CPR Promotional Check-Up - Aug 20, 2012

Bet/Destroy/(Insert Violent Verb) Your Debt

Was sitting in a hotel perusing the fare on network and cable during prime time. Games are back with a vengeance.

TV is great at discovering themes, genres and methodologies. Radio is good and glomming on and stealing them, ie:, we'd have been bereft of contesting themes for a decade if it wasn't for Millionaire, Deal Or No Deal, Survivor, The Real World, Idol and Dancing With Stars.

TV does games. Games have opened-ended options as to the conclusions. God forbid, people lose. People love to watch and play vicariously and try to beat the people on TV.

Radio has contests 99% of the time. We tell you up front what caller ten wins at 11:08. No mystery. No surprise. And judging by the research, no one cares.

Even "Pay Your Bills", which is a homerun, lacks any show biz element. We read Bob's name. Bob calls. We pay his bill. And it works. Imagine if it was exciting and people occasionally got zonked. THAT would play to the 97%.

Delete Your Debt is Beat The Bomb, which is invariably one of the best game (note: game) methodologies out there. People sit in their cars mentally coaching them to stick or quit. Jamz in Birmingham did this with stealing gas. KRTR in Honolulu did this with hacking into an ATM machine that shared a wall with the station. It was a game. Who knows if the next person will win or how much...so you have to listen.

I think it would be be great to do Destroy Your Debt. Call in time and within 30 minutes jumpsuited promo people (Attached is a photo from Fuge in the UK: they "get" show biz over there) show up at your door, carefully place your bills into a burn can on a stick, this is carried out to a larger, coned off container and lowered in. Fuse is lit and with camera rolling, your AMEX bill disappears in a fountain of sparks as your neighbors applaud.

If Mark Burnett was tasked with coming up with a TV version of PYB, I doubt he'd model it on the Radio design.

I think he'd do Bet Your Debt. The morning show picks two families who have sent in their bills to be paid and calls them. Each family bets their debt on the outcome of a bet between the morning show. They could both place their bets on Dave, or on Lena or split them. Whoever wins the daily bet, gets their listeners paid off. Somedays no one will win. Other days, both will. "Today's bet? Who can successfully sneak into (whatever the hot topic film of the week is)"

Wired in Saskatoon sent off a dozen pairs of listeners for "17 Hours In Las Vegas." They took two listeners each morning, one sided with Ryder and one with Brandy. Whoever won that day's bet, also won for their listeners.