Visualisation of Radio: Audiovisual Content Strategies of Moscow Radio Stations in Social Media During the Turbulence

Abstract

This paper presents the results of a study of the content strategies related to visualisation of Moscow's top-rated radio stations in social media. The objectives were to determine the activity of Moscow radio stations and audience response in social media during the turbulent late 2022. First, the official accounts of forty three Moscow radio stations on the platforms VKontakte, Odnoklassniki, in the messenger Telegram* and on the video hosting YouTube, as well as Yandex Zen, Twitter*, TikTok*, Yappy, RuTube and so on were analyzed. For a more detailed analysis of content strategies, ten radio stations leading the Mediascope ranking were selected. The analysis was carried out according to the following criteria: the presence of official representation in social media, the number of subscribers, forms, formats and genres of activity of the radio station, the audience response to the content of the radio station in social networks and messengers. Particular attention in the study was paid to the ways in which the selected radio stations were visualized. The results of the analysis show that VKontakte remains the most popular platform for radio stations during the turbulence, followed by YouTube, Odnoklassniki, Telegram* and Zen. Social media pages are used by stations as a specific method of expansion or as a means of strategic interaction with the audience. The predominance of video content is observed on two platforms — Vkontakte and YouTube; music stations are the most active in posting it. Radio stations are not particularly active in publishing video content on the site, and almost all of them post videos from their YouTube channels. A number of radio stations do not publish video content at all. The most popular are short vertical videos and 'long' horizontal recordings created from both on-air and unique off-air content. There are practically no broadcasts (except for the news content of "Moscow Talks"). The channels' audience is rather passive. With regular video broadcasts and publication of content, radio stations achieve high audience engagement.