On the heels of Lori Lewis’ post last week about the rapidly declining “free ride” on Facebook was a riveting panel at the Worldwide Radio Summit that talked about social media from a corporate programming point of view.
There were lots of great sessions last week in L.A., but there was an incredible contrast between the session that ended Thursday, moderated by Nielsen’s Bill Rose: “The Science Behind the Sounds: Innovate or tPerish” – and a social media session called “Social/Digital: Move People to Move Meters” headed up by Lori.
The Rose session was loaded with radio gurus from around the industry: Mike McVay, Buzz Knight, Don Parker and Andrew Jeffries (both with Clear Channel), and Guy Dobson, the chief content officer of Australia’s Southern Cross Austereo.
There were several amazing moments during that panel, including when Aussie Dobson noted that international broadcasters used to flock to the U.S. to hear great radio, but since the ‘90s, that’s pretty much stopped because there’s simply no driving reason for them to do so. That was a theme we also touched on in our “Radiodays” post last week and it’s a message U.S. broadcasters need to hear. It was gutsy of Guy to throw it out there in a room of mostly American radio pros.
But the segment that caused a hush started when Rose changed the topic to social media. Jeffries remarked that he lamented Facebook changing its algorithm, essentially ending the ability for his brands to reach a large percentage of his “likes” without having to pay Facebook for the privilege. His point was that radio helped make Facebook, and now this rule change is disturbing, and hopefully not the beginning of other social platforms following suit.
No knock on Jeffries because there are probably many people in radio who agree with him. And yet, that thinking just doesn’t hold water when you consider how the broadcasting industry (among others) has truly had a free pass on Facebook, aggregating thousands of listeners, running contests and promotions, benefitting from untold sharing, and becoming more interactive with its customers in the process.
For free.
Clear Channel, Cumulus, and every other radio company haven’t sent a dime to Mark Zuckerberg after all these years. Instead, radio has been squatting on Facebook’s property, reaping untold benefits from its presence on the Facebook juggernaut.
Since the meteoric rise of Facebook, many in radio actually believe there’s no longer a need to do any outside marketing because social media can be used for just this purpose. Seriously?
And somehow I think Zuckerberg’s social innovation would have been every bit as successful without thousands of radio stations imploring the audience to “like us on Facebook.”
Radio knew what it was getting into when it first started launching Facebook pages, and then Twitter accounts. Lots of analysts, including us, warned of the day when these social platforms would inevitably use their scale and their need to monetize as a reason to change their rules of engagement.
So if Mark Zuckerberg would have been in the Roosevelt Hotel ballroom last week, he might have uttered a variation of that famous Clint Eastwood line: “Get off my lawn, radio.” And who could blame him.
In contrast, Lori’s panel featuring a fascinating mix of radio talent and marketing genius – KISW’s B.J. Shea, WHPT’s Cowhead, Coca-Cola interactive marketing strategist Christy Amador, and Island record’s Christine Chiapppetta.
Here was a social discussion that covered the bases, and Lori set the tone (and answered the Jeffries observation) with this quote:
“The era of entitlement is over. We are now in the era of “earned.”
And to truly reap the benefits of social media now, radio will have to stop treating social media as an entitlement and a hobby. In order to be effective in this space, broadcasters and talent will have to excel in the way they write, create, and engage. And yes, they may have to actually pay for the right to be there – just as they once did with TV, outdoor companies, and direct mail outfits.
Moving forward on Facebook, radio promoting its own agendas, promotions and contests should be replaced by interacting with the fans who made our radio stations. And as we learned in Techsurvey10, if we acknowledge them, three in ten fans tell us they’ll give us more quarter-hours. That’s a pretty good deal.
Facebook and Twitter aren’t public services. They’re publicly traded companies that need to convince investors they are viable businesses. No one in their right mind – including radio – would provide free advertising to help local companies build their brands and their followings. Why does anybody think Facebook or Twitter should be providing this service for no charge? In fact, the Wall Street Journal reported last week that Twitter will unveil 15 new types of advertising products designed to help its (paying) customers reach their target markets. These platforms need to use their scale and habit-forming qualities to make money for their investors – plain and simple.
Rule changes on Facebook were inevitable, and we shouldn’t be surprised if Jeffries’ fears come true and other social media platforms – like Twitter – institute their own rejiggered algorithms or protocols that may make it difficult for brands to get that free ride.
They should.
It’s just good business. If anyone should understand that, corporate radio should.
Jacobs Media has consistently walked the walk in the digital space, providing insights and guidance through its well-read national Techsurveys.
In 2008, jacapps was launched - a mobile apps company that has designed and built more than 1,300 apps for both the Apple and Android platforms. In 2013, the DASH Conference was created - a mashup of radio and automotive, designed to foster better understanding of the "connected car" and its impact.
Along with providing the creative and intellectual direction for the company, Fred consults many of Jacobs Media's commercial and public radio clients, in addition to media brands looking to thrive in the rapidly changing tech environment.
Fred was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2018.
