Hear 2.0

When I got my first full-time radio gig in 1974, the PD told me, "The magic of radio is the visual fantasy created for each listener." And with that mantra, the station's goal was to make every second entertaining. And that's all the stuff that comes between along with the music.

After I wrote and produced my first commercial, I played it for the PD and was summarily chastised for not keeping the mantra in mind. He told me creativity in the writing and production elements that bring that copy to life are what's necessary. He gave me a few ideas and sent me back to the production room.

Soon, producing commercials became like a competition between all the rock staff as well as those that worked at the AM station. I was amazed at how the stuff between the music was gaining on the music as being truly entertaining.

Forward to the new millennium. These days, if a cluster has more than one production director doing commercials for 5 - 8 stations, and copy writers beyond the sales people, it is doing great. It seems there are too few hours to do much more than wham-bam commercial production. Or worse, you get the agency or national spot that is no better than what the station bangs out.

While some stations or companies have systems in place to gauge the effectiveness of the client's advertising campaign, many count another buy from the client as a sign of effectiveness. Now there are stations that charge their sales staff with building a strong relationship with clients, becoming more of a marketing consultant or partner to continually help the client build his/her brand.

But you know what? It all gets back to the creativity of the commercial and a significant number of spots (remember OES) to hit the advertiser's target squarely on the head. Recently, one of my clients' production director had a very twisted idea for a home improvement store. He produced the commercial, but truly thought the client would think it was too sexually inclined. But to everyone's surprise, the client loved it, upped the buy, and created a smile on a lot of people's faces. Listeners talked about it and shopped at the store. The advertiser bought another strong flight and asked that the commercial be just as if not more creative. Oh, and the spot won an Addy.

These days, just as it has always been, if you wanna win, you have to make the station a total package. And it has to be more than the music, air talent, and station imaging. Regardless of whether they take up 9 or 18 minutes an hour, the commercials have to be great!

Greg Gillispie

Thanks for your comments, Greg!

Greg:

As usual, sage advice from an industry pro (you). I will take exception with one issue though, that is if I may. Creativity is certainly THE critical component for an effective advertising campaign. However, often equally important is the process of making sure that the advertiser does, in fact, have an infrastructure (and a firm commitment in terms of dedicating time and personnel) in place to accurately gauge efficacy. Specifically, reaching agreement with the advertiser on a reasonable set of expectations as it relates to "results" is essential, BEFORE the first commercial airs. Otherwise you're likely to be faced with a "bad-pay".

The process begins with an analysis of the condition of the current "bridge" between a business and its target market (customers). The most creative production ever known to radio can only bring the advertiser "selling opportunities" in the form of motivated prospects. Beyond that, it is the advertiser's responsibility to create a "positive selling environment" which ultimately leads to a sale. You would be surprised at how many business owners fail to consider this extremely important detail. Worse, you would be amazed at how many radio sales people fail to bring this to their clients' attention.

Why is this? Because just as consolidation has impacted programming and production, so too has it affected sales. All too often, AE's are pitching "tonnage" using the same creative across station clusters that reach widely disparate demographic groups. It's the old "throw enough shit against the wall..." marketing theory. Too bad it works better for the station owners than it does for the advertisers, huh?

Paul Robinson, President/Emerald City Radio Partners

Mark,

You are asking the questions I have been asking for about fifteen years. It's good to "meet" you.

I am hired by small to mid-size businesses (and radio stations on behalf of such businesses) to help them create results. Having worked with hundreds of them, I'm convinced that the frustration associated with creating results is less an advertising problem and more a business problem. Yes, with the experience I've gained, I can create ad campaigns with an "absorption factor" that is unusually high. But my biggest success stories come from advertisers who simply have a great business. Therefore I now offer a pair of services...

1) A "Brand Exam." This is a comprehensive look at the business itself. What is it? Who are its customers? What does the business want prospects to do? Why should they do it? We also take a thorough look at its competitors and what "Differentiating Ideas" they own in the prospect's mind. With the results of this Brand Exam we can then isolate a Brand Identity and outline a strategy for promoting it.

2) A "Branding Campaign." I make perfectly clear to my clients that all media can work well when used properly. But since most of them have ad budgets between 50k and 150k, I demonstrate for them why Radio nearly always provides a superior combination of Reach & Frequency. Usually we write and produce eight ads for them. Yes, these ads incorporate the latest findings in brain science and human memory retention. But what good are they if the business is just another "Me Too?" No good, sir.

Geez... I didn't mean for this to become a brochure. Lemme just answer some of the questions you posed.

What makes a radio ad effective is that the business itself is (as Seth Godin would say) "remarkable"--or is at least *differentiated* in some way that is strongly relevant to prospects, with a Differentiating Idea they can credibly claim. Example...

My client, Convenient Family Dentistry, would love to use advertising to communicate all the reasons why they think they're special. But, upon performing the Brand Exam, we discovered the REAL gem of their practice: They are open Seven Days a Week! This was not something they had ever emphasized. But we found that mothers absolutely despised trying to make dental appointments around school hours and their work schedules. They loved it, and what's more NOONE else was doing it. So what did we do? We created simple, comforting ads that focused on "The Dentists Open Seven Days a Week." Unfortunately the client would not like this published, but in the first four weeks on a single radio station, our campaign brought them forty-five new patients who definitely volunteered that they were responding to the ad. (How many do you suppose just didn't want to volunteer hearing the ad?)

I guess my answers to your questions center upon the belief that, if advertising consultants REALLY want to help produce results, they'd better figure out a way to help the business itself become more marketable.

Okay, this is becoming a bit of a tome. I'd love to discuss my answers to the questions you posed. If you'd like to do so (without my using 12 megabytes of your site's memory) feel free to contact me.

Thanks!
Jonathan