Spot Loads & NTR

Spot loads absolutely must come down.

As much as I hate to say this, the answer in larger markets is NTR. (Non Traditional Revenue) The problem is that most seem to want NTR *AND* insane spot loads.

Every time someone comes up with a new way to make money, rather than lowering spot loads even a little, corporate says "Ooh, we'll take that too!" (by corporate, I mean all of them)

There are a hell of a lot more ways to make money with a radio station than spots. Set a goal of how much a particular station - or cluster - should profit each year, and then let them reach that goal any way they please (within reason of course)

I'd love to see some talented sales managers replacing some spots with revenue generating events, partnerships, and so on and so forth.

Spotload down, listener participation up - what's not to love about that scenario?

UPDATE: a year later, Clear Channel launched their "Less Is More" campaign of lowering spot loads and breaking up long stopsets. My only complaint is that some of their stations are making such a big deal about how soon they'll be back to the music that they sound as if they're playing more spots now than before..

"Back to the music in 3 minutes on Z100..."
"Back to the music after this on Z100..."

Six times an hour, they're telling their listeners that they're not playing music.