For most folks in the sports media business, December-February is a time when things slow down. Holidays hit, vacations get used, and aside from a few bowl games, NFL playoff games, and the Super Bowl, sports viewing becomes more manageable.
But for yours truly, this is the most chaotic three month stretch of the year. I rarely travel during this 90-day period because so much has to be done in a short amount of time. The one exception I make is a 2-3 day visit to radio row during the week of the Super Bowl. Yes I’ll be there this year even if one radio group has less of a presence. It’s just my opinion, but the biggest event in sports deserves to be covered live on-site by local sports stations, especially in cities where NFL teams reside.
But I digress.
It’s this time of year when I finalize the BSM Top 20. The process involves gathering feedback from industry executives, creating custom images of the people/shows that earned votes, writing press releases and columns, and developing a social posting schedule so the series reaches the most amount of eyeballs. Somewhere in there I also have to make time to listen to and talk with clients, manage the content flow on the website, and find time for my family.
But that’s not all that’s on my plate.
The remaining details for the 2020 BSM Summit have to be figured out in January and February too. That means hunting down speakers for specific subjects, creating visual presentations, meeting with building officials, securing the cocktail reception location, creating and producing programs, determining the award winners with a small circle of industry executives, having the custom awards made, hiring the videographer, laying out the conference schedule, writing press releases, developing a promotional content strategy ahead of the show, and selling sponsorships. It’s why at this time of year I start looking ahead to February 28th (the day after the Summit is over).
Speaking of sponsors, I want to extend my appreciation to ESPN Radio, Compass Media Networks, Harker Bos Group, and Steve Stone Voiceovers for signing on as partners of the 2020 BSM Summit. Putting on this event isn’t cheap, and without their support I wouldn’t be able to continue doing it. With that in mind, we do still have a few sponsor opportunities available. If your company would like to be involved as an event partner please send me an email here. Your participation makes a big difference.
Also, if you’re planning to attend the conference, we’ll be having a special holiday sale December 16-24 on BSMSummit.com. Ticket prices will be lowered to $224.99. This will be our final sale so take advantage of it if you’re planning to come.
I’ve had a few industry friends say to me ‘you must make a killing on that event‘ and I laugh when I hear it because the amount of resources and time that goes into executing this event makes it impossible to feel like I’m walking away in the plus column. But that’s not why I do it. I built the Summit to bring the sports media industry together, and help people learn and improve their business. If in the process I can gain a few fans and earn future business, that’s icing on the cake.
If you’re reading this and not familiar with me on a personal level, I hope you’ll remember what I said in the last paragraph about why I created this conference. Sometimes we have good intentions, and try to do good for others, yet folks on social media who we don’t know take aim at us because they see an opportunity to make noise at our expense.
Last year on Christmas night, I was doing what most people do, enjoying the evening with my family. I dropped off my son at his grandparents house, and took my fiance to dinner at a casino when my Twitter timeline started blowing up. I assumed a talent with a large social following retweeted a BSM story, but soon discovered I was under attack for the 2019 BSM Summit not being diverse. The comments caught me off guard because I hadn’t finalized the conference schedule, and I’m the same guy who wrote pieces calling for more women and minorities to be given opportunities in the industry. In fact, the year prior in Chicago, I had Jason Goff and Sarah Spain participate in one of our best and most honest discussions on that very topic.
Even more frustrating was that I had talked to a few women about being part of the show but wasn’t going to announce new additions until January. I knew that releasing speaker announcements during the holiday week would receive little attention so I figured I’d wait until the first week of January when more people would take notice. As a matter of fact, I’m actually going to release some additional names to this year’s show next week just to avoid a similar headache during the upcoming holidays.
But none of that mattered.
All it took was one motivated uninformed person with a cell phone to cause chaos. Once it starts, others pile on, and soon you’re stuck defending yourself to people you have no connection to.
I learned firsthand on that night how ruthless people can be. Thankfully I developed thick skin a long time ago and don’t let negativity deter me from getting to where I want to go. I trusted that my industry friends and clients would see thru the BS and not overreact, but more importantly, I knew who I was as a person, and what my plans were for the show. Once February rolled around, we had a great event in Los Angeles with many different people involved, and I’m proud of what we created.
