Radio Direct Response: Direct Response Radio Advertising Agency | Blog Zone

I was one of the fortunate people to attend the Marconi Awards last Thursday night at the Philadelphia Convention Center. I was there with RDR’s Promotions Director Theresa Russell and our friends Matt Cutair, Katie Beltz and John Murphy from Dial Global.

I wasn’t sure what to expect but ended up having a great time.

Before I go into the details, let me explain what the Marconis are.

Established in 1989 and named after inventor and Nobel Prize winner Guglielmo Marconi, the NAB Marconi Radio Awards are given to radio stations and outstanding on-air personalities to recognize excellence in radio. Marconi finalists were selected by a task force of broadcasters and the winners were voted on by the NAB Marconi Radio Awards Selection Academy. The votes were then tabulated by an independent firm.^[1]

It was nice to be in a room with all of these talented people from the radio industry. Everyone was excited whether they were up for an award or not.  It may have been even more fun for us to sit back and just watch people winning and receiving their awards.

At dinner, we shared a table with some people we didn’t know. At one point, one of the gentlemen at our table went to the stage and accepted an award. I was surprised because I didn’t even realize he/his station was nominated for an award. When he came back to our table, he was holding his award and had this proud smile on his face. The award was for the Religious Station of the Year and his station KLTY FM in Dallas, TX was deemed the best in that format. Though he was there alone, he let us all be part of the experience by passing the award around.  We each waited for our turn to hold it and tried to imagine how it might be to win one.

TR’s Laura Ingraham was the host of the evening and she did a great job. No wonder she is ranked eighth among the most listened radio programs and has an average 5.5 million weekly listeners.^[2] She was so energetic and was one of the few people who weren’t wearing black!

Grammy-nominated singer, songwriter and radio personality Brian McKnight made a special appearance and acted as the entertainment portion of the evening. I buy air time during Brian McKnight’s show for our clients and it was interesting to see him and listen to him in this setting. Not only is he a great singer but he is also a very funny person.

My favorite winner of the night was Alberto Alegre, who won the Spanish Format Personality of the Year for KSAH- AM in San Antonio, TX. He gave the most interesting and funny speech of the night and was so happy and honored to win.

It was a great night and I am so glad I was part of it.

Congratulations to all the winners!

Here are the winners of 2009:
Legendary Station: KKOB-AM, Albuquerque, NM
AC Station of the Year: WBEB-FM, Philadelphia, PA
Network/Syndicated Personality of the Year: Dave Ramsey, The Lampo Group
CHR Station of the Year: WVAQ-FM, Morgantown, WV
Major Market Station of the Year: WBEB-FM, Philadelphia, PA
Country Station of the Year: KYGO-FM, Denver, CO
Large Market Station of the Year: WIBC-FM, Indianapolis, IN
News/Talk Station of the Year: WGN-AM, Chicago, IL
Medium Market Station of the Year: WHO-AM, Des Moines, IA
Oldies Station of the Year: WMXJ-FM, Miami, FL
Small Market Station of the Year: WJBC-AM, Bloomington, IL
Religious Station of the Year: KLTY-FM, Dallas, TX
Major Market Personality of the Year: Matt Siegel, WXKS-FM Boston MA
Rock Station of the Year: KQRS-FM, Minneapolis, MN
Large Market Personality of the Year: Bill Cunningham, WLW-AM Cincinnati, OH
Spanish Station of the Year: KLVE-FM, Los Angeles, CA
Medium Market Personalities of the Year: Van & Bonnie, WHO-AM Des Moines, IA
Sports Station of the Year: WGR-AM, Buffalo, NY
Small Market Personality of the Year: Lacy Neff, WVAQ-FM Morgantown, WV
Urban Station of the Year: WJMZ-FM, Greenville, SC
Spanish Format Personality of the Year: Alberto Alegre, KSAH-AM San Antonio, TX

^[1]More information on the Marconi Awards.

^[2]“The Top Talk Radio Audiences”. Talkers magazine. November 2008. Retrieved 2008-12-18.

Askin Emir, Media Director

I am an adman and I love good commercials. There are many clever techniques for grabbing a listener’s attention. The Cockney Gecko in the GEICO commercial, The AFLAC duck quacking (Comedian Gilbert Gottfried) and The FreeCreditReport.com rock band with their silly but cool songs immediately come to mind.

Every time I hear those commercials on the radio or see them on TV, I know the product and the service instantly. And the spots make me smile. Obviously the commercials are working, because the media is saturated with them

And then there are those techniques, so annoying and distracting, that they reduce the effectiveness of the commercial and could be potentially dangerous.

