(Local) Radio Gaga

The RAJAR figures out earlier this month should have given radio stations in the Channel Islands a reason to be optimistic.

Commercial station Channel 103 recorded its highest listener figures ever, with a weekly reach of 59% - the highest of any local radio station in the UK – whilst Island FM also achieved healthy figures, with a weekly reach of 49%.

Meanwhile, BBC Radio Jersey and Guernsey figures were up on the previous year. BBC Radio Guernsey was listened to by a record 24,000 people, with a weekly reach of 45% – the highest local BBC station in the country. BBC Radio Jersey’s audience figures were also up year on year by over 7%, increasing its market share to around 23%.

The signs are that people in the Channel Islands are tuning in increasingly to their local radio stations for news and local information.

These are useful statistics, particularly against the backdrop of the BBC Trust's recent decision to order the BBC to re-examine its plans to make local radio cuts. The BBC Trust’s chairman Lord Patten said: “Local and regional services…provide something unique for audiences that can otherwise be neglected by eh mainstream media”.

Compare this with Janet Street Porter's berating of local BBC content in The Independent (29^th January). “Local bulletins are necessary only twice a day in drivetime,” she wrote, adding: “The current local regions are so large as to be pointless.” Perhaps the Channel Islands, though, might be a special case?

Despite Street Porter's comments, local radio can be a hugely valuable media, and PR professionals should be aware of that. Businesses can often become obsessed with seeing their name in print in regional press, but radio has the advantage of being able to update its locally focused news in a timely fashion, as it develops.

At the same time, it is important that local radio stations continue to evolve to reflect the interests of their listenership. I often think, for example that, given the prevalence of the finance industry in Jersey and Guernsey, there is scope to produce some excellent business-specific programming on local radio. In the Isle of Man, Manx Radio has been doing this for some time with, in my opinion, great success.

Meanwhile, spare a thought for Manx Radio. It was reported recently that it is facing a cut in its government subsidy and consequently the need to axe jobs. It will be interesting to see how these cuts impact its listenership – it currently enjoys a healthy 58% listener share.

AR

Online challenges for PR professionals

Developments in online media are throwing up a range of new challenges for those of us in marketing and public relations.

In a previous edition of Crystal PR's newsletter, I spoke of the threat posed by inaccurate stories which while they may be subject to a correction in the printed format of a publication, may still appear online following a search of the media’s archive, without any reference to the correction, unless action is taken to ensure the media revise the online entry.

In recent weeks the Wikipedia site has been the subject of considerable controversy within the PR sector. PR practitioners at some of the biggest agencies have been accused of sureptitiously registering with the online giant in order that they can amend the ‘inaccurate’ entries of their corporate clients. In turn, PR professionals have argued that they had to resort to this action because untruthful and potentially damaging information on a company was remaining on the site for far too long before the Wikipedia content providers took action.

It is an unsatisfactory situation which both sides are hoping can be resolved. PR Week has reported that representatives from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations and Wikipedia’s owners are planning to draw up a best practice guide. This would sit alongside the process by which individuals can apply to amend inaccurate content which is already available for everyone to use.   

No one can afford to ignore the potential impact of the Wikipedia site whose entries are invariably on the front page of any search results and which expects during the course of this year to reach 500 million unique users a month.

MS

Building relationships with the media should be a matter of course

After a trying time from the media when its results were announced three weeks ago, Tesco’s COO has now been moved to a different role.

The media showed no sympathy for Tesco when it announced a plunge in share prices in January, bucking a trend for consistent growth. It has been suggested by at least one commentator that journalists exacted retribution on the company for its closed-off approach to the media during the good times.

Building positive relationships with key journalists on a consistent basis is just as important during boom and bust. The media’s collective treatment of Tesco when it announced its results, and the embarrassment created by its chief operating officer selling shares a week before the results announcement, should encourage businesses to engage and respect the media as a voice for reaching the wider public and its influence in forming opinions.

Perhaps Tesco’s senior management will be counselled by PR advisers to take pains to establish relationships with the media and foster an open dialogue. It could be argued that had this approach already been in place, Tesco may have been treated more moderately by the media when the profit announcement was made.

LD