CPR Promotional Check-Up - Nov 29, 2021

New Years Eve

This is it. The last big promotional opportunity of 2021. Going to a club and hanging a banner qualifies you for the exciting world of fast food middle management.

This is potentially a big night for radio listening. You're the background music and party music to thousands of at-home bashes. You need to sound out of control. Audio quality is never going to be as key as it is this December 31. Most club broadcasts suck. Distorted. Screaming girls. You get the idea. 'HYT in Detroit had a novel concept and went down and miked the entire club. Not just the jock's mike in the DJ booth. They had live mikes everywhere. It sounded larger then life. Wild 97.9 in Oklahoma City did something similar, and had three jocks in three different parts of the same club. It sounded very MTV-ish as they sent it back and forth to each other. Wherever you're going to be this New Years, go down a couple weeks ahead and start doing sound checks.

Revenue aside, the reason we do clubs is because it gives us a vibe. That's the reason to be doing these gigs. Not because a huge number of your listeners will be there (because they won't), but to improve your on-air sound. And it's important to do more then just a club. This is like Halloween. You should have a club (or ten), plus something for the families and something for the massive audience listening along wherever they're partying. Now, on to the ideas. In no particular order...

“Club Gigs” Pretty much every December 31st club gig blurs together. The names all sound the same. The breaks all sound the same.

What if you did “Last Call” as the moniker. The hook is that throughout the evening you will somehow choose a letter of the alphabet. (My choice would be to have an intern in a diaper as baby New Year, you reach in and pull out a piece of paper with a letter on it)

Then, live on the club soundsystem, you call a place like a brothel in Amsterdam or a 7-11 in China or a bus station payphone in Australia. Person picks up, you play a hook of a song, they ID it and everyone on the club with that letter as a first initial, wins a drink.

Wired in Philly used “The Big Hook Up” as their club event moniker. Why? Because they weren’t trying to dance around the issue: that was the reason people came to their club gigs. To hook up. “We could call it ‘The Big New Years Eve Dance Party And Seasonal Soiree’, but who’re we fooling?”

Michael Martin is the King of weird names. They did “No Names Futtbucker Bonanza And Meat Circus” as a concert name a few years ago.

And “Extreme Hangover: The Club Edition” was done by a couple of you in 2019.

“Baby New Year” As done by Y-94: a cutest baby gallery contest.

“Happy Renewal Year” How fortunate you would be if one of your talent is ordained and could renew vows at your inevitable New Years Eve event.

“Because New Years Eve Isn’t Complete With A Drunken Kiss At Midnight” One of the morning guys was lamenting that he didn’t have someone to grope and neck-munch on at midnight. So women emailed in their drunken mobile phone shots from the past year, those were posted, voted on all day and his Midnight Mishap was crowned at 5 pm.

“Listeners Choice Music Features” The phenomenally cool Mix 94.9 in Cincy catered to the people who actually listened to the radio on 12/31/16; the house parties. They had listeners submit one hour blocks of music over the previous two weeks and each hour was “programmed” from a house party.

“The Early Shift” Z-94.7 in Grand Forks awarded the post balldrop airshift from midnight to 1 am to the winner of their Best Year Ever Contest.

“Polar Bear Dives” In many markets they do Polar Bear Dives on New Years Day. Large groups of people venture down to the lake/river/ocean and jump in. Why? Latent brain damage would be my guess, but if this isn't a tradition in your city, you've got an opportunity to host a first. Obviously this wouldn't work in Miami or Dallas, but just about everywhere else, it would.

“Live & Worldwide” You know what would be cool? Webcam a listeners’ houseparty. Much like Y-94 when there was a blizzard and the city shut down.

“Walk Of Shame” Tommy Chuck is married to the lovely and lithe former promo assistant from KDWB, Alli Petterson. Her costume at the Exotic Erotic Ball was “The Walk Of Shame”. Man’s dress shirt, mis-buttoned. Boxers. Socks. Bed hair. Smeared makeup. Hickey on her neck.

There will be a LOT of walking on Wednesday morning. This is a topic. Or ask one of the talent for a video tutorial. Or do it as a pageant at your NYE event

“InstaMigrain” New Years Eve on social media is about drunken selfies. You need a gallery for people to post them after they post to their own page.

“Invasion Of The Party Crashers” I think that many people have begun to realize that by just being at a club, you’re reaching a small percentage of the partying public. So most of the stations include some aspect of this in their plans for December 31st every year. The best New Years Eve I ever spent in Radio was in San Francisco when I hit the road at 4 pm and didn't crawl back into the station until 4 am. In between, we cruised the market, popping in to people's parties and crashing clubs. It sounded GREAT on the air. Every 20 minutes there was a break from another party. We sounded omni-present. Plus I stuffed myself on all the food these parties were serving.