When I put the Summit schedule together each year, I choose people to participate based on merit and their fit with specific topics. I welcome people from all backgrounds, and give them a platform to present issues and solutions at the show that will help those in attendance. If the idiots surfing the mean streets of Twitter who don’t know me don’t like my approach, that’s OK. They’re not my audience, and they’re not going to define who I am.
Although that experience was disheartening, it opened up my eyes to the darker side of social media. I learned that night that some people browse social media looking for a reason to be offended. Some want to be activists and push for change when they’re not even aware of the facts behind the thing they’re trying to change. They also don’t reappear afterwards when you’ve done a good job to tell you they’re sorry or that they were wrong about your intentions.
Keep in mind, I’m just a consultant. The avalanche of hate that on-air talent deal with is much worse. Most of the time managers don’t even know the extent of it. If they do, most aren’t trained on how to manage it. It’s easy to tell a host ‘ignore it, he/she is a jerk’ but we’re all human and affected differently.
I remember talking to Colin Dunlap of 93.7 The Fan in Pittsburgh on Season 3 of the BSM Podcast and he shared how some trolls on Twitter took aim at his daughter who was going thru a battle with cancer. How is that not supposed to affect someone? If you were in his shoes wouldn’t you be thinking about tracking down the individual who said it to inflict some pain on them? If you did, you’d be human.
With mental health being an important issue in the country today, I can’t help but wonder how many air talent are affected by their exposure to harmful social media content without us knowing it. We’re conditioned in the media industry to be mentally tough and absorb criticism, but if someone in your building isn’t strong enough to handle it, what’s the solution for helping them? Do you have support available in house for your employees? Do you know the first call to make outside of the building?
You may not have thought about this before because so much of the job is focused on creating content, chasing ratings, and generating revenue, but the words our people see each day get baked into their brains and can have a lasting affect. Imagine if you were under constant scrutiny the way Mike Francesa has been with the Funhouse account on Twitter. Though some of the clips are funny, what if it were you in Francesa’s shoes. Could you endure that daily criticism? How would you respond when friends, family, listeners, and media outlets constantly bring it up? I don’t care how thick your skin is, you’d be affected. The only question is how much.
If you watched the HBO documentary this week with Bill Belichick and Nick Saban, you heard Belichick mention how much he hates social media. He’s right when he says ‘who cares if you get 2,000 likes from people you don’t know‘ but we’re in a business where we seek constant validation of our content and opinions. To expect talent to disappear from the space when it has many positives and offers them the fix they need is impossible.
Everywhere you turn, brands are promoting social platforms in order to build deeper relationships with the audience. These channels are necessary to push content to our fans, but more importantly, they’re also a pathway to revenue. Yet the same pathway we wish to monetize is littered with people seeking to mentally damage our talent.
As I gear up for the third BSM Summit in NYC this February, this is a topic I’m interested in hearing discussed by some of our on-air talent and PD’s. How do we navigate hate on social media? What can we do to help those who use these platforms for professional purposes yet are mentally abused in the process? We may not have the answer today or by the Summit, but if we stay alert and continue working on it, those we care most about will be less damaged.
Jason Barrett is the President and Founder of Barrett Media since the company was created in September 2015. Prior to its arrival, JB served as a sports radio programmer, launching brands such as 95.7 The Game in San Francisco, and 101 ESPN in St. Louis. He also spent time programming SportsTalk 950 in Philadelphia, 590 The Fan KFNS in St. Louis, and ESPN 1340/1390 in Poughkeepsie, NY. Jason also worked on-air and behind the scenes in local radio at 101.5 WPDH, WTBQ 1110AM, and WPYX 106.5. He also spent two years on the national stage, producing radio shows for ESPN Radio in Bristol, CT. Among them included the Dan Patrick Show, and GameNight.
You can find JB on Twitter @SportsRadioPD. He’s also reachable by email at Jason@BarrettMedia.com.
I so concur.