As jam-packed and exhausting as the week was, the learnings and takeaways were numerous. Here are 3 that have really stuck with me from the week:

The creator economy is booming.

Greg Ashlock from iHeart Media talked about this in session #1. This is a fantastic time to allow the creators on your team to do what they do best – after all, it is their personalities, individual insights, and perspectives that make your station unique. Greg encouraged a focus on micro connections as opposed to macro connections – and I agree. Building strong connections with smaller groups of fans who share similar hobbies/interests or live in the same neighborhood will create much deeper bonds between your personalities and your brand. The win for this coming year will be in empowering your talent to be free to create all they can, and then to encourage them to merge their interests and passions with their air work (more on this in point #3- the value of community).

***This presupposes one key factor***… that you have talent on your team who are dynamic, 3-dimensional people who have opinions and a sense of humor and are fun to be around at parties. If your talent don’t naturally possess these qualities, get them coaching (99 times out of 100 your talent do possess those qualities, it just takes the right person to unlock it in them) or find new talent. Boring, vanilla, or syrupy-spiritual won’t cut through and grab the attention of your busy listeners.

Leaving the margin to create space for the divine intervention.

Tania Bright spoke of creating more margin in our life – stemming from the biblical principle of gleaning. When our schedules are so packed with no white space and no breaks, we don’t give ourselves the opportunity to see the Holy Spirit do something special in us or through us. As a person who is goal oriented (to a fault) and who can drift toward validation in life and work coming from a full schedule, jumping from meeting to meeting and call to call, this point touched a nerve. Being busier than the other guy doesn’t make you a better PD, and it doesn’t make the Lord any happier with you than He already is.

The Value of Community.

The opportunity to reconnect and be present with people I know and love is invaluable. Throughout the week, I was thankful to talk programming challenges and strategy with really smart people, as well as share about significant life events taking place in my world with people who care about us. Simultaneously, I feel honored to help carry burdens of others walking through extreme difficult seasons. Others tell me this too – that beyond access and education, community is one of the most valuable aspects of CMB membership.

The reality is that none of us are unique in our desire for connection. We all need it. Just as you and I long for meaningful relationships, so do our listeners. And Christian radio occupies a unique position to help grow those connections. This year, let’s be intentional about creating opportunities for community, both within our teams and among our listeners. If your station becomes the catalyst for friendships, encouragement, and lasting relationships, you’ll earn a place in people’s lives that goes far beyond what comes through their speakers.

Cheers to a productive programming week!

The post 3 Takeaways from Momentum 2026 first appeared on CMB.

The post 3 Takeaways from Momentum 2026 appeared first on CMB.

For some, this Momentum is their first-ever, and they’re coming to get “indoctrinated” into all there is to know, see, and experience about the Christian media industry. 

For many, this annual pilgrimage to Orlando to reconnect, network, and to learn is a highlight of your year. The spectacular opportunity that Momentum offers – which is a testament to the CMB team’s dedicated effort and exceptional standards – is VERY rare. 

In advance of this year’s conference, I’m issuing 4 challenges to all of us “Momentum Vets” (myself included) to ensure that this year is not just another “rinse and repeat” of previous years, and that we truly capitalize on this week for ourselves and for the industry we serve. 

They are:

Be Invested – For us “seasoned” Momentum veterans, remember the exciting journey of the week ahead for first-time attendees – many just starting out in their careers. We have a special opportunity to positively shape their experience by intentionally connecting with a first-timer, engaging in conversation, asking questions, and simply investing something of yourself in them. Find some time during “the crazy” to welcome someone new.  

Be Present – It’s truly disheartening to see phones and laptops come out when our artist partners (many of whom we call our friends) are on the Momentum stage sharing their new work. Imagine how discouraging it must feel for them to perform for a room of seemingly disinterested radio partners. Let’s be present and give them the gift of our full attention.

Be gracious – Putting together a conference to the standard of excellence that Momentum achieves every year is not cheap, and the involvement and support of the record labels and business sponsors is critical to the event’s success. Engaging with sponsors, thanking label reps for the swag, artist experiences, etc., goes a long way toward reinforcing the value and importance of their partnership with CMB in the future. 

Be ready – Radio is in a really fragile state right now (just ask our neighbors in mainstream radio!), and while there is tremendous hope and opportunity on the horizon, seizing those opportunities will require us to embrace new thinking, change, and taking actual risks. 

It’s why the theme of Momentum 2025 is Risk.

We must all be open minded enough to examine everything we do with new eyes, from new perspectives, and drop our old wineskins for new future-forward thinking. 

Attending Momentum while remaining close-minded to the realities that we face and the change that will be required to navigate these next chapters is, in my opinion, short-sighted, exploitive, and poor stewardship.

Instead, let us be ready to grow, lean into risk, and forge a magnificent future together.   

See you in Florida!

The post Maximizing Momentum first appeared on CMB.

