Is video the new radio star?

Inside Radio posted an article today about the importance of Video on a radio station's website. The article focuses on data gathered by comScore.

A new report from comScore shows that’s a smart strategy. The U.S. online video market attracts an average of 75 million viewers every day.  And content providers are doing a better job of monetizing those views. The gap between the number of video ad views and content views is narrowing, comScore data shows. The percentage of videos accompanied by a video ad jumped from just 14% in 2011 to nearly 23% in 2012.

Some public radio stations are on-board with this. Back in 2006 we did some early dabbling in video for radio at WNPR. We recorded and posted  the Steve Davis Quintet at Sweet Jane's in Hartford. It now has over 7000 views. WNPR's offerings are much more robust. WNPRVideo's Channel has 32 videos. The most watched is Kate Callahan and Two Doors with over 12,000 views.

WUMB919 (I had a cup of coffee with this station.) has 37 videos. Most of the views are in the 100's. The most recent video was posted about nine months ago.

WNYC has over 1500 videos. WNYC's Street Shots: Bruce Gilden, was posted about four years ago. It's a good example of the long tail of appealing on-line postings with over 600,000 views.

There are many more videos cross linked to each of these stations. An example of that cross linkage are videos posted by Colin McEnroe and the Real Life Survival Guide.

Still not convinced? YouTube is the second most utilized search engine behind Google. The platform is a must for your content.  A robust video strategy is going to bring more visitors to your station's website and will make more users aware of your content and your station.

And finally...According to the article from Inside Radio, advertisers (underwriters) are willing to pay higher cost per thousand rates for on-line video content and ads.

The Platform Matters

I recently sent out a post about WOSU's decision to sell its AM signal. WOSU had recently transitioned its news audience to 89.7FM. The change was made possible after the station had purchased another FM signal and moved classical programming to that signal.

The transition to FM for the news programming was, unfortunately, 25 years late. The radio platform preferred by the Boomers (NPR's prime market segment) is FM radio.

I'm spending some time helping with the production of the Real Life Survival Guide. One of the goals of the program is to continue the conversation on-line. We were frustrated by the scant participation through the program's website. (Of course, there's that scary moment when we thought nobody cared.) Through the help of our web guy, Gary Choronzy, "the new RLSG / Facebook comment integration is now live. what this does is synchronize site comments with FB conversation threads. to see it in action, see Bruce's latest post:"  http://reallifesurvivalguide.com/2011/12/09/whats-the-best-way-to-get-started-on-an-exercise-routine/

We're trying to increase awareness of the program and increase participation by utilizing Facebook...the platform used by most of our listeners.

Real Life Survival Guide - Crowd Sourcing

Last Thursday I was given the privilege of sitting in with a taping of the Real Life Survival Guide. The Real Life Survival Guide is "a radio show (and web community) dedicated to answering questions through a series of conversations – with a diverse group of people across a variety of media channels: a blog, an online forum, a public radio show, and social networks like Facebook and Twitter." It's also the brainchild of Bruce Barber. I'm helping to produce the show.


Thursday's conversation was populated by a cross section of New Haven are intelligentsia.  The Gang of Provocateurs, as Bruce and co-host Duo Dickinson like to call them were Christine Ohlman, Mark Oppenheimer, Danielle Gianetti, and Matt Scott. The host and “Guest Provocateur”, Carey Savona of Heirloom at The Study Hotel.


Christine Ohlman is vocalist for the Saturday Night Live Band but, that really doesn't do justice to her resume. Her bio says she Teased her blonde hair into a beehive in honor of Ronnie Spector and never looked back, picking up a guitar and forging a career as a songwriter in the process. Mark Oppenheimer writes a bi-weekly column about religion for the New York Times and, "and I am a writer for The New York Times Magazine, Slate, Mother Jones, Tablet, The Forward, and many other publications. I also enjoy publishing personal essays and book reviews. I am an editor of The New Haven Review and an occasional commentator on NPR." Danielle Gianetti owns one of the best places for a cocktail in New Haven: 116 Crown with her husband John. Matt Scott is Meteorologist for WPLR he was the weekend weatherman until recently for WTNH. 


Eventually there will be about 20 Provocateurs posing and looking for answers to questions about everyday life. Where are they coming from? Connections. It's like networking which is something I've become very familiar with in the past two years since being laid-off by Connecticut Public Broadcasting. It's how I met Bruce. In public radio we like to call it Crowdsourcing. 


There's a more precise definition about what the Real Life Survival Guide is trying to do. According the the Website Crowdsourcing.org it is Collective Knowledge - Development of knowledge assets or information resources from a distributed pool of contributors. Crowdsourcing is used to develop, aggregate, and share knowledge and information through open Q&A, user-generated knowledge systems, news, citizen journalism, and forecasting.


The next installment is Sunday, July 3rd, at 4:30pm. on WNPR. It will be interesting to listen to the conversation and the stories presented evolve in the coming weeks.