"No presenter is bigger than the station"

It's an old saying in radio - suggesting talent should be team players and rely on the station's overall success for the platform they have.

While I will always agree with the former (an issue of morality), I would question to what extent the latter is still true given how much more radio and other media we now consume.

Ultimately, it depends how the presenter as a brand compares to the station as a brand.

If the presenter merely exists as a voice to link together the overall package and talk up the whole station, despite fulfilling a valuable role, they are obviously not bigger.

If they consistently factor in personalised content that listeners emotionally connect with in some way, perhaps prompting people to follow them on social media, that's when the tables can turn.

However, it takes a lot of work to get into that position if you're starting from nothing on the radio.

You may have heard a few community station egos who believe they are the big draw - often doing shows that seem to be all about them which, ironically, is the first barrier to winning an audience.

Anoraks like to criticise radio for hiring influencers or any celebrity who isn’t a jock, yet we’re enticed by TV shows hosted by the most famous faces.

For radio, as just one platform in a multi-media world, hiring the biggest and best talent has never been more important. The risk of them having a stronger personal brand is one the industry has to take.

Chris Evans was far bigger than Virgin Radio upon joining and went on to more than double its existing reach in his first quarter, adding almost a million listeners. He began to drive audience for the whole station with more people tuning in throughout the day.

If Evans left, would the overall churn be just as significant?

On the flipside, Radio 2 remained fairly static when Zoe Ball took over from him and, despite seeing declines by up to 2m since then, it is still the most listened-to.

No one presenter is bigger than Radio 2.

Eurus on Twitter shared their analogy:

That's like saying no train is bigger than the station. But, many come to the station to catch or watch trains, surely. Though there also are some, who are interested in certain stations as well.

I think this sums up today's radio landscape well.

Many railway enthusiasts enjoy everyday service trains, but a special loco with distinctive characteristics attracts specific attention and people go out of their way to catch a glimpse.