With just a tap on a touch-screen radio display, audiences around the world can now access Wharton thought leadership 24 hours per day through SiriusXM Satellite Radio channel 111.
Business Radio Powered by the Wharton School features more than 20 live shows and 40 hours of original programming each week, making rich content from faculty and alumni easily accessible to SiriusXM’s 30 million subscribers. Shows originate through the School’s new on-campus radio studio in Jon M. Huntsman Hall, Sirius’ studio in New York City and Wharton | San Francisco.
Does all-business programming all of the time appeal to audiences? The short answer, it seems, is yes.
“Money—and better money management—is one of the most important issues people face,” says Kent Smetters, host of Business Radio show “Your Money” and Wharton’s Boettner Professor in the Business Economics and Public Policy Department. “There is great need for accurate, clear information that people can use to make better decisions.”
When you provide clear, consistent, nonconflicted advice, an audience will follow, Smetters has found. He reports regular listeners, consistent caller volume and a steady stream of emails after each show.
The other part of Business Radio’s successful equation? The channel hosts’ passion for educating beyond the walls of the Wharton School. After all, faculty hosts shoulder full research and teaching loads. Adding regular radio appearances to an already jam-packed schedule was initially a challenge, Smetters admits, but the broad, far-reaching impact of such a medium is worth it.
“Education is a passion. Money is tied up in personal and emotional well-being, and there is great need for programming like this,” Smetters says. “As faculty members, we have the opportunity here to really help people.”
—Susan McDonnell
