Christian Media's Next Blockbuster

Netflix quietly dropped an announcement a few days ago without a tremendous amount of fanfare - On Christmas Day 2024, Netflix will broadcast 2 NFL games live on their platform. ?Netflix – that company started in 1997 by mailing DVDs to your house – will be the only way to watch these matchups.

After hearing this news, the words of business writer Greg Satell came to my mind- Greg is a frequent contributor to all the business websites and writes often about companies that are approaching the future with purpose and a plan. Here’s Greg’s wisdom –

“In a networked world, the best way to become a dominant player is to become an indispensable partner.” -Greg Satell

In a nutshell, Greg’s main point is that today, organizations that thrive in their space are organizations that network well, both in their sector and across sectors. In the past, business owners aimed for efficiency and streamlined processes that cut costs and drove profits. New technology and new platforms required networking and partnering to adapt, and some companies literally vaporized into thin air because they were afraid to embrace a partnership that was outside what they knew.

Such is the case with now-defunct Blockbuster Video –Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings brought a partnership opportunity to the leadership at Blockbuster early on, only to essentially be laughed out of their office. Blockbuster had its systems and processes in place and failed to open their mind to “adjacent possibilities for growth (or survival, depending on how you look at it)” by networking with others.

Here’s where this becomes real for our radio stations. We’re in danger of following in Blockbuster’s footsteps. We’ve had a business / donor support model that has served us well, and we know how to run it with precision and efficiency. Meanwhile all around us, others who are competing for the attention of “our people” are doubling down on networking across sectors, forging new partnerships, making new connections, figuring out new ways to grow brands and make a living doing what they do, but in a new way.

The speed in which this is all happening feels like it is increasing exponentially every week. Artists are growing successful brands / careers without record labels, and are collaborating with other artists / creators across genres. Record labels are growing their rosters without radio. Live event producers are collaborating and merging. Concerts are coming to our towns and selling out solely on digital ad placement and social media buzz. ?Hollywood is taking a more serious look at faith-based stories, etc.. ?

Some standouts in radio are shaking things up a bit. IHeart Media’s commitment to their app certainly meets consumers where they are with what they want, and iHeart has cleverly tapped into the audiences of all their competitors (us!) in the process by volunteering to offer our content on their platform for free. Media companies are merging, not just to scale up their reach, but to leverage each other’s superpowers. New formats are emerging, focused on growing passionate audiences over large audiences. I know of one media ministry that is actively working on a streaming platform alternative to Spotify. While these things are wonderful and exciting, it is not enough.

Over the last few months there has been, in my opinion, way too much buzz about Christian radio stations playing or not playing songs by Forrest Frank and Josiah Queen – two artists creating music that is clearly connecting with a completely home-grown (and quite massive) digital audience. With both “Good Day” and “The Prodigal”, radio just barely jumped into the tail-end of the “parade” right before it completely passed us by. There is a narrative floating around (maybe it’s just floating around in my own head), that if your station played those 2 songs, then you somehow “get it”– you’re embracing the future (Yay! Way to go!). And, if you didn’t play the songs… well, you “don’t get it” and will soon fossilize before our very eyes. (Boo!)

Whether or not your station played those songs is irrelevant. If we learn anything from the disruption that those songs have caused, it’s this: Radio is RIFE with systems and processes that aren’t working the way they used to anymore, and in order for us to embrace the future and continue to share Jesus with the world, we have to be willing to strip our ministries all the way down to the skeletal foundation of our mission (to share Jesus with the world) and our method (faith-based media on radio towers and digital platforms), and rebuild everything with a structure of connections, partnerships, and collaboration.

This isn’t simply a discussion about changing up the way we choose music, although that is a process that is being disrupted (Josiah and Forrest are a very quick sneak peek into that). We must also invite disruption into everything else we do – our financial support models, our research methods, our audience measurement, our success metrics, our marketing efforts, all the way down to even our weekend programming. While I am not suggesting that everything that is “tried and tested” is outdated and needs to be re-thought, I am saying we’ve all got a number of “sacred cows” that need to become steaks.

I am confident that back in 1997 when the founders of Netflix launched their company with the mission “We want to entertain the world”, they never envisioned that on Christmas Day 2024 they would be showing millions of NFL fans 2 exclusive games on their proprietary internet platform… and yet here we are. They have leveraged their platform for collaboration probably 100 times between then and now, and while their mission remains solidly the same, their company looks so much different. On the flipside, how many of our organizations look pretty much the same as we did back in 1997?

Starting today, I recommend we abandon the idea that there is only one step-by-step “recipe” for creating a radio station, and focus on leveraging our platforms, expertise, and assets into being an indispensable partner to our listeners, to other ministries, to other media, to the artists / labels, to those we’ve previously viewed as our competitors, and to other like-minded companies and individuals who share our mission.

Our future hinges on it.