In addition to whatever your plans are, you should allocate a van or limo and at least one jock to going out and cruising the market. Have people call/e-mail where they'll be partying and ringing in 2022. Spread out a map and pick locations in various parts of the city so you don't get bunched up in one area. Get some pizzas, deli trays, bottles of champagne and noise makers and hit ten or twenty parties over the course of the evening. Can you imagine having a radio station show up at your New Years Eve party? It'd be huge. And we're not talking six or seven people sitting around and playing Risk. Some of these house parties get hundreds of guests who are, yes, listening to your station. You'll sound much more "rounded" if you have some breaks from these parties, interspersed with call-ins from clubs and concerts. You'll pretty much have covered your bases.

How do you pick the parties you hit? On the website. Come up with a cool graphic and give them a quick form to fill out. In addition to the obvious “where” and “when” and “how many”, you’ll want to spice it up and ask some stuff like?

• Potential of nudity? 0%, 10%, 25% 50%, 75%, or 100%?
• Domestic or imported beer?
• Accessibility to a hot tub?
• Illegal fireworks?
• Have the police ever been summoned to this residence before?
• Describe briefly the array of food our under-paid and over-worked staff can except to find.

Another consideration when selecting locations is distance between them. Map out the night so you only have 10-15 minutes max between hits. Power in Miami, NOW in NY and Hot in Greenville have done this. Club-to-houseparty-to-another-house-party-back-to-club.

(A Dial Position Number) Party Hits KTFM in San Antonio hit 102 parties New Years 2006, in addition to having their homebase at a club. Sounded larger then life.

“Ball Drop” Times Square in New York is famous for its ball drop. Is there an appropriate location in town for you to create a tradition with a similar event? Very few radio stations have created a tradition. Here's an opportunity for you to join that select group. Maybe localize it. Instead of a ball, in Atlanta they drop a peach. What would fit your local vibe?

“Ball$ Drop” Kiss in Cincy dropped 2007 pingpong balls from the ceiling of their event in ‘06. One was worth $1000.

“And Now, A Commercial Interruption” You really need to clear the spots out on New Years Eve. You’re going to be the party music for 1000’s of houseparties. The moment you go into spots (and they’ll inevitably be for Massengill or Levitra), they’ll stick in their phone and you’ll be off for the rest of the year.

“Marriage Material” I've already sent this out but it bears repeating: want press? Then marry 200 couples at your event on the 31st. Or divorce some people and allow them to start the new year un-encumbered. Or do a singles night and at midnight, marry whoever wants to, and then divorce them two days later on the morning show on Friday. Lots to work with here, folks. Wild in Tampa had a justice of the peace on hand in ‘02 and married a dozen or so completely trashed couples who’d just met on the dance floor.

“One Night Stands” I can't think of a night that has more one night stands. Find a listener who's dateless this New Years and track down one of their old one night stands to see if they want to end the year with a bang.

“Music” Since this is Party Central, the music and vibe need to reflect it. I've seen stations that don't figure this is a big night so they put a part-timer on the air. Are you insane? This is one of the biggest cuming nights ever. Whether you're doing a countdown or uninterrupted mix show, make it smoke. Last year one of the stations mixed all New Years Day and called it The Hangover Mix.

“The Sky Suite” In many cities the downtown area is closed off for a street party. If that's true where you are, then add it to the list of places that you absolutely must have someone doing check-ins. And screw them if there's an "official" station and it's not you. Rambo it.

A radio studio is a pretty vibe-less environment. How can your jock on New Years Eve sound excited about his/her job when they're sitting alone with no access to alcohol?!?! If you can't get down in the middle of the action on the street, then get a hotel room high up above the action, dub it your Sky Suite and make that home base for all your call-ins throughout the night.

“Psychics” A great "last bit of the year" is always to get a psychic on the air and have him/her make some predictions for the New Year. Can't get a psychic? Let your audience have a crack at it. You can either have them call in and air their predictions for fun, or, you can have them e-mail in their Top Ten Predictions For 2022. As a Facebook topic, it’s a “Duh”. Seal all of these in a box and open it the week after Christmas next year. The listener who has the most correct predictions wins.

Facebook Bests Have a different best for people to vote on every day following Christmas. Concert. Song. Movie. Trend. Whatever. Have some fun and stray from the standard items. “Best Place To Go For Breakfast After Being Up All Night”. Stuff like that.

