1. Corporate Social Media Plan
WWVU-FM Radio Station
Jamie Mazza, Danielle Marchione, Jordan Johnson, Hilary
Landers & Jim Guiliano
9 December 2014
2. Executive Summary
This document is to help WWVU-FM improve their social media presence and gain more
listeners to their station. The first section of this document, partner overview, addresses the
history and background of WWVU-FM and discusses who it is currently. The social media
presence and analysis section will show a map of the station’s current state of its social media
platforms. This section will also include the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of
WWVU’s social media presence currently and help improve the business goals of the station.
The proposed social media presence and strategy section will show the ideal social media map
for WWVU. This proposed map for the station will also help WWVU-FM reach business goals
and give more awareness of the station to new, potential listeners. The strategy portion of this
section will help explain how to achieve business goals by explicitly listing ways to improve
strengths, eliminate weaknesses, minimize threats, and take advantage of opportunities. The next
section, expected outcomes, lays out the potential results of implementing the social media
strategy. The section, recommendations, is a brief breakdown of the strategy document directing
the company to implement the strategy plan. The final section, references, will list the theories
cited throughout this document.
3. Partner Overview and Vision Statement
WWVU-FM (also known as U92) has been active since 1982. It is the source of new
music and student development in West Virginia. They broadcast at 91.7FM in the Morgantown
area and it is also available on iTunes Radio under the “College/University” category. Juniors
Tom Koetting and Alex Gavula recognized that universities around the country were starting
radio and decided to start it at West Virginia University. It began as a top 40 station for a year,
and when music director Tom Koeting was a senior it switched to alternative rock to attract up
and coming new music.
As of 2014, the radio station has evolved to include 30 specialty shows including
Feedback (news and politics), Sports Page, and their typical regular rotation from 6am to 6pm
throughout the week. The radio station has evolved from having time off air to having a DJ 24
hours a day. In addition, the sports staff was just recently in Atlanta, Georgia to travel to
broadcast an away game for first time. In 2010, the radio station began online streaming.
The main purpose of U92 is to provide new music, news and quality sports casting to
both WVU students and listeners nationwide. Their overarching goals and objectives include
increasing listener base, to have high quality remote broadcasts (outside the radio station), and to
improve their social media presence and add platforms other than Facebook and Twitter.
According to general manager Darlene Johnson, “Success is everyone enjoying the music and
work. We want to provide a good atmosphere with our music and have a good relationship with
the local music scene.”
U92 wants to add a visual to their current programming. Our second goal through social
media is to attract new listeners. We also want to get students more involved in U92 campus
events. These goals are important because we want keep radio relevant by adapting it to the
4. current times. People see radio as a dying art, and we want to bring new life by implementing
new and current social media platforms. Good student participation in U92 activities puts on
united front between students and the station, which can increase popularity of the station. Social
media can accomplish these goals by bringing publicity to events and in turn help increase
attendance. Social media also gives us a platform to post videos of what goes on in the station.
On the radio, there is forum to post visual media.
To consider this partnership successful, U92 wants to implement social media that can
allow viewers to see content from the radio station, rather than just hear it. We want to also
create a way to listen to our music on demand. They would to see at least 500 new followers or
subscribers on their new social media platforms. They would also like us to increase their Twitter
followers from 1,600 to 2,000, and Facebook subscribers from 2,000 to 2,500. They want to
achieve these goals by the end of the semester.
6. SWOT Analysis
Strengths
• WWVU has accounts set up on various
platforms including Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram, SoundCloud, and Tumblr
• WWVU’s main Twitter account is very
active with both routine posts and
interactions
• WWVU has separate accounts for their
News and Sports shows to appeal to
specific listeners who prefer not to
listen to music
• WWVU has strict policies about
allowing a student organization to
receive university and outside funding,
but WWVU has the ability to partner
with other university-affiliated
organizations to promote their brand
and expand their audience.
Opportunities
• WWVU could utilize underwriting
for their social media posts
• There are minimal commercial
interruptions during broadcasts
• The only technology needed for
the Instagram video feature is a
smartphone, therefore all staff of
WWVU is equipped with the
proper technology.
• WWVU could focus more intently
on their main platforms.
Threats
• Other local radio stations can attract
potential listeners (WVAQ, WVPM,
WVLG, etc.)
