WHO WILL SAVE THE DYING RADIO ?

 Radio is dying a slow death and stakeholders in the industry should either change or perish.

Over the last ten years we've seen change in the media industry especially in radio. Shows are no longer captivating as before and the execution is poor.

Only a few number of practitioners have been able to adapt to change.

The emergence of podcast and music apps such as Spotify and boomplay has dealt a big blow to the once crucial industry.

I remember growing up listening to Q Fm afternoon show which was hosted by The late Rhino Kukuni. The show was about the Caribbean vibes and this made me love the station basically because I would find the best music there. 

Kiss 100 was also my favorite because they would play the best hit songs that everybody could sing along.

Now this is not the case, stations that based their content around music are now struggling. If I want to listen to new songs I would rather go to Spotify and search them instead of waiting for the whole day listening to a boring station only because they play my favorite song. 

Podcasts have also changed everything in the media industry. The good thing about podcast is that there is no censureship on content and they can say whatever they want without sugar coating anything.

For example I like sports and politics. I will not waste my day waiting for Mazungmzo waziwazi or Spoti wikiendi. There are podcasters who are already doing that. 

I will just go and search podcasts that discuss matters politics or sports.

There are more podcasts on YouTube than songs . Every topic has been covered leaving radio on it's knees. The best thing about podcast is that these guys do not script their conversations. It's natural and the creators are well informed on what they talk about. The success of podcast is majorly because of the independence of these creators that allow them to explore their creative minds.

This is something that radio has failed to implement. There is no difference between radio and acting. The producers play a major role in failure or success 

 The radio hosts are told what to do.

After realizing that music and some content is not the core reason why people can tune in to radio now, the stakeholders switched gears and changed the hiring system. 

They decided to employ funny characters to reflect on the lead presenters At some point this worked but the introduction of TikTok changed everything. All funny conversations are now on TikTok hence the idea of hiring comedians died before we knew it.

And as if this lesson wasn't enough, radio owners decided to hire TikTokers with the hope of converting their followers to listeners. This is a short term solution because people can lose the fun character in them.

The last resort taken to save the dying radio was the introduction of giveaways.

This is where a sound, question or game is played and the winner gets to be awarded. 

At the introduction stage, this thing worked but later people started complaining of not not being paid. All media stations in Kenya are doing this and Royal Media has gone to the extent of having a betting company. Radio stations have now turned into betting companies.

They want to use this rewarding system to attract more audience but the problem is that there is no transparency in that.

There were stations that used to rule the airwaves' back in the days but they no longer exist .

This is because they've failed to learn and adapt to change.

Let the conversation be centered around issues affecting people, talk about trends in a humourous way allow social media to be the guide for topics discussed.

Creative freedom should be promoted.Just like when Jesus came, many were called, few were chosen and those who were chosen were the ones who adapted to change .