WUVM has been serving the Milwaukee area for over 60 years, providing dependable news and information to southeastern Wisconsin. As a public radio station, the support that we get from our listeners is essential to our mission. That's where our marketing and development department comes. They make sure that those operations are running smoothly and we're getting the support that we need. The team is led by our Vice President of Marketing and Development Melanie Johnson. And for this segment of our get to know WUWM series, we sat down with Melanie to learn more about her background, her philosophy on leading these groups and what she's most proud of.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
You have a really unique perspective as a staff member because you were here and then you took a hiatus and then you came back. And so what was it about this place that motivate you to come back?
So, what motivated me to come back, I would say is really the staff, I'll be honest, when I left, I really just left to gain more management experience. And so when I left here, I said "I would be back at some point in time." And I honestly meant that because I left and said, "This was the best place that I had ever worked." It was the people. It was the mission of the organization. It was everything that the station was doing. And I actually went to the new place. I started working and told those individuals, "If anything ever opens up at the station that is in my field of interest, I am going to leave and go back and work there." So, it was always that career path for me to come back to the station because there is just something about the dynamic of individuals that work here and everybody brings something different. But they all meld together and it just creates just something magical here.
Can you describe a bit about your approach and your philosophy to directing the marketing and directing the development and making sure it all works together?
One big thing for me is our member drives. The first time I was here, they were always one of those things that felt more like we were maybe begging for money. So, one of the things that we really did was make it more of a team effort. So, everybody is involved in it — content team, the hosts, programming, marketing, all of my team members are involved. But it really is everybody lifting each other up, being part of the planning process and trying to not make it sound like we are begging for money, but really involving the listeners and saying, "Here are some of the great things we did." And we actually have people tell us they're not turning us off during member drives, which is one of the things we always used to hear is, "Oh, it's a member drive. I turn the radio off." Now, we actually have people tell us, "Oh, I actually enjoyed listening during your member drive." So, that is music to my ears when somebody actually says they they enjoyed listening to the member drive because that really means we're we're making a connection with people during that time.
What is it about your work and everything that you do and experience that keeps you here at the station?
I think, honestly, it's our listeners and our members. We hear from our members and they just genuinely support us. We hear, sometimes, good things and, sometimes, bad things. But even in those moments, the fact that somebody is reaching out to us to tell us something about the station shows that they are passionate about us. That that's what you want. You want somebody to be that engaged, that they're willing to reach out to you and say, "Hey, this was great," or, "Hey, this did not work for me and this is the reason why." There is a passion in that. And just the station, for me, it's just a magical place. That's the only way I can really describe it. I don't know if I can imagine working anywhere else, living in the city and working anywhere else.