The post Maximizing Momentum appeared first on CMB.

If you’ve got an on-air talent that struggles to move a break from point A to point B, I’ve got a great coaching exercise to help them get past it.

For example: 

• Your talent might have decent content ideas, but their breaks never really “land” anyplace.
• Or, they have good story instincts but struggle with adding too much “detail”to their presentation (turning a :40 second story into 1:30). 

If someone on your air staff struggles in either of these areas – set aside 60 minutesthis week and take them through this exercise, so that they can begin to apply it in their show prep every day:

Before they ever make any decisions about the structure and details of the break idea they have, get the talent to write out a single sentence that specifically states what the talent would like the listener to do, think, or feel about the topic. (A one sentence statement– no paragraphs, bullet points, or questions) 

The discipline of this exercise does 2 things: 

• The exercise helps talent to crystallize their thoughts and ideas about the content into something more cohesive and focused.

• This one sentence statement acts like a mini “mission statement” for the break. 

Once the talent is clear on this single statement, the next steps become about crafting the beginning, middle, and end so that each leads the listener specifically to the takeaway of that sentence. It is now a lot easier to determine what story details move the listener closer to the single sentence takeaway, and which don’t. 

One other “bonus” benefit of this exercise… if your talent is struggling to come up with a single, clear sentence about what the goal of this break is (ie. it’s so vague that it needs more than 1 sentence, or they’re not able to clearly articulate it), it is a good sign that the content idea is not ready for air yet… it either needs some more time / thought, or needs to get scrapped for something else.

So, just like that GPS app won’t plot a course without a destination, don’t let your on-air talent wander aimlessly. That single sentence? It’s their destination, their North Star, their “you are heading here” on the map of their break. Get them to nail that down, and suddenly the path becomes clear, the details fall into place, and those rambling stories find their focus. 

Need help with an air talent that is struggling to “stick the landing” in every break? I’d love to chat…text me at 206-552-6848.

The post Helping Talent Find Their On-Air Destination first appeared on CMB.

The post Helping Talent Find Their On-Air Destination appeared first on CMB.

The 60 Minute Listening Exercise

Set aside one full hour with no distractions. Choose another station – maybe a competitor, or one you’ve heard great things about. With pen and paper in hand, write down everything you hear:

• Every song title & artist (plus your best guess at its category in their music library). 
• Every imaging piece (capture as many words as possible). 
• Every talent break (including the topics covered and delivery style). 
• Every commercial, promo, or jingle. 
• The exact time each element happens.

Why This Works

Studies show that physically writing things down activates different parts of your brain, helping you process and retain information in a deeper way. By forcing your analytical side to track what your artistic side is absorbing, you’ll get new insights and fresh ideas—often revealing things you wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.

The Takeaway

This exercise shifts how you listen and sparks creativity. You’ll walk away with new ideas for your own station and a clearer sense of what needs improvement. Try it out – you’ll be amazed by all the fresh ideas and insight you uncover for your station.

The post Creative Blocks first appeared on CMB.

The post Creative Blocks appeared first on CMB.

As media companies with the calling of leading people to the hope of Jesus, we have always known that people were meant to be together, to live in community and in connection with one another. This theme is a thread the runs through all of the Scripture. 

Throughout COVID, Christian radio did as good if not better job than any other radio format in building a sense of community – listeners who were either new to the format, or casual fans at best prior to COVID, gravitated towards our stations because we felt like home, something good and decent and normal in the midst of an enormous sea of far less than all that. We all knew even though we couldn’t actually BE TOGETHER, others who shared our values, and hopes, and dreams, and fears were listening TOO… that alone united us despite being socially distanced. 

Now, life is back to normal- albeit a new normal – and masks, outdoor only dining, and lines for vaccines are tiny dots in the rearview mirror. Yet, loneliness and isolation are the new pandemic. To be fair, loneliness was a huge problem before COVID – time spent with friends nationally fell by 20 hours a month from 2003 – 2020. It’s far worse now. 

As a societal ill, loneliness and isolation is ravaging to a person on multiple fronts at the same time – physical, emotional, mental, spiritual. To make it even worse, the flood of AI EVERYTHING is pushing our psyches into being less trusting, partaking in even less in person communication, and having less interaction with other humans with a soul and a heartbeat. But the longing for connection, to have friends, and to do life in community grows deeper. 

While this all feels heavy and burdensome and dark, there exists an opportunity for us as Christian broadcasters. Creating a sense of community among listeners on our stations and on our digital properties is a given, but what else? What adjacent possibilities are there at our fingertips to create connection between our listeners, in person?

Concerts and events are a good start, and the shared experience of worship is absolutely a community builder, but it is difficult to make meaningful connections with other humans when the music is playing at 110 decibels. What other environments and/or moments for human connection can we create for listeners, most of whom are getting a little lonelier every day? 

