Using Local Radio Ads – Old Fashioned, but Clever
Posted by aonenetworks On June 25, 2014
Who doesn’t love radio. Yes, it’s a little retro, a little old school, particularly nowadays, given the number of radio-like options available on the internet, and in particular, Sirius Radio. Yet local radio’s numbers have held up remarkably well. There’s something comfortable about it, something warm and predictable. People like familiar and cozy things, and local radio is usually just that. Because they do, it opens up a door for you.
Highly Targeted Marketing
The problem with the internet is that if you’re trying to reach a specific market segment, you have to try really hard to filter out the traffic you don’t want, but radio is something altogether different. It’s local almost to the point of being intimate, in the way that the internet is not.
The internet is a huge, amorphous thing that doesn’t know boundaries or borders. Yes, with good SEO and tight targeting, you can filter past the global deluge of traffic (some human, some bot and spiders) and reach the audience you intended to reach, but with radio, there’s no SEO to worry about, really, and your audience is guaranteed to be local, at least on the FM band, because those radio waves don’t really have a long range. It’s almost as though you’re talking to a captive audience, and from a marketing perspective, that is something very desirable.
It’s Old School
Of course, you may have to dust off your old school marketing skills. There’s a bit of a difference between marketing on the radio vs. marketing on the internet, and if you’re going to go retro, then you’ll need retro skills to pull it off. The good news here is that there are literally thousands of books that have been written on that particular topic, so you’ll have no difficulty in getting back up to speed and polishing those skills to a brilliant sheen.
At the core, the game’s still the same; let people know what you’ve got and how it can make their lives amazing. Let them know how your products and services can save them time, energy, or money, or make them fashionable and desirable, and make them a compelling offer.
Horses For Courses
Your specific radio strategy is very dependent on what sort of business you’re in. If it’s service oriented, then odds are that it won’t do you a lot of good to invite the station to your place of business, though of course, if you’re involved in the community in any way, it would be a fantastic opportunity to not only showcase your community spirit, but also get your name and brand out by inviting them in anyway.
On the other hand, if you are retail focused, then a product launch is a great time to invite the local station that caters to your specific customer demographic. Or, invite several if you’ve got a broad and varied customer base. It’s easy enough to lure them in with a few complimentary copies of whatever it is you’re selling.
If that’s not your speed, of course, you can just stick with the traditional route of on-air ads. That works too, and as mentioned, it can be highly geographically targeted. Radio advertising is well trodden ground, and you should have no trouble fitting your message to that particular format. Use every tool at your disposal to good effect, that includes going old school where it’s going to have high impact.
