How Many Facebook/Twitter Followers Does Your Station Have? Have You Been Conned?

Social media such as Whatsapp, Facebook and Twitter are at the heart of Irish radio station media presence as they keep listeners involved. Their online presence is another advertising revenue stream and can influence advertisers as they decide where to locate their cash. On Sunday December 3rd 2017, as the stations in a very competitive broadcasting landscape ramp up their Christmas advertising packages, we took a look at some of the Irish radio stations online presence and found some surprising results. These results do not include every radio station in Ireland just a representative selection and they are listed here in order of their Facebook Likes

Station		Facebook		Twitter
98 FM	Dublin	695,923		145,000
iRadio	Munster	580,816		102,000
Beat FM	Munster	555,680		70,600
FM 104	Dublin	496,558		123,000
Today FM	National	439,501		235,000
Spin 1038	Dublin	414,541		329,000
4FM	National	401,900		13,100
RTE 2FM	National	393,461		241,000
Spin South West	Munster	262,941		81,800
Q 102	Dublin	172,237		15,300
Galway Bay FM	Galway	135,279		11600
Newstalk	National	121,794		203,000
Cork 96FM	Cork	111,853		34,900
Christmas FM	Temporary	102,063		89,700
Radio Nova	Dublin	101,291		11,200
Sunshine Radio	Dublin	98,015		2,645
WLR	Waterford	70,629		16100
RTE Radio One	National	42,257		110,000
Midlands 103	Midlands	37,282		3,839
MidWest Radio	Mayo	31,719		11,400
Northern Sound	Ulster	27,838		6,506
LMFM	Louth	24,846		17600
KFM	Kildare	23,322		10,700
Raidio Na Gaeltachta	National	22,114		17,800
Ocean FM	Sligo	20,561		6,920
Phever	Pirate	12,473		1,634
Radio Maria	Online	11,764		14,100
8Radio	Temporary	9,620		6585
Klub FM	Pirate	9,420		624
Spirit	National	9,408		2,097
Tonik	Pirate	8,362		353
RTE Gold	Digital	6,885		1,921
Radio Na Life	Dublin	6,818		7,727
Dublin City FM	Dublin	6,111		8,454
Near FM	Community	4,894		4,024
Radio Snowflake	Online	3,018		571
Dublin Digital Radio	Digital	2,694		1308
Cork Community Radio	Community	2,573		19

98FM have over 695,000 likes for their page that equates to 58% of Dublin's population. To put that into perspective according to recent JNLR figures (Q1 2017) 820,000 people in Dublin listen to the radio every day. According to those figures 110,000 listen to 98FM on a daily basis that is just 1/6th of their facebook followers. The top ten stations were

Cork based pirate radio station Klub FM have more followers than Spirit Radio which broadcasts across the country and more followers than RTE digital station RTE Gold that has been receiving extra press coverage recently.

Twitter is another measurement stations can use to entice advertisers to their station. The more twitter followers your station has the more popular they are, right? Well NO. 

The top ten Twitter accounts from the above list were 

Spin 1038	Dublin	329,000
RTE 2FM	National	241,000
Today FM	National	235,000
Newstalk	National	203,000
98 FM	Dublin	145,000
FM 104	Dublin	123,000
RTE Radio One	National	110,000
iRadio	Munster	102,000
Christmas FM	Temporary	89,700
Spin South West	Munster	81,800

Spin topped the twitter top ten but that's not the full story. Spin 1038 was the second most listened to station after FM 104 in the Q1 JNLR figures with a 13% share (FM 104 had 16%) and they have 88,000 more twitter followers than the national state broadcaster's music channel 2FM. This should be music to an advertisers ear but when you drill into the 'followers' just like RTE Radio earlier this year when it was discovered that the 'followers' were padded with non existent followers (https://twitter.com/rtesecretpro/status/926051160972255232)then there is a fraud been perpetrated on advertisers and legitimate followers. These are screen shots of some of their phantom followers

Surely it should be the responsibility of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland to ensure that their licensed stations are not conning the public and businesses.