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Enjoy your posts, Fred and Lori, but wanted to offer an opinion that- share limiting algorithm changes aside – there has always been a quid pro quo between Facebook and radio. That exchange is…radio uses it to engage its audience…and Facebook gets page views which it can monetize. So it isn’t necessarily a “free ride.” It’s more of a “value exchange” in my opinion. But of course as a radio company (aka an audience company) it’s frustrating to keep giving Zuck more page views that we can’t monetize. That’s why we like to say “social followers are great but subscribers get you paid.” The goal with Social is to nurture relationships and convert as many as possible to “subscribe” to our content and/or our promos with tune ins, clicks, and best of all, registrations.
Jim, all good points. But it’s not like Facebook came to radio (or vice-versa) and put together a partnership. There was a tacit understanding here – or at least the radio industry hoped and thought so. The part that we should have been monetizing all along was not to just send our audience to Facebook, but use links and other content to drive them back to the assets we own – our websites, our databases, and of course, our own air. If all we did these past few years was to amass “likes on Facebook,” we failed ourselves and perhaps have lost an opportunity to garner more fans, more listening, and of course, more revenue. Thanks for the great comment.
I think some people in radio harbor delusions of grandeur when it comes to Facebook – radio didn’t help build Facebook. If every radio related post since the inception of Facebook magically vaporized, I doubt Facebook would have to change any of its accounting…anywhere. With Facebook having over a billion users, exactly what percentage of overall pageviews does radio think it’s responsible for?
Facebook has an audience that it believes provides value to marketers of all sorts of goods and services and their business model revolves around charging access to that audience. Radio has been built on that model since its inception, so why does it seem so out of bounds to some if Facebook uses the same playbook?
No arguments from me on any of these points. I think that because Facebook has been “free” from the beginning, there are lots of misconceptions about it. Is it a platform that fosters engagement? Or is it about marketing? And after a brand aggregates all those “likes,” who owns those fans? These are questions that have been around since brands were allowed to launch their own pages, but few have taken the time to consider and discuss them. And that’s why the panel in L.A. provided such a revealing moment, and one that obviously struck me as missing the mark. I’ve heard from a number of people – mostly “off-line” – who agree while others think I’ve misstated what radio has done for Facebook. As you suggest, I think radio has gotten the better part of the deal – perhaps until now. Thanks, Bob.
The quote that hurt the most came from Austereo’s Guy Dobson, “international broadcasters used to flock to the U.S. to hear great radio, but since the ‘90s, that’s pretty much stopped because there’s simply no driving reason for them to do so.” I would like to note that his title is ” Chief Content Officer.”
You can use Facebook and Twitter all you want. You can even pay the so-called social media “gurus” to teach you how. Without your stations personalities it’s worthless. What? Your station has no personalities? … You better get back to hiring some. By the way, the Lex and Terry show is syndicated through United Stations! (Had to do it Fred)
Not a problem, Terry, and I’m glad you took the time to react to Guy’s quote. I’ve talked to a number of people off-line today who had different reaction to Guy’s quote. I also heard from a number of international broadcasters who told me essentially the same thing while I was in Dublin. And it wasn’t said out of arrogance. Instead, I think that many are frankly disappointed they feel this way. And by the way, I miss hearing your show.
I think Zuckerberg needs to mow all our lawns. Think about it. Facebook started off as a school wide social network. Throughout popularity and content, he eventually expanded it to just those with .edu email addresses. Through there he was able to expand it to the public. From data mining he was able to make it public by selling things such demo and psychographics to companies that were able to make advertisements based solely on things that a certain person “likes.” How did this all come about? Through every single person that is and has ever been on Facebook. Without that, Facebook may not be where it is today.
The point of radio, as I see it, is to be interactive with listeners. And what is the best way to do so? Through social media. And the point of social media is interaction. It’s our human nature to want to be in contact with others. With the evolution of superstars came this sense of the everyday person wanting to interact with those people. The best way for the average person to reach out and get a chance to get these superstars is through social media. If any social network needs us to mow their lawn, it may very well be Twitter.
I could on and on, but I’ll cap it off there. I always enjoy your articles as well as Lori Lewis. I follow you both on Twitter.
Chuck, thanks for taking the time to respond. I knew when I heard Jeffries make this claim that a number of broadcasters would side with him.
I think, however, there’s a difference. It’s not like Facebook came to businesses and laid out the deal – you amass followers and post cool stuff and we’ll let you do this for free while we build our platform. Under those circumstances, there would be justification to new rules that limit radio’s effectiveness on the platform.
But instead, Facebook was like an empty lot that broadcasters (and other businesses) simply assumed could be used – and when no one questioned it, they built franchises on the space hoping that no one would say anything.
So here we are today, and Facebook’s needs have changed – especially since going public. And radio comes away unhappy even though they’ve used it for free all this time.
I’ll add one more point, and it’s based on something you said. Radio’s purposes is to be interactive with listeners. But pre-Facebook, that meant occasionally answering the request or studio lines, and showing up at remotes and acknowledging people who showed up. I would argue that Facebook has taught radio how to connect with their own audiences in the digital space – a skill that is critical to the medium’s future. Without Facebook, jocks would still be “busying out” the request lines.
As for Twitter, we shall see. Whether their business model is sustainable is a good question. And upcoming rules changes there could have an impact on radio. Some have suggested the end of hashtags, for example, a change that would most definitely impact media brands.
Thanks again for the thoughtful comments and the kind words.