[BC] Order of spots in a spot break

[Grady Moates]

> Grady Moates wrote:
>> Ask me sometime about how the order of the spots in a spot break can
>> double your TSL.
>
> OK, I am asking! I do all of the programming on a Catholic Talker. I
> would LOVE to impress the Bean Counters by doubling our TSL.

    In order to follow this, a few unrelated ideas:

[1] Attention Deficit Disorder is real.  Those who have it
    diagnosed are just extreme cases of something every
    human being has, just not so much.
[2] Before a spot break, a station has an opportunity to
    convince listeners to stick around during the castor
    oil because we'll give'em another sugar cube in a minute
    or two - it's called forward promotion.
[3] Either the FP worked, or it didn't.
[4] When the spots start,
    [a] those listeners who were not given a
        compelling reason to stay are already gone.
    [b] those listeners who actually heard you say
        that the new Michael Jackson tune was coming
        up in a coupl'a minutes will stay,
        _but_only_until_their_ADD_kicks_in.
[5] Spots don't make people tune out. . . transitions
    between spots are the trigger.  Here's how it works:

    When the first spot starts, each listener has a
tolerance for how long they will wait.  Each listener's
tolerance is _different_, but the only thing that matters
is, at some point in time, each listener will decide that
"this has gotta be the last spot".  It's not something
they do with their forebrains, it's just ADD.  So, while
a spot is playing, once the listener has decided that this
should be the last spot, they will stick around until the
end of _that_spot_.  IF THEY HEAR ANOTHER SPOT START,
THEY ARE GONE.  They don't know how long it is, it's just
too damned much.  Each listener reaches this point after
a different number of spots or seconds, but that doesn't
matter, as long as the programmer is aware of the
phenomenon.

    When I took over programming at a station in the late
'60's/early '70's, every spot set was about two minutes
long, but ended with a ten second live spot for the local
drive-in theatre chain, plugging what was showing at one
of the local drive-ins.  This meant that at 2 minutes
into the set, _with_only_ten_seconds_to_go_, we were giving
the listeners a transition.

    All I did was reverse the order of the spots in the
set. . . ten second spot first, then either two :60s,
or two :30s followed by a :60.  In this way, we got all
the transitions out-of-the-way in 70 seconds.  Having the
last element be entertaining, either musically or comedically,
was a plus, so we endeavored to have all our :60s be
60 seconds for reason. . . 30 seconds of plug at most,
at least 30 seconds of entertainment.  And, the :60s were
not allowed to gt stale.

    TSL doubled.  And, as a side-product, the drive-in
advertising became measurably more effective.

BTJMO,IPW

Grady