Planning for the Holidays on Your Radio Station

Holidays of any kind can call for special holiday programming on your station. Whether holiday programming is a strategy, your station's specialty, or just something special to throw in every once in awhile, there's a chance holiday programming plays a part on your station. And, an important part of having that programming on your station is planning it beforehand.

Why's planning important? Planning is the first step to preparing your programming, giving you the opportunity to think through every aspect of it to make it the best programming it can possibly be.

When planning, you might ask yourself the following questions:

• What will my programming be?
  • Will it be a playlist, live event, or scheduled event?
  • Will I have multiple shows?
  • What will it be about?
  • What will the format(s) be?
  • Will any guests be involved?
• When will my programming air?
  • Will it be one time or recurring?
    • If recurring, when?
• What do I need to create beforehand?
  • Do I need a script?
  • Do I need to record anything?
  • Do I need to create promotional images?

After deciding all of the details of your programming and creating the actual content, you should create your final schedule that you'll publish in advance. Planning isn't just important for the content creation portion, it's also vital for the marketing portion. Once you have a plan and develop your final schedule, you can then share that schedule with your listeners to keep them updated, so they are never in the dark about what to expect on your station. This may involve publishing the schedule to your website, station profile page, and/or social media as well as on-air promotions.

In addition to informing listeners, it's important to inform Live365 of your holiday programming schedule and details. We are always looking for more ways to help promote your stations, so having information ahead of time on what your stations have going on, especially around the holidays, is really helpful to direct our efforts. This is why we encourage Live365 broadcasters to submit their plans for holiday programming or special programming of any kind to this form. No matter what holiday or occasion you're celebrating on your station, we want to know about it! Once we have this information, we can more appropriately curate blog and social media content that features your stations.

Ultimately, planning your holiday programming in advance is crucial for both the content creation and marketing for your station. You might be able to whip up your holiday programming the day before, but that just may not be enough time to properly market your special programming, meaning you might miss out on interested listeners. So, don't forget the planning phase, and don't overlook its importance to marketing your station!

For more info on programming your station during the holidays, see this article.

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