Here’s a quick shot at a few ideas – 

• Could your station open a coffee shop in your town where people could congregate? (I mean, depending on the part of the country you’re in, coffee shops can be money machines!)
• Can your extra office space be used for community events? 
• Could your station launch a series of community meet-ups where listeners get together over shared interests, hobbies, or life circumstances? (or, at the very least, offer free promotion to other organizations that are already hosting them.)
• I co-hosted a morning show way back where once a week on the show we declared “We’re having a morning show meeting at 12” at some local restaurant and invited listeners to come “join the meeting”. (In all honesty, we only did it to give a shout out to whichever restaurant we wanted to try in hopes of getting our lunch comped. Eventually, we had to stop doing it because the restaurants were getting slammed with over 100 customers at once!)

At this point, we could both be thinking the same thing – isn’t this really what the churches in our community should be doing? Hopefully some church leaders will see the same advisory from the Surgeon General and begin to brainstorm ways to combat the drift into loneliness of America. But what about the gazillions of others who are listening to our stations, but are resistant to church-y stuff? It could be our moment.  

Here’s the thing – I am now more convinced than ever that more of the new, future cume and fans of our stations will come from communities that we grow to draw in “not-yet” listeners who are seeking connection and relationship, rather than super-slick marketing campaigns and digital ad spends. 

What other adjacent possibilities for using our platforms to create in-person connection and relationship for our listeners come to mind for you? 

And, if you’re interested, here’s the link to the US Surgeon General study for your light reading enjoyment.
https://www.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/surgeon-general-social-connection-advisory.pdf

The post Adjacent Possibilities first appeared on CMB.

The post Adjacent Possibilities appeared first on CMB.

You may read that sentence and celebrate all the opportunities that voicetracking now affords radio operators… access to new talent, cost savings, expanded workloads, etc., all created by air talent not having to be tied to a studio 24/7.

Or, you could read that sentence and curse under your breath, having lost your gig to some guy in another city that now voicetracks on 14 different stations as your company used this technology to consolidate resources and liquidate a bunch of live, local personalities, including you.

For me, I’m kind of in the middle.

Here is my issue. A survey of several Christian broadcasters reveals that the going “rate” for hiring a voicetracker is $25 – $50 per show. That’s not a lot of money, so if the voicetracker values their time and wants to make some decent money, their only path forward is to turn voicetracking into a volume business. Doing so makes SPEED the way to create a better income, rather than excellence. In other words, “if I get paid $30 for a show, and I can track 2 shows in 1 hour, in essence I am making $60 an hour!”

At my first real radio job (WBNQ / Bloomington, IL), I did 7P – 12M on Saturdays, and made $12 / hour. Do the math, and that means for a 5 hour shift I made $60. That was good money for a college kid having the time of his life on a top 40 station in 1986. What is baffling to me is that my casual survey of stations in Christian radio that hire voicetrackers to cover prime dayparts (for example, middays Monday through Friday) are paying a lot less per show than what I made on a Saturday night show over 30 years ago. Something is very wrong with that.

Let me state this without hesitation:  the people who voicetrack for a living (or even for a side hustle) are not at fault. This problem was created by and continues to be perpetuated by program directors and GM’s who have lessened the value of the on-air talent under the delusion of somehow being able to save your way to success.

Sadly, the problem has created an inferior product. It’s not that uncommon to hear voicetracks play on a station with the wrong call letters /station name, no local content, tracks with no connection to the music whatsoever – where it is obvious that the talent has no idea what song was playing right before their track played, and breaks where the content was just re-edited with a different station name backsell at the front. Again, as PD’s and operators, when we are not willing to pay for excellence, we force voicetrackers to create value for themselves by speed, and our stations suffer as a result.

The role of air talent in our format (more so than most other radio formats) is paramount to our success, no matter if that success is measured by Kingdom impact, or fundraising efforts, or ratings. Excellent on- air talent are the bridge builders to new incoming audience of a radio station filled with unfamiliar music, and they have the difficult job of being instantly likeable and familiar – the person who feels like an old friend after just meeting them.

Where do we go from here? I believe the solution is two-fold. First, if you are a voicetracker and you are committed to doing your job with excellence, think about raising your rate. If the numbers I’ve talked about earlier in this post are in line for you, there is a high possibility that the station you are voicetracking for is paying more to outsource their cleaning services than they are paying you.

Lastly, for program directors or station managers, give every voicetracker on your station that you feel like is an important part of your sound a raise. Any smart business owner (no matter the industry) would tell you that you cannot cut spending on mission-critical, core functions of the business and expect to grow, but that is exactly what we are doing when we pay the equivalent of minimum wage or less to the spokespeople for our radio station. If you are going to outsource that role to people outside your organization, that is fine – but you owe it to your mission, your board, and your donors to compensate that role properly so that it is the best that it can be. It is that important.

The post The Voicetracking Conundrum first appeared on CMB.

The post The Voicetracking Conundrum appeared first on CMB.