• Local news and sports outlets have
much larger social media following,
which draws attention away from
WWVU’s coverage
• WWVU is a non-profit organization, so
they don’t have the budget to
implement the same platforms that
other local stations can (Spotify).
WWVU has the ability to hire
underwriters as another source of
income to implement those platforms
• Lack of interest from the community
and students
Weaknesses
• WWVU has multiple identities, such as
U92 and WWVU-FM
• The social media platforms do not link
to one another
• There are not enough staff members to
properly manage the news and sports
accounts
• There are very few interactions
between the station and followers on
all of the platforms (except Twitter)
• WWVU’s social media accounts do not
have a strong following. (Facebook
and Twitter have about 2,000 followers
each, which doesn’t amount to the
32,000 students on campus
S W
TO
8. Strategy Development
Strengths:
-WWVU has accounts set up on various platforms including Facebook, Twitter,
Instagram, SoundCloud, and Tumblr
• WWVU-FM is going to optimize this strength by posting content to each
individual site on a consistent daily basis. This could include, but is not limited to;
live broadcast schedules, specialty show times, weekly giveaways, photos and
instagram videos of live broadcasts. This could satisfy the business goal of
increasing community involvement and cohesion. This exemplifies the ritual
aspect of primal coding (Hanlon, 2006). [A3]
-WWVU’s main Twitter account is very active with both routine posts and interactions
• They will continue to have routine posts and interactions on both Twitter accounts
to continue to produce ambient awareness (Thompson, 2007). [A4] This will
allow the people who follow the station’s Twitter account to receive bits of
information everyday about the station’s shows and activities. Overtime this
makes people more aware of the station and will make them more likely to listen
and/or participate in the station’s events. The strong presence on Twitter could
help set the standard for WWVU’s other social media platforms.
-WWVU has separate accounts for their News and Sports shows to appeal to specific
listeners who prefer not to listen to music
• Differentiated content needs to be on the two twitter pages to target the specific
audiences of each show. WWVU needs to play on the interests of each group by
creating content relevant to each of the fan bases of both news and sports. [See
appendix A5 for example tweets].
-WWVU has strict policies about allowing a student organization to receive university
and outside funding, but WWVU has the ability to partner with other university-affiliated
organizations to promote their brand and expand their audience.
• By utilizing Katz and Lazersfeld Two-Step Flow Model, we can further increase
the amount of weak ties [A6]. An example would be to partner up with the
Student Government Association and publicize our partnership via our social
media platforms to increase the desire of other student organizations to work with
us. One organization could see the success of another’s with WWVU and be
interested in partnering with the station as well. This outcome could be measured
by tracking how many student organizations partner with WWVU. This will
increase community involvement and cohesion.
Weaknesses:
-WWVU has multiple identities, such as U92 and WWVU-FM.
• To fix this weakness, we are only going to utilize WWVU-FM, and eliminate the
use of U92 on all of our social media platforms.
• The majority of our listeners refer to it as WWVU-FM, so we want to eliminate
disconnect between the station and the audience. This is a change that will be
implemented based on Barry Feldman’s research “that a brand should establish
itself with a consistent look” and it is important to solidify which brand they want
to represent. By adopting consistent WWVU logos, profile description, and
9. posting language WWVU will solidify the objective of increasing brand and
quality.
-The social media platforms do not link to one another
• To enhance the consistency between the different social media platforms, we will
mention all of the different platforms on each separate account with direct links to
them. The outcomes would be measured by an increase of followers throughout
platforms.
-There are not enough staff members to properly manage the news and sports
accounts
• Hire an unpaid intern to handle specific media accounts. This will increase jobs
for students. This business goal can be measured by the increase of student
employment.
• If this is not feasible, we can have weekly meetings to better delegate specific
accounts to different staff members.
-There are very few interactions between the station and followers on all of the
platforms (except Twitter)
• To increase follower interactions, they will start having a contest once a week
where the station reaches out to its followers. The contest would be choosing a
listener at random who posts a picture with the specific hashtag during a
broadcast giveaway. This increases follower engagement and community
involvement, which could result in an increase in followers on Instagram.
