Dan Watts Introduction

Welcome to the week after Labor Day...home stretch for the Holidays.

My name is Dan Watts and I have been in the Radio Industry (mostly) for more than 20 years. I have been on both sides of the hallway as we like to say.

Started out on the air at the campus radio station for Anderson University as well as a commercial station in town. The commercial station was Oldies and the first night I was on the air and allowed to play music I played a cut by Boston that was not on the playlist. Not surprisingly the PD was on the phone to me within :60...whoops.

I transferred to Eastern Kentucky University for my last 2 years of college. I worked on the air at the campus station there too and a commercial station in town.

After college, it was out into the "Real World" and doing mornings in the metropolis of Leitchfield, KY. I was LIVING making $15k per year and living in a tiny apartment. I couldn't believe it that I was actually making a living being on the radio...it was a dream come true. My career idol as a kid was Johnny Fever from WKRP.

Then I met this girl... (this is the point where most stories take a really big turn) and long story short I ended up in Washington Courthouse, OH doing weekend air work and learning sales during the day. That was 18 years ago and radio advertising has been my life ever since!

Radio Advertising has been a very rewarding career for me....not only financially but in many other ways as well. I have moved around the country (Columbus, OH...Wheeling, WV...Scranton, PA...back to Columbus...and now in Cincinnati.) I have had periods where we have made lots of money and periods where it was all rice and beans. I have worked with some wonderful Radio people like Tim Stinson, Dave Robbins, TJ Holland and Donna Gamblin....and some certifiable idiots who shall remain nameless. To have gotten to go to a lot of great concerts for FREE and have eaten at a lot of fantastic restaurants on expense accounts.

At this point in my life, I have gotten to the point in my career where it is more about what I can do for others and less about what I can do for me.

About two years ago, I started working with a radio station called WAKW FM in Cincinnati, OH. We are a Contemporary Christian Music radio station. I was asked to created a Business Development Department (essentially selling advertising on the station) from scratch. When I started here, they we doing a just a little bit of underwriting billing. We recently finished our 2nd full fiscal year and we finished at over $1 million in revenue. Our goals for this fiscal year are to exceed $ 1.5 million and we are on pace to do so.

So that's a little bit about me...my blogs on here will be from the advertising view of things with a focal point on Christian Radio.

I was thrilled to be asked by Charlie to be a part of this blogging team and hope that I can make meaningful additions to the blog. If you see something on here that you like (or don't like) please feel free to post a comment...would appreciate your feed back.

Blessings,

Dan Watts

Hi... My Name Is Eric. And I'm a Radio-Holic.

Hi there! My name is Eric Seigel and like many of my radio brethren, I'm currently unemployed. OK, not completely. I serve people coffee at Starbucks. But I'm otherwise unemployed. I have a long history in radio...

Here's a quick resume... I started in 1992 as an intern and Assistant Promotions Director at WKCI (KC 101) in New Haven, CT. Did some on-air there as well. I spent the summer of 1995 at WQGN (Q105) in Groton, CT on-air. From 1995 to 2000 I worked at WTIC AM&FM in Hartford in several positions including on-air, Promotions Director, and National Sales Promotion Director. Somewhere in this time frame I also worked on the client side as an Account Director for a radio promotions agency called TMPG. In 2000, I got a call out of the blue inviting me to interview for the Promotions Director job at WRKO-AM in Boston. I took the job and stayed a little less than a year. After a stint of unemployment, I got out of radio and became a fundraiser for the Muscular Dystrophy Association. Although, I wasn't out of radio completely. I started doing weekend airshifts at the radio station that I grew up listening to. WRKI (I-95) in Danbury, CT. When the Marketing Director left, they offered me the job. Which I promptly turned down. 5 times. Realizing how much I missed the business, I eventually took the job overseeing marketing and promotions for both I-95 and WDBY (Y-105). 3 years after that, apparently it was time to "make a change". 2 years after that... well, I can make a mean 1/2 caf grande non-fat sugar-free vanilla extra carmel carmel macchiato.

I'm looking forward to blogging about my experiences. A lot of my posts will be about radio through the eyes of a promotions person. I hope that you find them interesting and leave comments. I have a personal blog (which sorely needs to be updated) where you can see my resume (you know... if you're hiring) called Blogged Down.

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Let's Get Started

I want to thank you for visiting the newest radio industry blog, the Radio Twit Bloggers Blog. I'm Charlie Profit, I own CAB Radio, a broadcast services company (read the blog here). Some of you already know me; for those of you who don't, I have been in the industry for the better part of 20 years and have worked for independents and large groups alike, in small, medium and large markets. Probably the highlight of my career was managing a small AM station for almost 7 years in Connecticut. I learned a lot about the business of the radio business. I hope to bring some of those experiences to this blog.

The Radio Twit Guide was born out of ideas I had on how radio could use Twitter to connect with listeners. That idea evolved into a news feed providing updates in the industry from many different resources. I hope you have enjoyed following our Twitter account and Radio Industry RSS News Feed Blog at www.radio-twit.com. If you haven't experienced either of them, click over and check them out. In the coming months, I'll do my best to offer more tips on ways to use Twitter at your radio station.

I hope you'll continue to follow the Radio Twit as we continue to provide you with unique insights, experiences and applications you can use in your radio career and beyond.

Welcome

This is the new Radio Twit Bloggers Blog. Radio Twit Bloggers are everyday radio folk with a variety of opinions! There are presently six bloggers and each will be introducing themselves in the coming days. Radio Twit Bloggers is an all volunteer effort. However we have committed to post consistently in order to make this one of your regular stops every week. Look for approximately two posts per week. Some weeks there may be more or less. This blog will primarily contain the opinions or experience of the person writing the blog. We do not plan to be blogging regular news, however on occasion we may toss in some information on breaking news as we hear of it from our Radio Twit Radio Industry RSS News Feed found at www.radio-twit.com. We welcome your comments to any of our posts and look forward to building up this unique community of radio folk interested in diverse opinions and the sharing of experiences in the radio industry! We look forward to serving you.

Respectfully,

Radio Twit Bloggers