In one week, driving to work, I heard a commercial that started with a police siren. The siren sounded so real in my back speakers. I slowed down and pulled over and the car behind me beeped and made a rude hand gesture. I never heard the commercial attached to the rude siren.

In the same week while I was driving to work, I heard a commercial that started with a cell phone ring tone that sounded like my cell phone. Of course I reached for my cell phone deep in my pocket, took my eye off the road for a second and swerved a bit towards oncoming traffic which resulted in another beep and another rude hand gesture.

Other commercials I’ve heard started with blaring car horns and car crash sounds. Not good.

On television, many advertisers over-modulate their commercials in production so that their commercials are 5X louder than the TV show I’m watching. The first thing I do is turn the volume down and then I generally miss the commercial.

Maybe it’s me…I’ve been accused on occasion of being jumpy. However, I am sure I am not alone in my feelings.

If you are interested in producing great radio commercials that grab the listener’s attention (without fire alarms) visit www.RadioDirect.com.

Vince Raimondo, Vice President of Marketing

Format Description:
The Oldies format has been evolving over the last several years as Baby Boomers enter their 50s and 60s. While some “oldies” stations have adopted a more current-based approach that is known as Classic Hits, there are still, pure Oldies formatted stations that rely heavily on the music of the late 50s, 60s and in some cases the early 70s. On-air personalities run the gamut from generic radio voices to radio market legends that have been with their respective stations for decades. Some stations go for the Sixties’ sound with old-fashioned echo and lots of slick 60s-sounding jingles. Others take the approach of a 21st Century radio station that just happens to be playing this music. Both approaches help audiences recall fond memories and good times from their younger years. These stations feature an upbeat presentation with lots of promotions and contesting.

Audience:
35-64 Adults

Core Artists:
Elvis Presley, The Beach Boys, Motown and The Beatles

Key Radio Stations:
WCBS-FM/New York
WODS/Boston
WOMC/Detroit
WDRC/Hartford

DR Factor:
In most markets, these stations are the only stations playing this
mix of music, so there’s a slice of their total audience that just can’t be reached via any other station. Additionally, talent reads by longtime legends can help you leapfrog the concerns of credibility. Just be certain that the air talent understands your brand and does it justice in his or her read.

For more information, visit:
All Access
FMQB
Wikipedia

A special exhibit at the Cleveland Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame features memorabilia and personal items from the storied career of Bruce Springsteen. Among them is a handwritten page onto which Bruce penned an early set of lyrics to his breakout anthem, “Born to Run.”

“By day we sweat it out on the streets of a runaway American dream. At night we stalk the jungle in heat with murder in our gears.”

Huh? Jungle in heat? Murder in our gears? Yes, line two of the opening verse was eventually reworded before the final tracks were laid down in the studio.

But this example underscores the importance of beginning the writing process by getting something, anything, down on paper.

There are few things more intimidating than a blank sheet of paper – or blank computer screen – impatiently awaiting your hands to sprinkle profound brilliance upon its empty canvas.

Former Saturday Night Live writer Ali Farahnakian once told me the hardest thing about the creative process was writing the crappy first draft. (OK, he used a spicier word than crappy.) Rewriting, editing and paraphrasing are easy, once there’s something down on paper to work with.

I never listened to Paul McCartney’s “Yesterday” the same way after hearing Sir Paul’s tale of how he created the melody line before the lyrics and used the words “Scrambled eggs” as a three-syllable placeholder until he chose the word “Yesterday” to replace it.

McCartney had the concept for a powerful composition and put something down on paper (music and the words “scrambled eggs”) so he could return at a later date to complete the composition. This was a far better choice than letting the moment of inspiration escape simply because the idea wasn’t fully formed on the first pass.

So if you’re ever taunted by a blank page or screen at the start of the creative process, just start writing! Describe what you want to say, even if you don’t know how to say it. Use your words and speak through the eyes of a child. Or a business reporter. Or a college student spilling his every thought to fill up a Blue Book. Start the process and simply let your words and ideas fill the page.

Conjugate your thoughts with subtle variations of phrasing. Explain selling propositions from the perspective of both the provider and consumer. You can always go back and edit, rewrite and paraphrase. Just get the crappy first draft down on paper.

Do it today. So tonight you can ride through mansions of glory in suicide machines, as Springsteen affirmed as a far better alternative to stalking jungles in heat when you want to break out of New Jersey.

Mark Lipsky, President & CEO

Facebook has 250 million registered members worldwide. 250 million – and growing daily!

