Is Our Local Media Media Savvy?

A few years ago I was fortunate enough to work with Harmony Airways and Kelowna International Airport as they operated a seasonal non-stop service from Kelowna to Honolulu. As part of my role I developed radio promotions involving giveaways of holiday packages.
The principal of such a promotion is simple – the radio station offers a certain value of promotional media in exchange for the prizing and this promotional media raises top-of-mind awareness of the client and it’s services/products.
In evaluating which radio station to partner with on such promotions a number of factors are taken in to account:

• Brand alignment. Or in other words “The medium is the message”.
• Audience figures, demographics and socio-graphics.
• Geographic reach.
• On-air promotional value i.e. The retail value of the air time offered up for the promotion
• Off-air promotional value e.g. The retail value of newspaper advertising taken out by the radio station to promote the competition.

Recently I’ve had the opportunity to plan promotions for another airline and this time round another variable is coming in to the mix of decision factors – social media influence.
To this end I’ve conducted a study of local radio stations here in Kelowna, BC to see who’s social media activity would add the most value to a promotion.
The methodology was simple. Of the various social media platforms only Facebook and Twitter are being used by any of the stations. For Facebook the only statistic available is follower count. For Twitter, with it’s open API, a lot more analysis is possible. I chose to use Edelman’s Tweet Level tool.  With this tool we can break down a Twitter account’s impact in terms of:

• Influence – what you say is interesting and many people listen to it. This is the primary ranking metric.
• Popularity – how many people follow you
• Engagement – you actively participate within your community
• Trust – people believe what you say

It should be noted that even the most influential of Twitter accounts only scores 80 for Influence, so on this statistic a “40” is really a 50%. For other statistics top accounts get 97+ so this is really a true percentage of how an account is performing against the best out there.
The following contain the results station by station:

AM 1150 (www.am1150.ca)

Facebook: no official presence. Two presenters/producers have accounts which are seemingly personal accounts.

Twitter: 1 station account (@am1150), 1 presenter account (@jackedinjessica) as below.

The low score for engagement seen above is typical of an account that is an unmanned “feed” – i.e.  A tweet is automatically sent whenever a website, facebook account or some other web presence is updated, but there is really no person behind the account. It’s not the best way to use Twitter.

For this account, the significantly higher engagement figure brings the overall value of the account to almost the same level as a “feed” account with three times as many followers.
Other useful statistics are on commonality between accounts.:
Following @am1150 and @jackedinjessica = 109

B103 (www.b103.ca)

Facebook: 1 account with 367 followers.

Twitter: 1 account (@b103)

Overall this represents a relatively modest social media presence. My supposition would be that the station is doing the minimum it deems necessary on social media platforms with little resource allocated to social media and little buy-in across the station. There may be one social media evangelist within the station that has little support from management.

THE JUICE (www.1039thejuice.com)

Facebook:  Station account has 587 followers. Presenters/producers have individual accounts but these seem to be strictly personal. A second “campaign” account exists for “90 day transformation” with 19 followers.

Twitter: Four accounts are active: @1039thejuice, @90daytransform, @juicy_nesta, @kenallanjoonyer
The @90daytransform account is new and had only 4 followers at the time of original analysis (and only 10 a week later). A full analysis is therefore not included. This strategy of having a separate Facebook and Twitter profile for a 90 day campaign is highly questionable and not something I would generally advise.

Following @1039thejuice AND @juicy_nesta = 85
Following @1039thejuice AND @kenallanjoonyer = 98
Following @juicy_nesta AND @kenallanjoonyer = 76

K 96.3 (www.k963.fm)

Facebook: 1 account with 530 followers.
Twitter: 1 account – @k963classicrock.

So a respectable effort on Facebook but K96.3 are a surprisingly late adopter of Twitter (account set up only this month) – and have effectively no presence as yet.

POWER (www.power104.fm)

Facebook: 1 account with 309 followers
Twitter: 1 account as below

As with sister station B103, overall this represents a relatively modest social media presence but this time with a very low figure for engagement.

SILK FM (www.silk.net)

Facebook: The station fan page has 476 followers. 2 presenter accounts (Andy & TJ and Breanne Cancade) seem to be used as part-personal, part-professional accounts with 460 and 194 followers respectively.
Twitter: One account – @1015silkfm

Again, this seems to be a feed, so has a very low score on engagement. Coupled with a low follower count this gives this account a rather low overall value. The station is obviously making efforts on Facebook but are let down with their Twitter presence.