Facebook Death Pool Pick ten celebrities, allow FB friends to pick one, save the info and if their celeb kick, everyone who predicted them, gets something.

“My %$#@ing Head!” How about some homemade hangover remedies? Have your audience phone in some of their favorite and most effective cures for alcohol poisoning. I worked with a Traffic Director who swore by White Castle hamburgers. And don't forget the obligatory Hangover Survival Kits for contesting over the weekend. Once again: logoed barf bags.

“The Hangover Mix” Very simple music feature for New Years Day. Mellow music played at reasonable volumes. And yet another early morning on the 1st option would be to do a quick mix show and call it The Bloody Mary Mix. (Hot in Ottawa did the Hangover Countdown on the 1st with all the song intros and imaging being whispered)

“Noon Years Eve” Many of our stations have large audiences of young parents. (Or young audiences of large parents. [I can never get that straight.]) KSFM in Sacramento did my Noon Years Eve party for that segment of the population. The people who wanted to ring in the New Year with their kids...before leaving them with a sitter and heading out for the night. They did it at Chuckee Cheese and started the party on the 31st at around 10 am. They had games, contests, balloons, face painting, the Power Rangers were on hand to cut the cord for the balloon drop, plus one of the balloons had a certificate in it for a shopping spree at Toys R Us. The party culminated with a countdown to 12...noon. It was a huge success. How huge? The doors were supposed to open at 10 am. At 9 am there were 2000 people in line.

“New Years Arm Candy” ‘SJT in Tampa was blessed with a really sweet and very fun MD named Kathy Curtis So in ‘07 she leant herself out as arm candy for some listener at the station’s charity bash on the 31st. Men sent in their pics, the audience votes, and one lucky dude went to the party with her. As can only happen when you do something like this, the guy was a yokel with a belt buckle the size of Wyoming.

“Happy Nude Year!” A station in Portland had 200 people show up to bowl naked in 1999, so yes, listeners will take off their clothes by request. What if you did a giant, clothing optional party? It would make every news channel on the planet. Maybe at an indoor pool. Have games, maybe some reggae music, limbo contests...you get the idea.

“Babysitters” They're going to be high demand, and like Wii’s for Christmas, if you have access to some, you'll have them by the, uh, you get the point. Try to hook up with some licensed day care professionals and turn a hotel conference room or ballroom into a facility. Make it free and have your listeners drop their kids off with you before they head out to get blasted.

“The Last Babysitter” Sounds like a Steven Segal/Hillary Duff project. (I wanted to see if my e-mail would make it past your spam block with that heading) It goes without saying that babysitters will be few and far between on New Years Eve. Which means that this is truly a promotional opportunity. Like giving away gas during a gas crunch. Awarding listeners with babysitting service is one way to go. Or, if you want to do something that is totally FREE for the station, create an area on the website where teenage girls can post their availability to sit on the 31st. Maybe have it broken down by zip code or neighborhood, ie: “I’m Holly, I’m 14, I live in Kenwood, I charge $10 an hour and here are my references.’

“Inebriate Idol” If you miss the houseparties, which are about 70% of the NYE vibe, address them by having people send in cell phone pics of their drunk and passed out friends. Post them, have people vote, and the biggest drunk gets a pair of passes to every club event you do in '19: because they clearly represent the spirit of New Years, and, frankly, that's your kind of listener!

“Hotel Rooms” What if the best possible prize for on-air contesting starting on December 26th? Hotel rooms. People don’t want to go home and they want to keep the party going until dawn. Hotels all have packages they need to promote…start calling.

“Alternatives” I heard this as a morning show feature once and it sounded great. For the parents who are going to hang with their kids, provide a list of all the alternate activities that families can do together on New Years Eve. Put someone on the task of tracking down all these cool, un-publicized things that families can do to celebrate the new year in your market.

“Getting Loaded” Alcohol plays a big role in New Years Eve, and with some consequences. The whole "getting drunk on the air" bit is pretty old, but it might be good to have a lawyer and a cop on the air to talk about the financial impact of a DUI: raised insurance rates, etc. When it hits them in the wallets, they'll sit up and pay attention. Lucky at Kiss in Boise did an amazing video for prom season that tracked his getting pulled over, tested, jailed and bailed. Mix in Dothan did it pre-Thanksgiving as a morning show feature.

“Home Invasion” This would be the New Years version of KUBE's Not So Silent Night promotion when they took over a listener's home and threw a massive Christmas party with artists, food and games. Create the premise that your station has been banned from every club in town because you've had too much fun in the past and now you're looking for someone who will allow you to turn their home into Party Central. (Get insurance!!!)

