Scott Thomson, the Manager of Universal – NSW and a former AFTRS student put a thought starter up on LinkedIn this morning suggesting it was time stations like smooth dropped their local call signs, saying:

“The frequency isn’t the product anymore — the brand is.”

I wonder how many of you are like me, and whenever you see smooth 95.3 printed anywhere, like in Scott’s post above, you sing the jingle in your head?

That’s great marketing.

smooth isn’t like McDonalds. I’d like to put forward the reasons why call signs are more important than ever.

I’ll start with an interesting bit of trivia that was passed on to me by my son – he works for ASICS and told me that he gets lots of people coming in post a visit to their physio. The physio has given them three different brand and style options and a lot of the time ASICS Gel is the most familiar and easiest to recall, so that’s where they end up. If you are as invested in footwear as my son is, you’ll be aware that Nike and its swoosh is immediately recognisable, but those who love the brand can also rattle off the shoe styles within, and when a new model or colour variation is released they’ll be on it immediately.

I’m in Sydney at the moment and have gone for a walk each morning which sees me going past a new house being built. The young guys on the job listen to Triple M 104.9. The first time I went past they were playing Thunderstruck by AC/DC, which is one of my favourite songs, and loud enough that I could savour for longer than I’m sure the neighbours appreciate. The next was during the news, and the third a talk break and then some Green Day. I heard the call sign early on, but even without it I knew that what I was hearing was Triple M.

There are 48 different Triple M stations across the country, including digital, and not all of them will play AC/DC or Green Day. The chap on a ladder who was humming away to Warning doesn’t just like his Triple M, he loves it so much that he was sharing it around. I would bet if I asked him that when he gets in a car that isn’t his, where they might be listening to smooth, he knows exactly where 104.9 is situated and doesn’t slowly surf to see who’s playing the best song.

The call sign means that anytime someone who loves a radio station needs to find it, they know exactly where to go.

Let’s think about an emergency situation now. You’ve lost power, your phone is on 3% and have only your trusty battery powered radio with you. You’ll want to know exactly where to find the ABC or the station you trust for updates. My local ABC has the unforgettable 666am call sign. The devil was in the details there. But that is also why when you drive across Australia and see signs for the ABC, they always including the digits. Just in case.

When I started working for Radioinfo Steve Ahern told me that I would be able to rattle off call signs for far flung stations in no time and it was just last week that I realised I could do all the Nova metro stations across the country, including Perth 93.7!

Radio networks are wanting to have listeners loyal to their brand, yes, but most of us are loyal to the local station of that brand, and the people who represent that station. 

It was Christian O’Connell who told me last year, ahead of his shift to broadcast across ARN’s Gold Network, that he always assumes that someone is listening for the first time. So they don’t know who Christian is, any of the team, or their back stories. It must always be an invitation to join, rather than feeling like an outsider at a party where everyone apparently knows each other.

Scott is right that for radio networks, the brand is the product. But, the local station within the brand is what most of us are listening and loyal to. If we want to bring more people to buy into them, we have to give them all the options, repeatedly (smooth 95.3 – sing it with me) of where to find them.

Jen Seyderhelm is a writer, editor and podcaster for Radioinfo. Email: [email protected]