SUN 99.9 (www.thesun.net)

Facebook: Sun FM and its presenters/producers have several Facebook accounts as follows:

• Station Facebook Page: 2684 Friends
• Sonia Sidhu: 1299 Friends
• Susan Knight: 2059 Friends
• Dan Freeman:  3499 Friends
• Ara Andonian: 1791 Friends

Twitter: Again the station and its presenters have several accounts: @999sunfm; @soniasidhusunfm; @susanknight @danandsusan. Statistics on these are as follows:

Following @999sunfm and @soniasidhusunfm: 190
Following @999sunfm and @susanknight : 147
Following @999sunfm and @danandsusan : 177
Following @soniasidhusunfm and @susanknight : 135
Following @soniasidhusunfm and @danandsusan : 149
Following @susanknight and @danandsusan : 224

Sun FM Kelowna’s sister stations in Penticton and Vernon also have social media presence. A further Twitter account, @thearashow, exists in Kelowna but has not been assessed (it is protected and so far, a week after requesting to follow the account, that request has not been approved).

Kelowna Assessment Summary

Sun FM lead the way. By miles. Juice and B103 are obviously making efforts across both Twitter and Facebook. Other stations are just too inconsistent to say they have any effective cross-platform social media presence. Silk do OK on Facebook but are nowhere on Twitter. The same can be said for K963. With AM1150 it’s the reverse. Other stations are making efforts but have an even longer way to go to get in the game.

The Kelowna Social Media League Table

Some individual mentions. Seeing as though it’s Olympics time:

Gold goes Susan Knight as Kelowna’s most social-media-influential member of the media with Breakfast Show partner Dan Freeman taking Silver.

Bronze is close between Nesta at Juice, Jessica at AM1150 and Sonia at Sun FM. But Sonia at SunFM edges it making it a Gold-Silver-Bronze for Sun FM.

In my next article for Culturactive, I’ll take a look at the social media presence of 102.1 The Edge.
As can be seen at http://www.edge.ca/Connect/ the station has 9 Facebook accounts, 2 Flickr accounts, an iPhone application stream (as part of the Corus Networks iPhone app), 2 Pocast channels on iTunes, 4 MySpace pages,  20 Twitter streams, a feed in to Viigo and four YouTube channels! They can be considered a “Diamond Standard” among Canadian radio stations with regard to social media presence.

*Statistics for Kelowna stations were collected 17th January, 2010 for The Edge on 24th January 2010.

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Vote for Kelowna

Monopoly is a board game published by Parker Brothers, a subsidiary of Hasbro. The game is named after the economic concept of monopoly, the domination of a market by a single entity.
Monopoly is the most commercially-successful board game in United States history, with 485 million players worldwide
According to Hasbro, since Charles Darrow patented the game in 1935, approximately 750 million people have played the game, making it “the most played (commercial) board game in the world

Do not pass ‘Go,’ do not collect $200, and do not ignore the chance to get Kelowna onto a new edition of the board game Monopoly. This is the advice the City and Kelowna Tourism should be shouting out to everyone in Kelowna — to fill the squares on an updated Canadian version

And it’s seems that we are not alone on this matter

London Ontario:
Vancouver:
Thunder Bay:
Medicine hat:
Kamloops: (should be some rivalry here
Chatham-Kent: (I do not know where this place is ?)

The 20 winning communities will be those with the most votes cast at http://www.monopolyvote.ca
The No. 1 community will occupy the high-end real estate of the Boardwalk space on the traditional game.
Others will be named to lesser-value spaces also based on votes. Consumers have until Feb. 7 to register and cast votes for their favourite three communities. One vote is allowed each day for three communities.
Two “wild card” squares on the board will be filled by two other communities nominated and voted on between Feb. 8 through Feb. 21.
The Canadian version of the classic game, which has sold more than 250 million copies, will be launched this summer.

This recent article in Kelowna.com http://www.kelowna.com/2010/01/16/could-kelowna-be-the-next-boardwalk-you-can-help-decide/ had a few local officals make comments

As Robert Fine of the Economic Development Commission put it, this city deserves its moment in the sun, or as the case may be, on the Hasbro assembly line.
“Kelowna is known across Canada for its lake views, wineries, and talented people — it’s about recognition and we are recognized as a place of significance,” he said.

