The team at Bauer Media has launched ‘The Kiss Breakfast Takeaway‘ – a bitesized video chunk of the best bits of the Breakfast Show.

There are a few key elements which makes this a fantastic piece of radio marketing:

1. Timing

2. Location

3. Quality

The content comes each afternoon at 3.30pm across all their social media touch points so listeners/viewers can get their KISS ‘fix’ on mobile, online, tablet etc.

The timing is perfect for the target audience – just as school/college kids are coming out and checking their phone or the young professionals are having that afternoon lull while browsing Facebook!

It’s instantly shareable across the social web and helps improve show recall, making it appointment-to-view content. Additionally, the video production qualities and studio branding are second to none. It’s a real TV quality effect.

Gone are the days of the producer having to quickly put together Breakfast promo trail which producers need to hash together to make sure they hit the first 11am sponsor credit spot.

Now you can hear, see and share the best of Breakfast Show each afternoon on mobile, tablet or PC.

Well done and strongly executed.

Last week, the news team at Metro Radio handed over their years of journalistic training to the listener and let them ‘choose the news’. The day became ‘News You Choose Day’, with listeners voting via Facebook, Twitter and online for what should be in bulletin running orders as well as suggesting their own content ideas.

The morning news prospects meeting was available to watch on-line and contributions invited via Twitter. A number of listeners put forward their own ideas which were taken forward and others suggested questions for interviews.

We spoke to Justin Kings (@newsleader)-  Metro Radio Head of News to get under the skin of the project.

ES: Great project, it would be great to understand a bit about where the idea came from and why you did it?

JK: Metro has done a lot of work in the past year to build likes and increase interaction on Facebook. My news department has been heavily involved and I thought ‘News You Choose’ would be a different way to engage users quite intensely over one day. We used Facebook primarily to allow users to build the running order for the news bulletins. We used the ‘Question’ function and asked them to vote on what story they wanted to hear more about. A video of the morning news meeting went on You Tube allowing users to comment and make their own suggestions. Our Deputy Editor live blogged in what became a discussion about various stories and our reporter asked followers on Twitter for their help through the day.
ES: What were the challenges – did it affect the general flow of the newsroom?

JK: It turned our usual way of working completely on its head, so there were lots of challenges! When we asked users to select stories for the news we were able to track the most popular throughout the process but it wasn’t until quarter to the hour that we could finalise what to run. We always try to think about what the listener cares about and what she is talking about but we were able to check in directly with her throughout the day. I know my Deputy Editor found it useful to discuss news with participants on the live blog which required a high level of interaction on his part. We were all careful to reply to as many Facebook messages, tweets and blog posts as we could which was a demand on everyone’s time. All in all, it was a day which took the team out of its comfort zone which is never a bad thing.
ES: In terms of a marketing / engagement activity – what results did you see? Has it helped in a marketing build for the station?

JK: The level of engagement was good with a high total number of users on Facebook. Each vote on there about what stories we should include pulled in about a hundred votes. We included a number of stories suggested by listeners too. One of these made the breakfast bulletins a few days after News You Choose Day. The live blog attracted a very dedicated albeit small number of contributors. All in all we felt the concept worked well for us. It is early days but I feel it could also help our marketing team in their mission to expose Metro to as many people as possible.

ES: Will you be doing it again? Was there any things you learnt and you would pass onto other newsteams?

JK: We’ve identified some improvements. For example, we won’t attempt to live blog throughout the day. This was a big commitment when the majority of interaction was based on Facebook. We will instead live blog during our listeners lunch break and give them the chance to catch up with the day and chat with the team then. I’m also considering using Audioboo, the audio microblogger, as part of the day. For obvious reasons I think this social media platform has huge potential for radio news. So, News You Choose will return on the first Tuesday of every month on Metro. I’m going to trial it next on TFM Radio on Teesside.

Here’s an advertising innovation I spotted this week in Africa.

MyJoyOnline is a website in Ghana that has grown from the popular radio station Joy FM and is now a successful content destination in its own right. Indeed, Alexa rates it as Ghana’s fifth biggest website, after Google, Google, Facebook and Yahoo.

As you’d expect, some advertisers have taken out banner ads on the site. However others have opted to use the space they buy for their Facebook social media plugins instead.

