Cool FM Cash Call wins BIG at Social Media Awards

Cool FM’s Cash Call competition has won a Northern Ireland Social Media Award for ‘Best Use of Facebook’.

The glitzy ceremony was held at the Europa Hotel in Belfast and recognises freelancers, individuals, teams, agencies and businesses delivering social media excellence across Northern Ireland.

Cool FM utilises facebook to help promote and highlight Cash Call which has rapidly become a phenomenon on local radio, paying out millions of pounds in cash to lucky winners across Northern Ireland.

Cool FM’s Digital Content Editor Emma Dickson explains how she is using social and digital media to help compliment the traditional radio broadcast output.

"As we hear screams of joy, elation, laughter and sometimes disappointment on air, we feel it's important to share these radio moments online.

"Our digital strategy engages audiences across all platforms - memes/social trends on Facebook and Instagram, to TikTok videos and short-form winner interviews.

"Cash Call is a brand so well known, it's hard to find someone here in Northern Ireland that doesn't know someone that's already won. From relatives and colleagues to neighbours and friends, we love catching up with our previous winners to see how life-changing the call really can be. "

The award was picked up by John Kearns who hosts Cash Call on his popular Drive show and Melissa Riddle who fronts Cool FM’s facebook show ‘Cash Call Countdown’

Cool FM also picked up the award for ‘Social Media Personality of the Year’ for Stuart Robinson - the Cool Saturday Show presenter rose to the top of social media timelines as the face of Cool FM’s COVID coverage.

For almost two years Cool FM became the authority in Northern Ireland utilising facebook live, Instagram and other social media to reach audiences other broadcasters simply could not.

Stuart explained that he had no idea at the time the content would reach such large audiences, nor would it go on so long; “We took the decision at the very start of the pandemic to provide extra content for our audiences at what was a worrying and confusing time for many.

"Very quickly we started getting large audiences tuning in and it wasn’t long before we had become the ‘go to’ place for the latest information on the pandemic and the restrictions”.

“When it became clear that COVID was going to be around for a while, we had to diversify how we delivered the content by moving our entire video production suite into my front living room – this enabled me to go live instantly at anytime of day or night as new information became available and get ahead of our competition”.

The live daily 3pm COVID briefings from Stormont was co-hosted by Cool FM’s Chief Reporter Sasha Wylie and reached mass audiences in NI – with some live streams being watched by up to 30,000 people at any one time and some videos reaching in the upwards of a quarter of a million viewers.

Stuart’s new social media notoriety placed him top of the list for NI’s leaders to relay important public health information to a younger demographic during COVID.

Indeed First Minister Arlene Foster and Deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill became regulars on Cool FM, interacting directly with Stuart’s audience on the important COVID news of the day while often showing a much more relaxed side of their personalities.

Congratulations to the team!