WGLT’s Facebook Competitive Advantage

By Emily Griffith

INTRODUCTION
This report serves the purpose to analyze how WGLT’s Facebook page performed compared
with other popular radio stations in the Bloomington-Normal market, such as B104 Bloomington-
Normal, Cities 92.9, Hits 100.7, and WJBC. More specifically, this report will look at the performance of
WGLT’s Facebook page for the past six months (from July 1, 2017 to January 31, 2018). Thus, this
research will allow WGLT to improve its Facebook page content and visibility.

Data was collected through Netvizz. This is a tool that extracts data from different sections of
the Facebook platform— such as particular pages like WGLT— for research purposes. Netvizz allows for
quantitative and qualitative analysis with regards to demographical, post-demographical, and relational
characteristics found on Facebook pages.

DISCUSSION
Looking the past six months, WGLT compares relatively well. With each comparison made,
WGLT came in second among the five radio stations, always behind WJBC. That said, we will take a
closer look into the platform’s followers, engagements, and specific engaging content.

Currently, WGLT has Chart 1

6,192 people who like the
Facebook page, while,B104
Bloomington-Normal has 16,153 80
page likes, WJBC has 15,041
page likes, Hits 100.7 has 4,075
Average Number of Relevant Engagements
Over the Past Six Months
60

page likes, and Cities 92.9 has 40

2,718 page likes. That said,
20
WGLT is doing relatively well
compared to competitor pages 0
for the amount of engagements WGLT WJBC Hits 100.7 B104 Cities 92.9
per its number of followers. Posts Likes Reactions Comments Shares
Looking at Chart 1, we can see a
visual comparison of the amount of posts, likes, reactions, comments, and shares over the past six
months for the five Bloomington-Normal market radio stations. Referring back to the number of
followers, WGLT, compared to B104 Bloomington-Normal, is doing extremely well for its average
number of engagements. For example, while B104 Bloomington-Normal has 9,961 more page likes than
WGLT, WGLT is having more of it’s followers engaging with its content than B104 Bloomington-Normal.
This is even more substantial when looking at the average number of posts each page publishes per day.
WGLT publishes an average of 2.5 posts per day, while B104 Bloomington-Normal publishes 2.3 posts
per day. With those number of posts per day, WGLT is getting an average of 32.8 likes, 44 reactions,
15.8 comments, and 10.3 shares. B104 Bloomington-Normal, on the contrary, only receives an average
of 14.4 likes, 17.6 reactions, 2.9 comments, and 3.6 shares, respectfully.

In addition, Chart 2
looking at the past six Number of Reactions Over the Past Six Months
month’s reactions, 7000
WGLT compares
6000
fairly, coming in
second behind 5000
Bloomington-Normal 4000
market radio leader,
3000
WJBC. Facebook
recently released a 2000
feature called 1000
“reactions.” Instead of
0
Facebook users just Jul-17 Aug-17 Sep-17 Oct-17 Nov-17 Dec-17 Jan-18
being able to like a
WGLT WJBC Hits 100.7 B104 Cities 92.9
post, they can now
interact with a status
update, article, photo, or video using one of six reactions: Like, Love, Haha, Wow, Sad, and Angry. These
reactions prove a little more helpful when looking at a Facebook page’s individual content because it
indicates sentiment that users may feel toward specific content published. For example, the fourth most
engaging post WGLT has published in the past six months got a great deal of different reactions (see
image below). WGLT posted about how McLean
County Coroner diagnosed seven overdose
deaths within one week. That said, WGLT
Facebook page followers had different reactions
to this content: 23 people liked the post, 25
people used the Wow reactions, 48 people
used the Sad reaction, and six people used the
Angry reaction. Clearly, these reactions can help
WGLT create better posts. Reaction data sends
signals from the audience about what makes
them laugh, what makes them sad, what makes
them angry or what makes them shocked. Of
the top five most engaging posts on WGLT’s
Facebook page, each post had an assortment of
different audience Reactions. All and all, over
the past six months, WGLT had a total of 9,503
reactions, while WJBC had 13,702 reactions,
B104 Bloomington-Normal had 3,766 reactions
Hits 100.7 had 1,393 reactions, and Cities 92.9
had 1,314 reactions (shown in Chart 2).