• WWVU-FM to begin mentioning devoted followers weekly, which will help
promote their brand. This consistent interaction will allow ambient awareness and
give a better sense of connection with the station. [A7]
-WWVU’s social media accounts do not have a strong following. (Facebook and Twitter
have about 2,000 followers each, which doesn’t amount to the 32,000 students on campus
• Promote the station on campus more by hanging banners in the Mountainlair that
promote upcoming events. These banners will include the dates of the events,
what the events are, and the station’s social media handles. The banners will also
have an eye-grabbing graphic. By adding the handles on a banner that grabs
people’s attention will make people more interested in following the accounts.
This will increase the follower to following ratio, an ideal amount of followers
would be at least 2,500 by the following academic year. This will also increase
the community involvement and cohesion of students.
• We can also team up with other student organizations that will help publicize the
station. Having this connection with other student organizations will help us have
a higher social capital because according to Ellison, social capital is the resources
accumulated through the relationships between people (2007, 1143-1168). Having
social capital provides you with more people to connect with. The more people
that follow, retweet, and share your content, the more people you are reaching.
[A8].
Opportunities:
-WWVU could utilize underwriting for their social media posts
• Create a specialized unpaid intern position for up and coming business and
marketing students this helps increase jobs for students, which is one of our goals
for the station.
10. • Creating posts publicizing underwriting partnerships will encourage other
businesses to underwrite for the station as well.
• This will help increase one of our goals which is to increase sufficient
underwriting revenue. Revenue from underwriting should be at least $300 by the
upcoming academic year.
-There are minimal commercial interruptions during broadcasts
• Not having commercials is a value of WWVU radio station. According to
Feldman, it is important to create a clear value proposition of what the station can
offer the audience–which is commercial free listening (2014). This would
increase listeners and followers. It would also establish WWVU’s brand by
promoting commercial-free radio on the different platforms.
- The only technology needed for the Instagram video feature is a smartphone, therefore
all staff of WWVU is equipped with the proper technology.
• By using this feature we can provide more visual entertainment for our audience
in a brief video
• There’s no budget for the necessities to create the expected quality of YouTube
content. A poor quality YouTube account would create a negative primal code
identity because the identity is providing listeners with high quality entertainment
(Hanlon).
-WWVU could focus more intently on their main platforms.
• This would satisfy our goal to increase remote attendance because eliminating this
account will allow followers to increase their “attendance” on our other platforms
• Tumblr isn’t helping us accomplishing our other goals, which justifies to our
decision to remove it
• Remove their seldom-used Tumblr to focus on other platforms
Threats:
-Other local radio stations can attract potential listeners (WVAQ, WVPM, WVLG, etc.)
• Continue to maintain and increase the amount of followers on the different
platforms, since WWVU has a higher amount of followers than its competitors.
WWVU can do this by doing Instagram contests as mentioned above.
-Local news and sports outlets have much larger social media following, which draws
attention away from WWVU’s coverage
• By connecting all of our social media accounts and being consistent with the
posted content, we can reach our goal of increasing our followers to 2,500 within
the upcoming academic year. By connecting all platforms and being consistent
with the posts, followers that we have on other platforms that don’t follow certain
ones will recognize the other platforms and follow them too.
-WWVU is a non-profit organization, so they don’t have the budget to implement the
same platforms that other local stations can (Spotify). WWVU has the ability to hire
underwriters as another source of income to implement those platforms.
• By incorporating more underwriting through social media posts, the increase in
revenue would allow WWVU to purchase platforms that the competitors use.
Examples would be apps like Spotify, Iheart Radio and Radiopup. Having these
social media accounts would aid in expanding your audience nationwide.
• Creating a positive relationship with the Student Government Association by
promoting their events and voting in their elections. This will make them more
11. likely to be in favor of donating money to the station from their organization. In
addition, increasing revenue at the station will make you more competitive
throughout Morgantown and even the state.
-Lack of interest from the community and students
• Engage them by incorporating the primal brand coding ritual aspect and have a
weekly contest on Twitter, where you have to follow and retweet a specific tweet
to be eligible to win. This will help the lack of interest from the students because
of the opportunity of winning a contest. This will also help you meet these
following business goals of increased community involvement and cohesion, and
increased followers.
• During live remotes on campus, the station could hand out free merchandise with
their platform handles listed on them. This would help encourage listeners to
follow the different platforms, by making it known that those other platforms
exist. [A9].
