Category Archives: Overview

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #684: Give the People What They Want — Really?

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There’s an old saying, “Give the people what they want.” That was the gospel.

But Volkswagon didn’t agree. People were driving huge cars when the original Beetle came out – but then millions and millions of VW Beetles were sold.

George Lucas didn’t. The sci-fi genre was pretty sparse when “Star Wars” came out. Hollywood moguls said people didn’t want that. They were, uh…wrong.

Apple didn’t. They knew a more intuitive computer was better. And a laptop (or later, an iPad) was a much better choice for millions of people than a giant, heavy desktop computer. Plus, Steve Jobs knew that a sleek, futuristic design for a mobile phone was going to make huge, complicated phones horribly outdated. They CREATED desire.

Give people what they want, sure, but also give them new approaches.

Example: My brilliant partner John Frost consulted a station in Austin, Texas. One of the first things he did was to have them play “The Eyes of Texas” at noon every day. People didn’t know they wanted this, but it set the station’s tone as being a TEXAS station. It was what they wanted, but they may not have known that.

Don’t kid yourself into thinking that a corporate, format-wide 300-song playlist is what people want. I’d like to drive a couple hundred miles WITHOUT hearing the same, beaten-to-death songs on every station in a given format.

I’d like to hear Promos and Production in general that can compete with Hollywood movie trailers.
I’d like to hear disc jockeys that sound like they came from the same region they broadcast to.

I’d like to hear something that SURPRISES me, rather than just “what people want.” And I’ll bet you would, too.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #682: A Takeaway from the great Lee Abrams

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Among his many accomplishments, my friend Lee Abrams is the guy who started XM radio (now SiriusXM). The idea that most radio people thought would never work is now a giant entity that changed the face of radio for countless people.

Having worked with Lee in Chicago and Cleveland, and watching him do his magic over the decades, let me share something about him that you might want to consider:

Lee always searched for an attitude in his stations. In Chicago, for instance (his hometown), he knew that the traditional AM Top 40 stations in the early seventies had become stale. Same thing in Cleveland. No new ideas. The jingles all sounded typical, the Production elements were predictable, etc.

Lee wanted the slew of stations that he consulted to have several ingredients that stood out: Hipness. Up to date. Young. Idealistic. Not afraid to take chances.

So…do a little “gut check” and listen objectively to your station. Is it those things? Is it ANY of those things?

The great pioneers of modern radio (Gordon McLendon, Todd Storz, Bill Drake, Jack McCoy, and so many more) heard what was already there, and decided to change it.

“Oh, but change is so hard.”

No, it isn’t. Start by taking something that’s been there forever and throwing it away. Then you HAVE to think of something new to replace it with.

Rinse and repeat. Forever.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #681: A Line From a Song

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A song I wrote a few years ago contains the line, “To refuse to see is the same as being blind.”

This definitely applies to radio, and raises questions:

Do you listen to your own show regularly?
Can you hear the things that you don’t do that well?
If you can, do you work on correcting and upgrading those things?
Do you have a P. D., friend, or talent coach to help you recognize where you can improve, and define what your greatest strengths are?

The point is, you want to eliminate the subpar things, discover what you do really well, then only do those things.

I believe that anyone who wants to become an elite Talent needs that focus.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching tip #680: What Will YOU Say?

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Here’s how careers are made…

When something happens – something that seemingly everyone is buzzing about – and you make a comment, what will you say that no one else would say?

If you can get past that, and own that, and get to where that’s the way your brain works, you will be a major star.

Read. Watch great movies. Listen to great songs. They all have that in common.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #674: The Aircheck Swap Meet

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Here’s something you can do to both improve your on-air performance and bond the station together a bit.

Years ago, my friend and fellow Texas Radio Hall of Fame member Bruce Gilbert each Programmed a station in the same cluster – mine was a Talk station, Bruce’s was a Sports-talk station.

We went to a hotel in downtown Dallas – away from the constant interruptions of the office environment, and listened to each other’s station. In separate rooms. For several hours. Taking notes about what we heard that we liked, and what might need a little help.

Then we went to lunch, and just chatted about normal stuff.
Following that, we went back to the hotel and shared our notes with each other. SO healthy. Truly eye-opening at times.

When you see your work through someone else’s eyes (or ears, in our case), you get a fresh perspective. Try it with a friend on the staff. It doesn’t have to be “formal”. Just “you listen to me, and I’ll listen to you,” then share with each other honestly, with no offense taken.

Ideas always seem to erupt spontaneously on something to DO. (Which is the first mandate: Do something.)

