The Jacobs Media Blog

For this holiday week, we've scanned this year's JacoBLOG archives to reprise some of the posts that elicited comments – on and off-line. Today's is about adapting. The Bones At A Barbeque A couple of weeks ago, an old friend and former client, Bob Ottaway, sent me an insightful analysis by Terry Teachout that appeared in the […]

In our continuing "Best of" shortened holiday week, this post comes from last August, following my return from this year's "Morning Show Boot Camp." Notes From Boot Camp I did something last week that I had never done before during my radio career – I attended Don Anthony's Morning Show Boot Camp, this year in […]

As we wrap up 2009, we thought it would be insightful to go back to past blog entries from the year that seemed to resonate with JacoBLOG readers.  This one, from last February, elicited many comments from broadcasters – mostly in direct emails to me.  Enjoy.       This graphic by Ji Lee literally […]

  We wish you and your family a happy, healthy, and safe holiday season!!  The JacoBLOG will return on Monday, December 28.

As the year winds down, and radio takes a breather from its many challenges, and hopefully, most of you do the same, I just wanted to take a moment to thank clients, friends, and readers of this blog.  It has indeed been a tough year for just about everyone in this business, whether you've found […]

Here's a guest blog from rock radio programmer extraordinaire, Keith Hastings, the guy behind The Hog in Milwaukee.  Keith is a hardcore radio guy, who admittedly spends time listening to Pandora. I was messing around with a Jackson Browne “station” on Pandora the other day, and on comes “The Load Out/Stay.”  Cool.  Nice long song, […]

As a company and in this blog space, we have taken an aggressive approach toward digital technology over this past decade.  I don't regret it for a minute.  Now we're seeing important shifts.  Advertising dollars are skewing toward digital and away from traditional media, and yet, I still hear the same questions: Are you sure […]

There is a bizarre contradiction in the mobile space.  In Japan, South Korea, and in many European countries, mobile phones do so much more than our iPhones and BlackBerries are able to accomplish here in the U.S. You'd think that the country that spawned Microsoft, Amazon, Google, and Apple would be well ahead of the […]

Think that it's been a flat-to-down year for the media businesses?  Not for everyone.  No talk about "flat is the new up" here.  Just hockey stick growth.

For more than a year now, we have been gently reminding (and lately, hammering) our clients to get serious about creating couponing programs with local businesses and retailers.  Once those department store Santas put away their pillows and fake beards, drumming up business in January and February will be tough hills to climb. Here's where […]

As we've discussed many times in this space, many former radio professionals have ventured into new areas as our industry has shrunk over the past couple of years.  At times these career jump-shifts have been forced by necessity.  But in other cases, ex-radio execs have managed incredible transitions as they move into different media realms. […]

Last week, I spent a couple of days in Annapolis at Arbitron's "Programming Fly-In."  And there were a few surprises. First, they drew a record crowd – in December and in a travel budget challenged environment.  Second, there were a lot of programmers in the room.  And finally, it was good to get outside of […]

Our Paul Jacobs was invited to present at this year's "Strategic Digital Leadership Summit for Public Radio Stations," held on the USC campus.  Here are some of his takeaways from this year's conference: We all know how challenging a year this has been.  We've been inundated with news about layoffs, cutbacks, and rumors about media […]

Here's the dilemma – more and more consumers are streaming video, and the more they do it, the more they like it.  We continue to track this trend in our annual Technology Polls, both among commercial radio rockers and Public Radio listeners. But as we know too well, most radio people have not been schooled […]

Those of you who know our company are aware that we are based in metro Detroit.  We sarcastically refer to the Motor City these days as "Ground Zero" because there's no place the recession has hit harder than right here.  While only a small percentage of our revenue here at Jacobs Media is derived from […]

Those of you who know our company are aware that we are based in metro Detroit.  We sarcastically refer to the Motor City these days as "Ground Zero" because there's no place the recession has hit harder than right here.  While only a small percentage of our revenue here at Jacobs Media is derived from […]

As the online music world continues to be defined and refined, Apple's purchase of Lala Media is noteworthy.  While no one can dispute the success of iTunes as a music discovery and revenue generating portal, the process of finding new songs and artists online has morphed considerably over the past few years. I discovered this […]

For the past 14 years, we have put together, produced, and pulled off annual Jacobs Summits, first with Gavin, then for more than a decade with R&R, and since last year, with the NAB.  We've learned a great deal about the art of booking, scheduling, and presentation, especially during the past few years when many […]

You have to give Radio Ink's Eric Rhoads a lot of credit.  If you missed it before the holiday, he is now "all in" for HD radio, on the strength of an inexpensive radio that he helped design in concert with iBiquity.   The essence of Eric's initiative is that among HD radio's many sand traps, […]

In the all-important lexicon of how best to report one's news and views, Twitter has made a left turn perhaps into the right place to maximize its ability to rapidly spread the word to networks of users. You may recall that from the beginning, Twitter's 140 character or less question was "What are you doing?"  […]