10-14-2013The number one way to get people interested in your content in social media? Visuals. Pictures and video. Yet, a lot of radio pros have difficulty grabbing on to how big visuals are at driving engagement in social media. After all, we?re audio, right? How much attention do you give to your visuals in social media and leading listeners back to your local radio brand? If it?s not that much, you should upgrade your visuals and get engaged with your local audience. Here are some examples of ways to rethink visuals and give listeners the fun experience of your station brand in social media so they want to listen more. 1. Visual in the market. Your market is visual. People know when they see pictures of landmarks near their house, near work, or near their favorite restaurant. They have emotion linked to the visual images that represent the familiar to them. You can use these visual images to ?represent? local connection with their familiars. If you look for opportunities to be local and spread the visuals on your website, Facebook, Twitter, and other social media platforms, you?ll find them. Great radio stations are part of their communities. Show it and listeners feel it.2. Visual with the format fans. This isn?t about you, right? Not about the radio station, right? People have a moment of decision and pick your content. So, it?s about loving your listeners. In social media, guess who is more important? That?s right. Them. Listeners generally like to see themselves. Visuals of them in social media (with their permission) are like giving the love back. 3. Visual with artists (or additional content generators if you are news or sports). If you and your listeners attend big events with artists or the additional content generators you use on your radio station as an attractant, you know photos are big. Use them. Focus on listener experience with the artist or content generator if possible and include them with your visual assets too (logo, station vehicles, staff handing them backstage passes if appropriate). 4. Visual with radio personalities. We have to be careful here. When photographing personalities, focus again on the listener experience and tie it into what?s important to listeners. Believe it or not, if you are a radio personality, you have a fun job. We?re not talking about the stuff you think is negative. We?re talking about the fact that many listeners think their job sucks and you have a good time for work. This is the entertainment business. Give them the entertainment pictures in social media and focus on why they would be attracted to you, and on benefits for them. There are so many ways to use visuals from your radio business to attract listeners in social media and social media platforms represent entirely new and exploding ways to help average Americans waste time at work, spend time looking at unusual photos, and feel like they belong. And you want to do it because you can use higher engagement to boost ratings and connect with new levels of listener loyalty.It?s time for you to experiment with visuals in your social media strategy. Let?s go!Loyd Ford is the direct marketing, ratings, and social media strategist for Americalist Direct Marketing and has programmed very successful radio brands in markets of all sizes, including KRMD AM & FM in Shreveport, and WSSL and WMYI in Greenville, WKKT in Charlotte, and WBEE in Rochester, NY. Learn more about Loyd here: http://about.me/loydford. Get his radio-social media content sent directly to your smart phone or e-mail for free here: www.rainmakerpathway.wordpress.com. Reach out to Loyd via e-mail HERE. Visit his Facebook radio social media page HERE.
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