12. Expected Outcomes
Presented in front of you today is a well thought out document that includes a
personalized corporate social media plan for your radio station, WWVU-FM. If you choose to
implement this strategy you can expect a significant increase of listeners, influx of followers on
all social media platforms, improved attendance at live broadcasts, and acquire another source of
income by hiring underwriters. If you are able to follow through and implement these strategic
business objectives we have a few reach goals that you can further work toward. These business
strategies can help you achieve specific goals, including: the increase in brand quality, more job
opportunities for students, and increased community involvement and cohesion with the station.
If this corporate social media plan is utilized without deviation, by the upcoming academic year
you should expect an increase of twitter followers from 1,700 to 2,500 and an increase of
Facebook likes by 50% giving an estimated total of 400 likes. Along with the strategies and
tactics advised to improve your Instagram following, we expect your number to rise to 400
which would be a surge of 50%. With the growth of social media followings, you can expect an
increase of listeners. This is measurable by logging on to the WWVU-FM main page and
checking the demographics of listeners. WWVU-FM averages about 52 listeners at one time on
the main page, this can be expected to rise to 70 listeners based on the amount of social media
following you will now have.
13. Recommendations
Overall we recommend that you implement this corporate social media plan. Though
there are risks in all business deals, the benefits, backed by logical thoughts and theories, heavily
outweigh the potential costs.
14. Appendices
[A1]: This is a map of your current social media standing. It includes the platforms WWVU-FM
is currently active on. Two-way arrows show that the connected platforms can be accessed off
both accounts. (i.e: WWVU-FM site to WWVU-FM twitter account). One-way arrows show
that you can access one platform from the other, but not vice versa (i.e: the news Twitter account
to the WWVU Facebook account).
[A2]: This is an ideal social media presence map for WWVU-FM. It got rid of platforms that
aren’t used often (Tumblr). Our rationale for these changes is discussed in the strategy document.
Two-way arrows show that the connected platforms can be accessed off both accounts. One-way
arrows show that you can access one platform from the other, but not vice versa. The “Daily
Athenaeum” app and the “Tune In Radio” app are not connected to any of the social media
accounts, which is why they were left out.
[A3]: Primal Coding- Hanlon says, “a brand is a community of believers held together by seven
assets that create a belief system.” These seven assets create an evangelist for WWVU-FM.
[A4]: Ambient Awareness- Is the way of describing the idea of being "ambiently aware" of
another's actions, thoughts and experiences without having to be near them physically, and
without specifically requesting such information.
[A5]: Example tweets for strengths-
• News Tweet: Tune in at the top of the hour with @playdoughcomb to learn how WVU
plans on improving Greek life. #WWVUTOPNEWS
• Sports Tweet: Tune in to this afternoon at 3:30 for the pregame show of the WVU
women's basketball game vs Coppin St that tips at 4pm #WWVUSPORTS
[A6]: Two-Step Flow Model- States that media effects are indirectly established through the
personal influence of opinion leaders. The majority of people receive much of their information
and are influenced by the media secondhand, through the personal influence of opinion leaders.
• Weak Ties- are the people that you have a weak relationship with. Having many weak
ties provides an opportunity to expand a network beyond those closest to you.
[A7]: Tweet/ Post examples- “@jamie_janine retweeted WWVU-FM five times this month, she
will now receive a complimentary WWVU-FM t-shirt.” - @WWVU_FM
[A8]: Social Capital- Assesses one’s ability to stay connected with members of a previously
inhabited community.
[A9]: Community Engagement- For example, when handing out stickers, frisbees and CD’s,
you can attach your platform handles on each merchandise. From there you will be able to
develop a chart of growing followers on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
15. References
Elisson, N., Steinfield, C. & Lampe, C. (2007). The benefits of facebook “friends:” social capital
and college students’ use of online social networking sites. Journal of Computer-
Mediated Communication, 12 (4). 1143-1168. doi:10.111/I1083-6101.2007.0367.x
Feldman, B. (2014). Make a name for yourself: 11 personal branding power tips. Social
Media Today.
Granovetter, M. (1973). The strength of weak ties. American Journal of Sociology, 78(6).
1360-1380
Hanlon, P. (2006). Primal branding: create zealots for your brand, your company, and your
future (p. 257). New York: Free Press.
Katz, E. (1957). The two step flow of communication: an up-to-date report on an
hypothesis. Public Opinion Quarterly, 21 (1), 61-78. doi: 10.1086/266687.
Thompson, C. (2008). Brave new world of digital intimacy. The New York Times, New York,
MM42.
