segments are “A” content with dramatic and comedic stories with strong point of view from authentic, unfiltered hosts? How many segments are “meh,” with celebrity birthdays, movie box office results and information like weather and traffic that audiences get on mobile apps?
To improve mic balance, measure word count.
If you have one host consistently dominating over 70% of the airtime you may not have a show but a monologue.
To improve digital effectiveness, ask your online team for numbers.
How many people shared your content, what got the most comments and what percentage are sticking with your videos and podcasts to the very end.
To improve station promotions, measure player response.
PPM tune-ins for your big cash giveaways. How many texts come in for each text-to-win contest and what percentage of your audience does that represent?
Can you measure things like comedy? Stand-up comics often record their shows and listen with a stopwatch to time how long the laugh is for each joke. Short laughs do not survive.
Not everything can be quantified, but simply being mindful of your daily steps toward success can focus your efforts in a positive and productive way. There is no performance without measurement.
Photo by Guille Álvarez on Unsplash
