Posts Tagged Radio Advertising
Posted on April 30, 2010 by Bill Hansen
Ad avoidance is a major problem for anyone in the marketing field. We buy, schedule, and target our media under the assumption that it’s going to get noticed. But often it does not. 60-70% of television ads can now be bypassed by DVR. Only 1/2% to 2% of direct mail is opened. According to scientific studies, over 80% of internet ad units are purposefully avoided.
Radio, on the other hand, is only ignored about 8% of the time*, but that’s not what this is about. This post is about making simple changes to your advertising or marketing approach to vastly increase the likelihood that your audience actually pays attention to your message.
Yes, consumers will pay attention to ads. Many do today, even with the tools that they have to easily avoid them. But only the ads that speak to them, and that’s the key – the ad actually has to make the consumer think that it’s about them, not just the company that’s advertising. Here are four basic things (and one advanced technique) that you can use immediately to improve your connection with, and therefore your engagement to, your target audience.
Posted on February 26, 2010 by The Growthwire Team
Here’s the second in a series of simple tips to improve the quality of your advertising. This month, we focus on the power of emotion and the appropriate use of facts and logic. As much as you’d like to communicate all of the things that make your business special, your best message is one that makes your strongest differentiator undeniably clear. If you can express this difference in emotional terms – specifically as a benefit that has emotion at its core, you’ve got it made. Remember, for every charming gecko, memorable slogan, or unforgettable jingle, thousands of businesses advertise very effectively by being authentic, direct, and adhering to a couple of simple ideas. You don’t have to be a creative genius to use advertising effectively!
Posted on February 12, 2010 by The Growthwire Team
Dr. Carmen Kavali, Kavali Plastic Surgery
When we think about the types of businesses that benefit most from strong consumer marketing effort, categories like retail, entertainment, and automotive usually come to mind. This month’s exceptional marketer, Dr. Carmen Kavali, illustrates how professional services – even medical practices – benefit significantly by building market-wide brand awareness.
Dr. Kavali has built a strong brand around an emotional idea: a metamorphosis for body, mind, and soul. Her logo, website, and on-air radio marketing work together to reinforce this idea. She’s even branded one of her practice specialties “The Mommy Makeover” around this holistic idea of change and growth.
The emotional thrust of her marketing distinguish her practice in a marketplace that is extremely competitive and, like most other sectors, feeling the impact of shrinking consumer spending. The branding is tasteful, relevant, and creates desire (while remaining well within the bounds of medical marketing canon). Her radio advertising, which is targeted toward her adult female client base, is a powerful and cost-effective tool for bringing this emotion to life on a daily basis. It’s built broad market awareness that other local practices can’t match.
Dr. Kavali’s proactive growth strategy has yielded enviable success. As a recent letter to Cumulus put it, “In a few short years, my brand has become something bigger than just me.” — a key point for all professional practices, medical and non-medical, alike.
Posted on November 7, 2009 by The Growthwire Team
MediaPost.com reported results from a Nielsen-sponsored study today that indicates that terrestrial radio has a dominant share of audio media usage (relative to online and personal audio players). The finding was somewhat surprising to its authors, since the study was conducted by the Council For Research Excellence – a group of TV and Ad Agency researchers – to measure the impact of digital media across TV, Computers, and Mobile devices.
The findings were quite conclusive: radio is second, only to TV, in daily reach (77% of all adults), over 1/2 of all audio listening is to local over-the-air radio, and over 80% of 18-34 year-olds still use radio for about an hour and a half per day, which is about 4-5 times the usage of digital alternatives. Read the MediaPost summary of this research here.
Posted on November 5, 2009 by The Growthwire Team
Each month, Access Points highlights a way for businesses to creatively and cost-effectively reach the large communities of radio listeners in their markets.
Most radio advertisers appreciate the power of a :30 or :60 second commercial for their ability to paint vivid pictures in the minds of listeners. The world’s leading brands have been building and holding market share with this strong tool for over 9 decades.
This isn’t the only way to cost-effectively harness the power of radio. For some businesses, like those that consumers are relatively familiar with, those that have very simple and credible differentiation, or those that are using other types of advertising concurrently, there’s another powerful and cost-effective option: sponsorships.
A sponsorship is simply a short on-air mention, consisting of what’s commonly called a ‘name and claim.’ (e.g. “…brought to you by Children’s Hospital, the Valley’s only juvenile-diabetes specialist”). Because the mentions are short, they can be economically inserted into radio programming without taking up valuable airtime. When the mention states something clearly differentiable, as does the example above, or it can have a very, very strong impact.
Posted on November 1, 2009 by Bill Hansen
After almost three decades in the marketing business there are still very few things that I’m comfortable generalizing about: for every rule that can’t be broken, there are always at least a hand full of exceptions that prove the axiom’s fallibility.
One exception is the importance of message frequency. In active communication, such as sales presentations, teaching, or parenting, it’s extremely rare to see something stick without repetition. No matter how clever, clear, or compelling, it’s extremely difficult to influence people’s behavior by saying something just once. In advertising, which is generally much less active (and often passive) communication, it is all but impossible to influence behavior with infrequent exposure.
This is a fact of marketing life. It’s not something new or something driven by today’s over-commercialized environment. It’s human nature. As proof, read the short story below – and note the date that it was first published.