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #663: Sounding Smart

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If you make grammatical errors, like mangling the object of a preposition (“Between her and I,” instead of “between her and me,” for instance), that shows a level of education that isn’t high enough.

We’re supposed to set the standard. We’re supposed to be the one person in the group who’s the best conversationalist, that uses the fewest words to make a point, that uses the right words to express your emotions, and can generate enough friendship and excitement just to hear what you have to say – the person who’s welcome in any conversation. THAT’S the goal.

To be a good conversationalist is to be an intelligent conversationalist. Not a “brainiac” or an “I’m smarter than you are” stiff; just a person whose thoughts are welcome, maybe even occasionally quoted by other people.

I believe that if you don’t sound smart, no one’s going to come to you for your thoughts when something dramatic happens.

Think about this: We OWE IT to the listener to sound smart. If you speak like an undereducated clod, why would I want to listen to you?

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #657: One New Feature

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One of the things I always challenge morning shows to do as a new year begins is to come up with one new “feature” for the show.

This means dropping one old one.

One of the definitions of a feature is “Something offered as a special attraction.”
SPECIAL attraction. Not just something you start doing, but something you draw attention to.

Here are a few keys:

• It has to be focused. (Know your target listener. Aim for the bulls-eye.)
• You should have several examples in mind of how it’ll unfold before you ever air it.
• Think about a produced intro to make it stand out. (But make it short. A big buildup can backfire on you.)
• Think of how each “episode” ends first. THEN think of how to start it.

If you get into the habit of letting older bits go, and replacing them with new ones, you’ll probably put a little more distance between you and your competitors.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2026 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #655: Faith and Hope

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It seems appropriate as we head toward the end of 2025 to offer this tip:

The world runs on Faith and Hope.

Either one of those will do, but both of them together is what everybody wants.
So – in the coaching process, and in the learning process, you have to have faith that you’re going to get better. And you have to hope that this next step will get you up that talent staircase to where you’re really a top-level performer.

Another year of coaching passes, and I wish everyone reading this a great next year.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2025 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer CoachingTip #654: Environmental Awareness

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Radio still seems to be somewhat nomadic. Rarely, if ever, does an air talent stay at one station all of his/her career.

But hopefully, moving to a new station is an upward move. I worked at many stations over my 30+-year on-air career, and nothing illustrates this point better than an early move I made from Dallas to San Diego.

I was leaving KNUS in Dallas (the first FM station to ever be #1), and felt fairly confident that I had learned quite a lot at that point working for radio pioneer Gordon McLendon and his VP, Ken Dowe.

But KCBQ in San Diego was the hottest CHR station in the country, and I would make 50% more salary there.
However, it wasn’t quite the same. While the whole airstaff in Dallas had contributed to our formatics, the way we handled, for instance, a “cold” ending song into a song that started cold “(:00 intro); never saying the call letters into commercials (because guess what doing that signals to the listener over time), and many other minute, but important ingredients.

KCBQ was different. The PD, the brilliant Jack McCoy, had just come off probably the most famous contest ever, “The Last Contest”, which offered fantastic prizes and created “buzz” like no one had seen before. The on-air approach was more “up” and the breaks over song intros and stop-down Content breaks were quite short. And it had that southern California “cool” vibe.

I had adjustments to make. I paid attention, listened to the other dayparts, and got into the rhythm pretty quickly, but it did take a bit of tweaking.

When and if you go to a new station, take time to sense the environment. The overall vibe of the station, the timing of things, the kind of Content that works in that market – so you can fit in easily. Soon, you’ll be “part of the gang”, and bank another learning experience. Environmental Awareness always pays off.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2025 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.

Tommy Kramer Coaching Tip #651: The Importance of Timing

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There’s a good lesson to learn from the World Series. Or the Super Bowl. Or the NBA Playoffs.
They all have one thing in common: It’s about doing the right things.
But not just that. It’s doing the right things at the right TIME.

It’s the same, in any music format, for what you say on the air when you make a comment. First, did you cut off the very end of that last word in the song’s vocal? Is that because you’re too anxious to talk? (Would you do that if you were the emcee for that artist’s live show? Chances are, the crowd would boo you, and the artist would never want you to be the emcee again.)

Patience.
Timing.
A sense of rhythm.
These things are essential to a great air talent.

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Tommy Kramer
Talent Coach
214-632-3090 (mobile)
e-mail: coachtommykramer@gmail.com
Member, Texas Radio Hall of Fame
© 2025 by Tommy Kramer. All rights reserved.