ARE YOU “INTERACTIVE”?
If you’re reading this you’re already interactive in at least a few ways. You’re obviously, on the web and chances are you have accounts you use everyday on Facebook and Twitter. Chances are you know all about tiny urls and use sites such as hootsuite.com to shrink your links. Chances are you text and email all day long; and you IM people on AIM, Google, or Yahoo, BUT chances are… your station is not nearly as wired and interactive as you!
The question isn’t whether you have a good website or whether you have a facebook page and twitter the station. The question is are you creating true portals of entertainment and information via all available interactive means of transportation? It begins on air; using that brand to expand the relationships, promises, and experiences you created between you and your consumers.
It can no longer be an after thought. The plane is at full throttle and the end of the runway is approaching! The web and every social activity on it should become part of your culture and take on the brands you have worked so hard to create. To go a step further, it should expand the brand in an effort to become the “home page” for your consumer. Notice I am not saying “listeners”, rather I am using the word “consumers” since your brand extends well beyond your radio station when you are fully, and successfully Interactive.
In the research PMW does everyday, upwards of 80% of 25-49 year old radio listeners access the internet at least once a day, yet less than 10% of them visit radio station websites on a daily basis. (This even includes those stations which stream audio). There is simply little perceived value and benefit and in the end, no virtual portal to the information they seek and desire.
There have been several companies out there who have begun this type of initiative. One that jumps out is a smaller group but nonetheless, one with great vision and insight into the importance of creating compelling content that not only integrates with their 40 plus stations, but has begun focusing on developing these portals of interaction, and even better, knows how to monetize their efforts.
Midwest Communications out of Green Bay, Wisconsin has an incredible team of people working on this process. It is indeed a process – but one that has become essential. Michael Wright and Lori Lewis have been leading the charge in this area. This year, they began to lay the foundation of an infrastructure for the future.
The goal is to bring people to their own sites instead of TMZ, AOL, MSN, People, or whatever! They know that their consumers come to them everyday for music, news, information, and entertainment. They also know the time has come to create these informational portals on an interactive level that go well beyond just radio. Then, like newspapers which are moving online, and most every site you go to for this type of information, it can be fully monetized and become a very profitable stream of revenue. Sometimes many tend to forget, they aren’t working for radio companies… They are working for media companies.
So, what do you need? First, you need to share the vision of those like Michael Wright and Lori Lewis to help bring it to fruition. Then you need a strong webmaster, content manager, and sales manager, along with programmers and brand managers who will begin to integrate it into the process on air. My advice? Jump on the train…before it leaves without you.
