Radio Advertising
Radio Advertising
The advent of radio as a common and popular medium decades ago changed the face of advertising. Radio advertising became a primary tool of marketing, particularly radio advertising on popular comedy programs and news broadcasts, as well as the emerging area of soap operas. Radio advertising was used to market every conceivable product, and daytime radio advertising was particularly successful in selling products to housewives. Foods, dishwashing and laundry soaps and certain cosmetics were sold by the truckload through radio advertising.
Early radio advertising employed techniques known as “hard sell”…that is basically beating the listener into submission through strong, repetitive phases. One form of such radio advertising hard sell was commercials that were geared to “direct sales”…in other words, direct consumer response. Sponsors could measure the effectiveness of such radio advertising by the numbers of responses to each announcement. This form of radio advertising required that announcers be very forceful in their presentations. Radio advertising also requires strong writing skills as there are no visuals to support the message. Comparable advertising today is the “:phone in your order now” advertisements on TV.
Radio advertising purchased during programs by famous personalities, such as Jack Benny, was of course far more expensive than late night radio advertising. The same pertains today for the cost of radio advertising and for TV advertising as well. Obviously the cost of both radio and TV advertising is related to the number of listeners to a program. Ultimately the effectiveness of radio advertising will be judged in terms of product sold.
Radio advertising has changed as radio broadcasting has changed, with emphasis today on a mix of news, DJ music and talk shows. A talk show host who commands a large audience will have more radio advertising on his show. While TV advertising has taken center stage in many advertising campaigns, it is considered important to support it with radio advertising. Radio advertising can be particularly important in reaching local audiences where it reenforces national TV advertising. Almost every major TV advertising campaign presented to a client will include radio advertising recommendations as well, along with strong print advertising campaigns
Local radio advertising can be quite inexpensive and useful in supplementing major national campaigns for products. An example of the use of radio advertising in this manner is commercials run by local car dealers. The national TV and radio campaigns will have emphasized the features of the automobiles, but the radio advertising used by the local car dealers will, like newspaper advertising, emphasize special sales events the dealer is holding, and the good prices offered to the consumer by the dealer. As with other media, the cost of radio advertising will vary according to the times when commercials are run and the position in terms of shows with good listener numbers..
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