What started out as a whimsical project - a website built by a Harvard student to evaluate the looks of the opposite sex and flirt on-line - has morphed into an international networking phenomenon in just four short years.

More than 5 billion minutes worldwide are spent daily on Facebook.

FB Members now connect with old friends, family and colleagues all over the world. They post pictures, music, articles, provoke dialogue on a multitude of subjects, share thoughts, join interest groups and make new friends and acquaintances. It is no longer the domain of the “under thirty” crowd. The fastest growing demographic segment on Facebook is Adults over 35.

Facebook has also caught the eye of marketers and businesses in a big way to market their products and services to 250 million people, one at a time. One-to-one marketing is a customer relationship management strategy emphasizing personalized interactions with customers. The personalization of interactions is thought to foster greater customer loyalty and better return on marketing investment. It’s one-to-one marketing at its best.

Companies as diverse as Century 21 Real Estate to Old Bay Seasoning to Honda host fan sites and post surveys and articles about their wares, enlisting fans and gathering information about who their customers and potential customers are. It’s a pretty heady brew. One can become a fan of Coors Light or customized M&M’s with no obvious selling going on. No coupons or price points.

But oh what a branding opportunity!

A mature brand like Old Bay posts a recipe and through the course of a day or a week, hundreds, maybe thousands respond with a “thumbs-up” icon and write a positive comment in the comment box, downloading the recipe with a promise to “buy and try” Old Bay, if they haven’t already.

A business can’t buy personal interaction like this…it’s priceless. Build a Facebook fan site and they will come.

The key is to update content on your Facebook fan site daily and keep the information topical, entertaining and fresh. Don’t be surprised if “Social Media Writer” becomes one of the hot job categories of 2010.

Vince Raimondo, Vice President of Marketing

Pop quiz. With a population of nearly one million, this city is the largest in Northern California:

a) Sacramento
b) Salinas
c) San Francisco
d) San Jose

Surprise, surprise. It’s San Jose. I thought, for sure, the answer was San Francisco. After all, the San Francisco radio market is the fourth largest in America, incorporating population figures from Oakland, Marin County and Silicon Valley. But the “city proper” of San Jose actually contains more residents than the “city proper” of San Francisco.

Interesting stuff. So, how can I use this eyebrow-raiser? Is there a place for this trivia tidbit in a yet-to-be-written radio commercial? Possibly. For now, I’ve chosen this blog and a bigger-picture-suggestion that we all keep our ears open for interesting facts that could be used as a “grabber” or an “a-HA” moment in our advertising.

The minute you catch a consumer’s attention with an “a-HA” moment that tells them something new and interesting, they are receptive to receive and process yet another message - like why your brand is something they so desperately need.

Why? You’ve earned credibility. You taught them something new, in an interesting and entertaining way. You didn’t mock their ignorance. You fueled their intelligence. Maybe they can turn that tasty morsel of trivia into something that will boost their stock at the dinner table tonight, or perhaps win them a bar bet. Either way, you’re the expert-of-the-moment. And you have their attention.

Of course, it helps to keep the tone and delivery system for your “business fact” in the same plane as the “fun fact” that originally earned you their attention.

But that’s just a creative challenge, now that we know the way to San Jose.

Mark Lipsky, President & CEO

Shopping and food. What else is there, right? When it comes to November, if you’re a retailer or a brand affiliated in any way with food or entertaining, this is the time to take a small percentage of your marketing dollars and reach some of the 235 million radio listeners through in-programming promotions.

Hallelujah! November is Peanut Butter Lovers’ Month. Ask radio stations to gather and post the most interesting recipes from their listeners that include peanut butter (and your brand) for their chance to win great prizes for holiday entertaining.

November 5th is National Men Make Dinner Day. There are plenty of ways radio stations can promote your brand to ensure that your man makes a great meal or, more importantly, a product that makes it easy for them to CLEAN UP after themselves.

November 22nd is National Family Week. Like it or not people, we have to spend the holiday with those we love and those we are happy that we only see at Thanksgiving dinner. Great radio always starts with commiserating about the latter. Why not have radio stations award listeners with the most horrific relatives by giving them cash, a trip or some of the hottest new products available this holiday season.

Here are other special days and themed weeks around which to build a great radio promotion:

• November 3 - Cliché Day
• November 8 - Dear Santa Letter Week
• November 14 - Loosen Up, Lighten Up Day
• November 22 - National Game and Puzzle Week
• November 26 - Tina Turner turns 71
• November 30 - Dick Clark turns 80

Call us for ideas on how to promote your brand using one of these ideas or the many others we can think up once we know your goal.

Barbra Tabnick, Senior Account Manager