Talking Like a Local

Sometimes, the best part of a radio promotion happens off the air.

Marketers are using station tie-ins to bring their brand experience to the street. Savvy radio promos leverage the localized celebrity status of on-air personalities’ and give listeners a face-to-face brand experience.

Radio stations have long offered promotions to plus-up ad buys. Marketers now are more proactive in pitching their own promotions — with or without an ad buy attached.

Marketers spent $19.8 billion on radio ads in 2000 (the most recent year available), up 12 percent, according to the Radio Advertising Bureau, New York City. Of that, $15.2 billion went to local spot buys (with $3.6 billion to national spot and $1 billion to network).

This year, Hormel Foods added mobile marketing and event sampling to its Ski Watch radio campaign. The 12-year-old program starts with two-minute local ski reports that air daily in 100 markets, sponsored by Hormel Chili and Dinty Moore Stew. SUVs wrapped with Chili graphics toured 25 markets, stopping at partner radio stations, stores, and slopes for sampling.

But it was the 50-market sweeps that best used the reach of local stations, which ran distinct contests giving away trips to Aspen, CO. (Another 10 trips were awarded through in-store tearpads and at Skiwatch.com, where players tracked the sampling team’s route to answer qualifying questions.)

The 50 winners each got a package with a Jeep key, then convened on the slopes during the March 26-April 5 trip to see which one fit the Jeep Liberty parked there. The winner took the vehicle home.

“We do something different every year to keep the program fresh,” says Barry Berman, president of Hamden, CT-based CRN International, Hormel’s agency. “About five years ago, Ski Watch got to be about audience impressions. We needed to refocus on the promotional spin instead.” The sweeps and sampling helped.

“Ski Watch is good for us from a media, retailer-relation, and consumer-interest standpoint,” says Hormel product manager Paul Krapf. “It’s a very efficient media buy, and Ski Day events with retailers’ families [let us] spend time with customers outside the office.”

Radio accounts for less than half of Hormel Chili’s media budget but has helped record sales growth of two- to three-percent per year for three years, says Krapf. The brand’s fiscal 2001 sales rose five percent to $135.5 million.

Ski Watch sampling helps position Hormel Chili as an ingredient, part of the company’s strategy to “take people out of the bowl,” Krapf explains. That has spurred partnerships with Velveeta cheese, Pillsbury Grands biscuit dough, Riviana Rice, and Tabasco (the last for a co-branded SKU).

“The great thing about radio is its flexibility,” says Howard Steinberg, president of Source Marketing, Westport, CT. “When you get low to the ground and work closely with stations locally, a campaign can take on its own organic life.”

Source created a program for Discovery Channel’s recent Blue Planet, Seas of Life program that tailored contests centered on sea trivia; one station played sound bites of sea creatures, with the first correctly identifying caller winning a daily prize and qualifying for the grand-prize trip to Bahamas resort Atlantis.

Discovery tied in with local aquariums for live-remote broadcasts the day before the program aired. (Some stations held contests to give away tickets.) All aquariums played a “making-of” video. The program earned a 3.58 household rating, more than double its goal, according to Steinberg.

Commercial-Free Radio

Promotions don’t always have to start with an ad buy. Some cash-strapped marketers bargain directly with station promotion departments.

Cable network Showtime, New York City, had no budget to support its September 2000 film Hendrix, so agency GEM Entertainment (formerly Vertical Mix Marketing) called classic rock stations in 20 markets to pitch a local premiere party. The shop asked Hard Rock Cafés to host the parties in exchange for on-air ticket giveaways that gave the Cafés an air of exclusivity. Travel & Leisure magazine chipped in 20 trips to the London Hard Rock Café (via Virgin Atlantic). The real-estate swap gave each partner visibility in a new venue.

Promos that provide programming content for on-air personalities often keep listeners’ attention better than ads.

Cable network A&E, New York City, this month breaks a 10-market campaign to boost awareness of Shackleton (a film about the South Pole ex-plorer whose crew survived being stranded for months), which airs April 7-8. The On Thin Ice promotion offers one Outward Bound adventure trip as grand prize and 10 daily prizes (including NHL tickets, atlases, and Shackleton books) per market to callers who tell the best story about a time they were on thin ice.

“You can match the content of the promotion with the personality of each station,” says GEM Entertainment president John Zamoiski. “You leverage the fun and intelligence of on-air personalities by letting them be themselves.”

Tax service Jackson Hewitt, Virgina Beach, VA, pitches its “super-fast refunds” with a raft of local contests. One station plays a “super-fast” riff and the 15th caller wins; another awards a weekend getaway, promising the winner that his refund will be there when he returns home on Monday.

“We brainstorm ideas, then go to stations to help us localize it,” says Doug Spak, president of Cincinnati-based Local Media Corp. (a unit of J.Brown/LMC, Stamford, CT). A dedicated merchandising budget — separate from ad dollars — offsets the costs.

LMC used a similar menu strategy for Smirnoff vodka’s holiday and Super Bowl promos. An umbrella theme, “Entertaining with Smirnoff,” was interpreted several ways for on-air contests. Prizes included a “Best seat in the house” package with big-screen TV and in-home party hosted by the DJ, and a two-suite party for five couples — with the game on in one suite and spa services in the other. In New York City, Smirnoff hosted the party after WKTU’s annual Miracle on 34th Street concert.

Listening after Sept. 11

Arbitron, Inc. surveyed 1,500 of its ratings diary keepers in November and found:

33% Listened to radio more after the attacks, but still chose favorite stations

40% Were more likely to patronize companies whose ads mention contributions to relief efforts

25% Now have a different perception of on-air humor

20% Donated to station relief efforts

Overall, young listeners were more motivated by relief-donation messages

RADIO reaches 96% of consumers — and 99% of teens — every week. Daily reach is 78% overall, 81.5% for teens.
Source: Radio Advertising Bureau