Rejected!

Last Friday evening our marketing guy asked me to write up a 300 word "advertorial" item for one of the radio industry magazines in which we advertise.  The purpose was to tout the features of our newest profanity delay, but I'm hardly going to write "Our new unit does blah blah blah and has yada yada."  Where's the fun in that?  Two of my theories about advertising:

• You have to catch the reader instantly or he won't pay attention. 
• He probably won't pay attention anyway. 

Did I mention that I had until Monday AM to provide it?  Or that it was a busy weekend?  Doesn't matter—I've gotten pretty glib over the years.  Some radio jargon:  GM is "General Manager," or the boss at the station, and PD is the "Program Director," the guy who hires and fires the talent—DJs or whatever, and is responsible for the on-air content.  "DUMP" is the process by which a profanity is sliced out of a continuing program.

What better way to sell a profanity delay than to curse the FCC?

As we peek into the GM's office, we hear her talking to the PD about the new FCC regulations that increase the fines for profanity by a factor of ten.

GM:  I can't believe the *&%$ FCC just raised the fine so much.  What will we do about our talk programming?

PD:  Something strange just happened.  I just heard you say "asterisk ampersand percentage dollarsign FCC"  What's going on?

GM:  Yes!  Isn't it great!  My husband made me purchase the "consumer version" of the Eventide profanity delay because he got tired of listening to me cursing around the house.  I'm trying it here because I want to set a good example.

PD:  Wow!  I knew Eventide makes the best and most versatile broadcast profanity delay available.  In fact I was going to recommend getting their new BD600 to protect our programming.  It has the best audio quality of all, and provides up to 80 seconds of  protection, with multiple DUMPs if we need them.

GM:  Not that I don't have faith in your people, but I've been thinking of giving myself a remote DUMP capability, too.  Can it do that?

PD:  Sure.  You can not only DUMP remotely, you can use their "AutoFill^(TM)" to substitute prerecorded material from a built-in memory card.  They have a new optional remote capability that makes the unit even more versatile—you can select from four different station jingles to play.

GM:  Sounds great.  I especially like the long 80-second interval.  Some of our callers are getting sophisticated in their trash talk.  I gather Eventide is good at this, right?

PD:  Of course.  They invented the digital profanity delay and have sold more than all vendors combined.  So what do you think?  Shall I go ahead and order the Eventide BD600?  Delivery usually is from stock.

GM:  Yes, you'd better.  I'm glad you can get it quickly—I have only one * for the station.

Well, I liked it.  And our marketing guy liked it, or claimed to.  But the magazine rejected it!  Imagine that—it somehow didn't fit their "format."

I guess this blog just has no standards.

NP:  "The Great Escape" - Marillion

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