“Bowl Patrol” There's lots of college football action on New Years Day, and instead of just having the van(s) sitting in the station parking lot, why not get some beer, chips, pizza and other roughage and hit the road to visit peoples' homes and apartments while they're recovering from the night before by watching some bowl games. This has a good on-air vibe, and once again, it beats having the vans parked out back all day.

“All Access Passes” Power 96 in Miami, like a lot of stations, had multiple clubs a few years back. So to service all of these parties, they created the Power 96 Power Pass which would get you into any of these bashes. Or all of them if you were feeling adventurous. This is a concept worth ripping off. Laminate some special passes and use these as prizes the week after Christmas. Your winners will feel like VIPs and by combining all the clubs and shows under one umbrella, it'll clean up the clutter while still giving them their all-important mentions.

“Reverse Resolutions” A great morning show idea. Basically let people get on the air and announce to the world all the vices they intend to start in 2022.

“A Last Temptation Weekend” This would be for that weekend’s contest: give out all-you-can-eat buffet passes, cigarettes, beer, gambling and other vices, so that your listeners can get in one last, final splurge of debauchery before swearing off them.

“First Baby/Last Baby” WPGC used to do this every year and gives a prize of $1000 in baby-related stuff to the first kid born in DC. Renie Hale networked with 20 hospitals that kept him apprised all night..

“Up All Night” One of the Promotion Directors on a conference call was talking about doing a big breakfast and blood mary bash at sunrise for all the revelers who'd been up all night. A great idea.

“Something To Remember 2021 By” KTFM had three countdowns one year: Top Club Songs, Most Requested and Top Selling. All three countdowns were put on CD’s and delivered to houseparties all night long.

“Breast New Years Ever” Breast augmentation is the gift that keeps on giving. Give one away at your New Years party. Have contestants get up and show what they’ve got. The audience votes on who gets the work done.

“More Stupid Drunken Activities” Besides getting married while drunk, getting tattoo’ed is another stupid drunken thing to do. So be an “enabler” and have a tattoo artist on hand to help make your party a memorable one. Or use “The Night Of 1000 Tattoos” as your umbrella for the evening.

“I’ll Drink To That” This is a KDWB morning show bit where they send a recording device out to bar gigs and get audio of drunks saying stupid sh*t. Then they breathalyze them and the next morning they play the audio and people call in and try to guess what they blew on the machine.

“The Erotic Exotic Ball” Tampa’s been doing them for years. The pics will blow you away. The actual concept for this party started in San Francisco during the 70's. It was the annual holiday party for that city's sex industry workers. It go co-opted and went mainstream as Halloween and New Year bashes for the general populace during the 80's (And boy are the hookers pissed.) I've already spoken to one morning show who was angry that they missed the chance to do this for Halloween. Cool. Then do it for New Years. It'd sure standout from all the lame club nights that will be happening.

“Global Fantasy House Party” This was a theater-of-the-mind trip around the world that Power in Miami did. They pulled all the spots for seven hours and did "live" check-ins from mega-Millenium bashes around the globe. This was all done ahead of time in Production, but it sounded TREMENDOUSLY better then the standard, distorted club call-ins that the competition was doing.

“NewYears Wii’ve” K-Rock in New Minas did this in 2013 and delivered food, booze and for one house, a Wii.

“New Years Eve Party Guide” We’re still trying to train the audience that our websites can be more than just celebrity gossip available on 900,000 other sites, and insistent soliciting for them to sign up for spam from us. B-96 in Chicago had a very cool list of events for New Years Eve in 2013.

“New Years Day Eve” We take working on New Years Eve for granted. We’re in Radio. We’re going to work. But our work is dramatically different then the poor shlubs out there who really DO have to work on NYE. Bartending. Cooking. Desk clerks. Security guards. Parking ramps. Cops. Hospital staff. The whole 3rd shift audience.What if you did a party for them? Maybe on the night of the 1st? Just a smaller version of what you did the night before. Or do a breakfast for them on the morning of the 1st. There are a myriad of “club nights” that address hotel/bar employees. This is just a spin on that.

“New Years Or Not” A contest for tickets to whatever you’re doing that night. Name five words and they have to ID them as being applicable to New Years:

Taxi? New Years
Diaper? New Years
People Magazine? Not
Stapler? Not
Crabs? New Years

Did I miss anything? Let me know. If you don't have a game plan soon, you're gonna be screwed. Call me if you want to brainstorm and work on something new and large for your market.

But, in retrospect, a club gig is probably the way to go. Since clearly there’s nothing else that can be done for New Years.