Catherine Frechette of Tourism Kelowna had a similar take, pointing out a business case for board game supremacy.
“Securing a spot for Kelowna on the Canadian Monopoly game board would positively contribute to Kelowna’s intrigue as a quintessential Canadian tourism destination.
Building intrigue and credibility as a travel hot spot happens through so many avenues, and being on the Monopoly game board would sure be one of them,” Frechette said.

Vote for Kelowna

But are we taking real action?
(a Few Social suggestions and challenges)

I would like to ask all the media to step up and get involved.
A true community social show of support.

Online: Kelowna.com and Castanet.net to take down a few of its rotating $$ ad’s and add a vote Kelowna banner

Newspapers: Daily Courier, Capital News banner Ad on the bottom of the front page

Radio Stations: Announce daily morning and evening drive times to remember to vote when you get to work or get home.

TV: Announce at the end of each evening News broadcast did you vote for Kelowna today

Twitters: Get on the band wagon

Facebook Fans: Become a fan of voteforkelowna and spread the word.

Why just have Kelowna added to the board game. Lets make it #1

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Being social is hard work!

So there you have it the local election here in Kelowna, BC, for a new city council member is over. For the culturacive web site it has been as much of a ride as for the nominee candidates themselves. With some very appreciated comments and media coverage.

So congratulations goes out to 19 year old Kevin Craig this time, however I am sure we will hear more from the other candidates who were in the running when the next full Municipal election comes around.

Reading a few facebook comments there now comes the question, can a 19-year-old “kid” handle the job?

Facebook comment: I’m a little shocked at the by election results…but congratulations to Kevin. I thought there were only really 3 serious contenders and any one of them would have done a crack up job. Now we will find out if youth can make a difference.
Facebook Reply 1: Guess that’s what happens when you can rally the campus. Good luck to the guy, but personally I’d prefer to see someone with a little more “life experience” in the position.
Facebook Reply 2: Craig missed by 39 votes last time so he deserves this from hard work.
Facebook Reply 3: I am not surprised that he got in, he’s been working hard, and has been a regular at council meetings for a long time. What he lacks in life experience, he compensates for with perseverance and focus. Will be interesting to see how he does. He rallied his age demographic to support him, but it also speaks to a cynicism towards the status quo in politics, before him, Neis was elected Mayor in West Kelowna on the strength that she was not like the others. People want something different.

So this blog post is a little follow up from my first article City Council Candidates Not So Social . As I stated in that post Kevin Craig was probably one of the most active to use social media as a tool to add to his campaign. And was eager to share these thoughts:

“I’d say that some candidates have certainly made an effort to use social media to support their campaigns, but it has played more of a supporting role than sitting at the centre of a campaign strategy. I’m reasonably happy with my efforts on Facebook and Twitter, but I know that I’ve done a pretty mediocre job at posting media articles mentioning my campaign to Facebook, and directing followers on Twitter to new blog posts on my website. It’s a work in progress for just about all the candidates but I firmly believe social media will continue to play an ever-increasing role in elections and governance.”

Another  place that may shed a few openers is the movie ‘The Youngest Candidate’ is a feature length documentary film directed by Jason Pollock. It is produced by David Letterman’s company, Worldwide Pants, in partnership with Oscar winner Lawrence Bender (producer of ‘Pulp Fiction’ and ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, etc..) and Balance Vector Productions.

It follows the story of 4 teens that ran for public office in America. Funny, inspiring, poignant, and ultimately uplifting, ‘The Youngest Candidate’ is not just a film about running for office. It is the coming of age story of four idealistic young adults who dared to confront the corrupt political systems in America. Through their journey these young candidates learn about fair play, leadership development, racism in politics, the importance of family, and many other lessons that they will carry with them throughout their lives. In the face of great adversity, these four young adults braved all the odds to make it to Election Day to show that regardless of the outcome, it didn’t matter… It’s all about how you play the game.

But I want to highlight and make comment on the Facebook Reply 2 and 3 and also a quote from this article from Kelowna.com. “But Craig is not spending the whole campaign just sitting in front of his computer. He is also one of the more active candidates when it comes to putting up signs and going out door knocking.”

People ask me do I think social media works… often I reply, “no I don’t”; and I get various strange looks, or I reply “yes as long as your work your ass off at it”.

