Radio – Not just radio

Radio and its listeners share a warm, heartfelt, and a beyond-description unique relationship. Radio eventually becomes your best friend, your lover, your partner, or someone who stays with you, when you need it. But if you observe, it is actually like your teenage crush which is always with you, somewhere residing in your heart. You cannot see it, but you feel it, and this sudden smile gives us a never-ending romance, which we would surely agree.

In today’s time, radio has evolved to the level that it has become more than just a medium in your media portfolio. It covers every aspect to make an impactful reach to the consumers. Now the radio programming is designing aka treating its content in a way that it not only has on-air but digital and on-ground legs also. This has enabled the medium to get more realistic so that it touches lives.

Radio always had two-way communication; earlier listeners used to call radio jockeys on telephone lines. Now this has extended to the level that radio jockeys are going on ground and speaking to the consumers (read TG). Most of the radio players are making their on-ground presence, speaking to the consumers, and taking their voices on air, which gives boost to its local connect. Radio jockeys are the biggest influencers in the city. The youth follows them religiously and great impacts can be felt as youth also joins, echoing the voice of radio. So, on local level and at a wider horizon, it is the biggest tool to make a change in today’s era.

Now when digital is growing fast, radio has taken digital as its extension. Most of the radio content can be consumed on digital platforms; not only this, but radio professionals are taking lead on digital platforms and creating some really good original content, which is not confined in its geographical reach. Radio Mirchi’s YouTube channel Filmy Mirchi has more than 4.6 million subscribers, with many more in its kitty with Instagram and Facebook.

When radio comes together with digital it makes a stronger impact, and can be very beneficial for the brands that want to amplify their reach. As radio enjoys the perks of being a well-established medium in India, the players possessing a large network can even deliver localized content for digital! For digital also, small-city localized content is really big; it engages even people sitting in metro cities. Radio has an edge of having local radio jockeys who can create hyper-localized content for digital platform.

Apart from this, radio properties have been able to make a big mark in TV world also – Mirchi Top 20, Mirchi Music Awards to recall. We can hope to see more such content in coming days, giving better brand integrations and brand presence.

We are in the era where Gaana, JioSaavn, and other music apps are offering on-demand music, giving the user freedom to search any song of their choice. Radio has taken itself to the next level; on-demand music was the oldest format for radio and it had a stronger connect with the listeners, where listeners used to call the RJs, and get their song played on air, and dedications were enough to pass on your message to your loved ones.

Now radio reaches out to audience at large through concerts, which is giving music junkies a real-time feel so that they enjoy music in a lit ambience with great vibes around.

Gone are the days, when ideation in radio was chained with on-air treatment only. It reaches out to digital campaigns, on-ground activations, fulfilling the 360-degree demand of today’s market. This has made the medium-client chemistry get stronger, fetching better revenue-generating ideas and hence, strengthening the good old saying – Content is King!

Could there be a better romance besides radio? Pure, unadulterated and straight to the heart.