Blizzards generally are not a surprise. They don’t sneak up on you like a tornado or an earthquake or a rash 10-14 days after attending a bachelor party in Las Vegas.
On New Years 2011, Fargo was going to get nailed. This was not a surprise. They’d been calling for a snow storm for several days. So on the morning of the 31st we got on the phone, tore up the schedule and on six hours notice re-wrote the battle plan for that night. Every warm body was mustered to the station, they got a webcam going and when the snow hit at 7 pm and the city shut down, they had a big party on the air, on line and on social media.
While all the other stations in town had to resort to syndicated mix shows and countdowns because they hadn’t prepared, Y-94 was live, local and having a raucous party in the studio. At one point they had 63 houseparties webcammed on their site, and they added photos of the DJ’s puckering up so you could have someone to kiss at midnight.
It was flat out huge. When people are blizzarded in, what do they do? They sit on social media and HOPEFULLY listen to the radio. Read more…