When Radio Advertising Works...

When radio advertising works, it's a win for everyone involved.

I came across a post from Karen at Big Pond that gave a brief glimpse of her experiences with a dedicated radio advertising professional that met her needs and expectations. I don't know what radio station he works for, but he exemplified what radio sales is supposed to be about.

It's what I strive for whether I'm selling radio locally at XM105 or online with Moms Talk Radio - finding the right niche for my clients, putting together the right message and producing results.

I keep saying that it's not rocket science -and it's not.

Karen's post shows that putting together a radio campaign is largely something you can put on auto-pilot. You can put the writing, production and delivery in the hands of a professional and come out with a campaign that works for you. All it takes is stepping out of your comfort zone enough to communicate your needs and goals so that the radio advertising representative can put it all together for you.

I just wish it wasn't so hard to convince people that we (radio professionals) are not just after the sale, that we really want to help your business grow. That is my biggest challenge. So often I find small business owners who have absolutely no interest in talking to me. Some do so only to be polite, but I can tell they would rather be almost anywhere else in the world rather than talking with me. It's obvious that they don't want what I'm selling and I'm working hard to understand why.

Who doesn't want more leads, more traffic, more sales?

Why does radio advertising seem so scary to small business owners?

I'd really like to know.

Fresh from another interview

The week before last I was on WAHM Talk Radio talking about podcast advertising on Moms Talk Radio and the great network of shows there. Today I spoke with Michelle Waters from Product Seller's Talk Radio about radio advertising for Product Sellers. It was a great, but short interview. You all know me - I could talk about radio advertising for hours and hours.

In any case, after the official part of the interview was over, we got to talking about what one needs to think about when calling a radio station.

Obviously, the first thing consideration must be your target market. If you're selling a product to work at home mothers (or those who want to be) - you should begin your search with Christian or Country Radio Stations.

This is not to say that you won't find work at home moms listening to Rock or Hip Hop and any every other type of music (I happen to be primarily into hard rock and punk myself) - the fact is the concentration of women who are most likely to be open to working at home will be higher on Christian and Country Music Stations.

Another option would be the local talk radio show that plays the Dr. Laura Show. Since Dr. Laura is a huge advocate of working at home, it stands to reason that there will be a proportion of her audience that works at home or wants to.

The point is that if you want to get the most out of your radio advertising, the better you can identify what station or show attracts the highest concentration of your target market - the more effective your campaign is going to be. If you can further identify when they are most likely to be listening, then you can schedule your campaign so that your dollars stretch further than buying a run-of-schedule campaign.

We also talked about getting to know your advertising representative an making sure he or she is a right fit for your business. I'll blog about that another day.

Stay tuned!