We developed and delivered an innovative social-media strategy for BBC Radio 3 to accompany their 200-hour Schubert marathon The Spirit of Schubert in March 2012.

After a workshop with members of the BBC Radio 3 Interactive and Radio production teams, we created a strategy to encourage existing listeners to deepen their engagement with the network, and to intrigue and interest a new, arts-aware audience.

This took three parts: a Viennese Scrapbook on Tumblr and two Twitter accounts, @FranzIsUnwell and @SchubertNow.

Viennese Scrapbook
This bespoke Tumblr theme was updated several times each day throughout the Spirit of Schubert festival, creating an ongoing accompaniment to the BBC Radio 3 transmission. This created a vivid world that reflected all aspects of the composer’s life and work, from the canonical to the counter-cultural. The site was featured as a highlight in the Tumblr Staff blog and also in the Tumblr music category. Across the 8-day campaign, the site also attracted almost 1000 followers and a healthy body of returning visitors.

@FranzIsUnwell
Franz Schubert came back to life for nine days on Twitter, where he tweeted his thoughts on sex, music and pastries, before breathing his dramatic last breath as the final bars of Schubert faded from the airwaves. This was a highly successful Twitter intervention, that provoked mention on the BBC R4 Today programme and engaged and delighted just short of 1000 followers. According to internal BBC figures, this account was the seventh most engaged BBC Twitter account so far in 2012.

@SchubertNow
A bespoke, automated account that used internal the BBC play-out system to generate updates of every piece as it started on BBC Radio 3. Although very simple, this was a revolutionary use of Twitter for BBC R3, using simple, glanceable outputs to serve the audience in a new way.

We brought together a bespoke team for this project, including Gavin Plumley, James Bridle and Natalia Buckley.