See these examples of ‘like’ buttons from Unilever products Omo and Lifebuoy.

Of course this means you’ll see which of your friends already ‘like’ the product advertised and it puts you just one click away from joining a community of likeminded people who, in this case, have very clean hands.

Social media expert Dr Claire Wardle is working with me here in Ghana. I learned from her that 33% of people trust banner ads but a whopping 70% trust their friends online recommendations, according to a UK study from the Oxford Research Agency.

Dr Wardle says the advertisers’ use of Facebook on MyJoyOnline is part of a trend:

“We’re used to seeing news brands using social plugins but now consumer brands too are taking advantage of the high level of trust that comes from friends’ recommendations.”

Would you let your advertisers do this on your radio station site?

The Capital FM brand has been rolled out to eight further regions of the UK today, spelling the end of the Galaxy network (Birmingham, Manchester, Yorkshire, South Coast, Scotland) and the Hit Music Network – Red Dragon FM, Leicester Sound, Ram FM and Trent FM.

Capital FM, previously only available in London, will be broadcast across the country and is expected to reach more than 6.5 million people.

Ashley Tabor, Executive President of Global Radio, said it was “a monumental day” for commercial radio.

He said: “The UK has never had a national commercial hits station before, this is game changing – another national brand, delivered locally, from Global Radio.”

Programming

Radiotoday.co.uk explains the programming changes as:

Capital FM London will remain a London-centric station, whilst the new quasi-national network will mostly recieve a second feed with pre-recorded links from Leicester Square. Local breakfast and drive shows will remain on weekdays in Scotland, North East, Yorkshire, Manchester, Birmingham, East Midlands, South Wales, South Coast and London.

“Significant Marketing”

Global is to launch a multimedia marketing campaign with a “significant above the line investment”, Stephen Miron [Global Radio Cheif Exec] says. He adds that for some of the stations involved, this represents the first marketing investment for a long time.

Social Media

Capital FM Facebook

Global Radio have understood the importance of social media within the marketing mix. More importantly, the importance of having to have a single brand touchpoint within the social media space for the ‘network’ brand. They worked with Facebook to succesfuly merge the users from all the various Galaxy and Hit Music radio station Facebook pages into a single Capital FM Facebook page which boosed 311,000 Facebook users at launch.

The Promotion

Capital FM Usher Launch Promotion

There’s nothing like a good hours builder promotion campaign to help build up profile of the station at the best of time, especially at launch. The New Year is always a typical time for a ‘win-money’ promotion as shown by Absolute Radio and their Thousand Pound Mix Tape. Well, again to amplify the HIT MUSIC strapline – the Capital FM network will launch with a music based win promotion involving key artist Usher. Listeners will win the chance to meet the artist, attend his gig but also win £1000 in cash – and it’s no doubt, this will be a promotional campaign designed to raise hours/bring in new listeners. However, listeners need to wait until the 10th January for details on how to enter.

The Street Team

Jo Jo from Capital FM Yorkshire with new station mugs!

As well TV, outdoor and digital advertising – the Capital FM network will use “Street Team” activity to help get the Capital FM team out there. Local teams in each area will work under the “100 day plan” to get out and about in the TSA to help drive audience awareness and brand recall for the new Capital FM radio station. A similar marketing tactic used at the launches of Heart FM back in 2009 – where a branded street team attend events, concerts and high footfall areas/attractions in the TSA, to hand out Capital marketing materials and take pictures of new listeners for the station website. Some will also be running targeted S&P launch activity with the street team like Capital FM East Midlands and Starbucks in Nottingham, Leicester and Derby.

The TV Advert

Capital FM launches with a brand new TV ad which really hammers home the ‘hit music’ message. With real stand out, these slick adverts have localised inserts and tails – including Rhianna talking up ‘your’ city. The ad features key artists from the playlist, including many world stars such as Rhianna, Blake Eyed Peas, Nicole Sherzinger, Usher as well as JLS, The Script, Tinie Tempah and The Saturdays.

Have you seen it yet?

This is just a snapshot of the initial marketing plans for the station. There is likely to be more marketing activity in the coming weeks for the national Capital FM network from the teams at Leicester Square –  which will be covered on radioandmarketing.com.