What I am trying to say is that just like anything in life nothing seems to come easy (well not for me anyway,  you may have found some kind of magical wand). Also there is usually not just one answer especially when it comes to marketing and business. I am a strong advocate of what social media can do for a business, service or organization of any size. But I am much more of an advocate of telling you that it can only help as long as you have a good strategy, and a comprehensive mix with lots of other effort. Marketing fusion is what I consider the only way to go about making a noticeable difference into a very diverse cultural world.

Just like our new member to city council, you have to knock on a lot of doors and have to try opening a few that you may not have tried before (ie Twitter, Facebook, linkedin) along the way. But if people are looking for something different from you or you business you are simply going to have to give it a lot of hard work…. Sorry for the bad news

Actually I know this is not news to any of us and know it does not take a newbie 19 year old or the wise learning of a 90 year old to figure it out. But  you can earn a lot of respect and gain a lot ground in this world whether it’s on a personal level or a business level by working hard, working smart, working in lots of different areas, and sharing your experiences along the way.

So a couple of points that I would love to hear comment on:

1: Do you think hard work alone can take you to where you want to go in life or do you have another idea?

2: Can hard work compensate for such things that we may find people hold against us such as youth or ‘life experience’?

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City Council Candidates Not So Social

So I live in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada population approximately 110,000 people. I’m pretty sure that most of them have heard about Barak Obama the now elect President of the United States of America. What I thought also made a fair amount of media coverage was his use of social media to help him along with his campaign. It seems that every photograph of him, he had his Blackberry in hand. Though there have been recent allegations that he never actually used ‘Twitter’ claiming that his thumbs are two big, you cannot deny that somebody was twittering for him.

His Facebook fan page is currently showing 6,926,844 fans then again is seems that people wanting to see Obama with an Afro also has 300,888 members.

His Social media Strategy is now part of many lectures: such as this article

What Businesses Can Learn from Barack Obama’s Social Media Strategy!

And the Barak Obama now famous Yes We Can – Barack Obama Music Video Has seen close to 20Million views

So what I’m trying to figure out is for the current 15 candidates that are presently up for City of Kelowna council nominations, were they away or just did not pay attention when this election took place.

I took some time to look over the social media usage for the 15 candidates.

From what I can tell seven candidates don’t even have a website. Two candidates do have websites but aren’t using any other form of social media. One candidate does have a website and went to the effort to make the video and then forgot to post it on YouTube to help him. One candidate has such a strange website that I was not sure if this was actually his website, and he is asking people to join his Facebook page but has it locked out. This leaves only four candidates using social media; and when I say using it, I mean in a very loose way to try and increase their candidacy.

Here is a local Newspaper article that has also approached this subject mater since this posting.

Please find links to the candidates in a social media usage.

Kevin Craig

Website: Alexa Rank (7,955,679)
Facebook: 592 Fans
Twitter: 186 Follwers

Rocky Mix

Website: Alexa Rank (19,291,119)
Facebook: 518 Fans
Youtube: 123 views

Vern Nielsen

Website: Alexa Rank unranked
Facebook: 8 Fans
Twitter: 2 Follwers

Matthew Reed

Myspace: Using this as his main platform site
Facebook: 102 Fans
Video: posted October 23 (with a promise to keep his candidates up to date)

Clayton Kessler

Website: Alexa Rank (23,964,486) Hard to figure out if this is even his site
Facebook: This is classic it’s locked out

Ernie Patterson

Website: Alexa Rank unranked
Youtube: has a video on his site but not on Youtube (So Close)

Mary-Ann (Maggie) Graham

Website: Alexa Rank unranked

Todd Sanderson

Website: Alexa Rank unranked

Mark Thompson, Andy Uitvlugt, Michael Loewen, Valerie Hallford, James Murphy, Dennis Rojem, Kim Ouellette

So what can you take away from this I think the biggest thing you have to realize and understand the social media is difficult and very time consuming. For those candidates using social media there has to be a strategy plan and a dedication of time to make it work.

My hat goes off to all those candidates who are running for election, I know it’s some thing that I doubt I will ever see myself doing. But one thing I hope I can say is if I ever do decide to do it and will try to use social media to my best advantage.

We would love to hear back from where ever you are and tell us if you think that your vote could be swayed. Could having a better understanding of local candidates, If they provided you an opportunity to interact with them via such social media avenues such as U-stream , or even just open Titter chat forums, or Webinars get them VOTED?

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Social Media Buzz and ROI

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