2
 Another interesting data set to look Chart 3
at is the total number of engagements over Total Enagements Over the Last Six
the past six months. Looking at Chart 3, Months
WGLT— again— comes in second behind 3094
WJBC for the total number of engagements 5163
over the past six months. Engagements are 1839
defined as post clicks, likes, reactions, 15154

shares, and comments on a post. However,

22893
what is contributing to these engagements?
By examining some of the posts with the
most engagements, we can see what type of
content is driving audiences to interact with WGLT WJBC Hits 100.7 B104 Cities 92.9
radio stations’ Facebook pages.

3
 To get an understanding of why WGLT is getting more average and total engagements, it’s
imperative to look at the type of content being posted to the page. Looking at the above four images
from competitor Bloomington-Normal
market radio stations, engaging
content was either videos or links to
stories on the websites of the
respected radio stations. WGLT’s most
engaging post was a linked story
about the new H&M store opening in
Eastland Mall, which received 656
engagements. On the contrary, WJBC’s
linked story on a local missing woman
found alive received 1107
engagements. Then, B104
Bloomington-Normal’s Delvar Day
video received 296 engagements and
Hits 100.7 loose monkey at McLean
County Fair video received 175
engagements. Finally, Cities 92.9 video
of Great Harvest Bread Co.
accompanying a Facebook contest
received 239 engagements.

All and all, what made these

posts so engaging for their respected
audiences was that it was compelling it
some way. For example, WGLT’s H&M article is considered breaking, good news for the Bloomington-
Normal area because Eastland Mall is arguably declining with stores leaving the site left and right. In
addition, the videos posted on Hits 100.7, Cities 92.9, and B104 Bloomington-Normal either provided
humor, inspiration, or motivation. Such content caught the eyes of the audiences, whether through
compelling titles or bright images. In a social media world where everything is fighting for the attention
of their respected audiences, there has to be some kind of hook that draws the audience to engage with
the post, otherwise, it will just be scrolled past on the feed.

CONCLUSION
After analyzing how WGLT’s Facebook page performed compared with B104 Bloomington-
Normal, Cities 92.9, Hits 100.7, and WJBC, using Netvizz data tools, it was determined that WGLT ranked
second out of five radio stations for engagements. That said, WJBC remains the leader in creating
compelling posts and driving engagements with its respected audiences. Although WGLT is not first,
based on the ratio of its followers with the amount of average engagements— compared to stations
such as B104 Bloomington-Normal— WGLT proves to be driving captivating content to catch the
attention of its audiences.

4
 However, if WGLT hopes to be the top ranking social media account for the Bloomington-
Normal market radio stations, it is suggested that WGLT publish more videos on its Facebook page in
order to drive content. Within the past six months, WGLT has only published eight video posts, while its
competitors have posted more substantial number of videos. In addition, the videos posted by the
competitors were of the most engaging posts they had published in the past six months. This could be
because Facebook users see a great deal of videos on their feed already and they are more accustomed
to this type of media on Facebook. In addition, another recommendation for WGLT’s competitive
advantage against other Bloomington-Normal market radio stations is to post during different hours.
While some stories may break and need to go up at certain times as the stories come in, there should be
some time regularity in posting. Publish during optimal times when the audience will be on their phones
or on their laptops. For example, WJBC’s three most engaging Facebook posts were published at 7:35
p.m., 3:03 p.m., and 3:00 p.m. However, WGLT’s most engaging Facebook posts were published at 1:29
a.m., 10:42 p.m., and 1:18 p.m. One reason why WGLT may not be getting as much engagement on their
content as WJBC is because they are publishing either when people are not awake, or when their target
audience is at work. On the contrary, WJBC published at times when people are just getting off work, or
they are at home relaxing. These recommendations are something to keep in mind.

All and all, although WGLT is doing fairly well when compared against its competitors, there are
always areas for improvement and learning. Once improvements stop, content becomes stale and could
risk the loss of the audience’s attention.