Disclaimer – All posts and views are my own, and are not endorsed or representative of any current or previous employer.

Image Source: Global Radio

Comments

• Wednesday 5 January, 2011, Quora writes: Facebook Brand Pages Merge... Can you merge brand pages? It appears that Capital FM have done so across their whole network. I've been searching for this function for quite a while, as trying to merge a companies social presence into something more coherent. More info here: http:/...
• Thursday 6 January, 2011, New marketing campaign for the launch of the 95-106 Capital FM … | World Media Information writes: [...] See the original post: New marketing campaign for the launch of the 95-106 Capital FM … [...]
• Thursday 6 January, 2011, New marketing campaign for the launch of the 95-106 Capital FM … | World Media Information writes: [...] Go here to read the rest: New marketing campaign for the launch of the 95-106 Capital FM … [...]
• Friday 7 January, 2011, The Capital FM Flashmobs « Radio And Marketing Blog writes: [...] the mighty 95 – 106 Capital FM Network. You can read about a lot of their marketing strategy here. If you lived in the areas that changed – its likely you would of seen something rather [...]
• Thursday 13 January, 2011, Major Radio Station Marketing in the Midlands « Radio And Marketing Blog writes: [...] and rebranding as Capital FM. Additionally, Capital FM East Midlands will be supported with an extensive advertising and marketing campaign from Global Radio. Additionally, it comes just after Smooth East Midlands lost all local programmes [...]
• Wednesday 4 May, 2011, Can a Twitter Trending Topic be a measureable metric? « Radio And Marketing Blog writes: [...] Capital became a national network at the start of the year – it’s received a large amount of both praise and criticism from listeners, industry and [...]

Public radio in Sweden has been instructed not to encourage listeners to go and find them on Facebook. It’s against the law.

The country’s Review Board has “convicted” the popular radio station P4 for suggesting to listeners that they “like” its morning show on Facebook. The regulator’s concerns centre on promotion of a commercial business (Facebook) by a public utility (Swedish Radio).

Swedish journalist Anders Mildner says this presents a dilemma for the broadcaster because P4 wants to take advantage of the Facebook platform which many of its listeners use.

According to this latest ruling (pdf), the law in Sweden appears to allow public radio stations to acknowledge their presence on Facebook but not actually encourage people to go there. Now there’s an interesting brief for a promo.

It’s not often you hear it said, but compared to Swedish standards, our attitude and practice in the UK  is considerably relaxed.

Radio stations here regularly connect with listeners on third-party sites, largely Facebook and Twitter but also YouTube, Flickr and others, and use that connection to enhance the on-air programming.

The BBC’s set of social media guidelines encourages its broadcasters to engage in open, transparent use of social media while protecting against “undue prominence” on air. For example, it does not permit third party URLs to be read out on the radio but presenters can mention the sites and the activity when it’s directly editorially relevant.

However this isn’t the only possible model and I hear a range of views on the matter from media colleagues. Some find a protective closed wall approach to their content rather appealing. Of course Rupert Murdoch has taken this line with his paywall approach to online newspapers.

At the opposite extreme others suggest media businesses of the future will be able to operate perfectly well solely through social media outlets run by third parties. They may not need websites of their own.

Personally, I prefer the proven ‘middle way’: create an engaging presence in the places your listeners and target listeners are likely to frequent. Then use it to entice them deeper into your content on your own website and radio station.

This model allows tone of voice to be adapted for each social media environment and ensures that any revenues generated around your best content will drop into your pocket and not that of Mr Zuckerburg.

And even in Sweden it would seem to be permitted, so long as nobody tries promoting it on air.

Photo: Sparkly subway map in Stockholm by James Cridland, on Flickr. Used under licence.

Comments

• Wednesday 8 September, 2010, Tweets that mention Where talking about Facebook on air is illegal | Earshot -- Topsy.com writes: [...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Matt Deegan and Stephen Martin, Andrew Newman. Andrew Newman said: RT @matt: RT @smartin: quick lunchtime blog post: where talking about Facebook on air is illegal. http://bit.ly/9pnOkj [...]
• Friday 15 October, 2010, This Reality Podcast: No 137 : This Reality Podcast writes: [...] Mentioning Facebook on Swedish public radio is actually illegal! [...]