Michelle Younkman – ‘Radio’s Not Dead!’

GMA: How would you further encourage someone who hasn’t attended Momentum or a Summit to go?
MY: Momentum itself is really a place where, regardless of your position at a station, we want to make sure that we are meeting everyone where they’re at. That can be a really hard thing to do, but we attempt that through various educational and inspirational opportunities. Mainly, I feel like radio stations need to understand that they’re not in this alone. [Momentum helps to ensure] that there’s strength in numbers—that growth can happen, and we’re never too old to learn; never too old to grow—and that by being with others that are like-minded and that are in the same business, it’s only going to help us grow even more.

GMA: How can, or, how is the artist community helping you with your continual message and mission?
MY: We have longtime partnerships with most of the record companies…even considering in just the past year-or-so in [working together to] figure out how we maximize all of our efforts [toward the changing demographics] and the artists’ efforts to encourage their listeners, etc. I feel like there are ways from a radio standpoint that stations can help artists, and artists can really help radio stations. Now, that concept may not even be on a station’s radar, but if they wanted to be able to be the conduit for those artists, there are various ways that they could do that. Whether that’s through social media, different opportunities that record companies present for their artists, or etc… For stations that are musically focused, that’s especially going to give them an edge.

Taking video for example—for the radio stations that are utilizing video—there are ways that labels can and do provide assistance for this and helps these stations with their efforts in those ways. Socially—things that the artists are doing… For example, if there’s a meme somewhere and they send it out to the radio stations, then the station can forward it out to their audience, etc. Everyone wins. It’s further exposure for the artist, and it really makes the radio station look great in their listeners’ eyes, too.

We’ve been seeing other creative ways of how to better engage listeners. We’ve seen a lot of that happening with Facebook Live where stations will, for example, live-stream at a concert, giving their listeners a glimpse into something that they wouldn’t traditionally be able to experience. The radio station becomes the one that brings it to them, but it’s really a win-win for the station and the artist and overall, their message. I’ve seen it growing over the years, and it’s only going to continue to grow, because that partnership is vital to the success of the artists as well as the radio station.

TobyMac “Drive-thru Difference” radio promo