"To me, radio is a fantastic canvas; it's the theatre of the mind," David Droga said on his way to creating Droga5. But he quickly added that good radio ads are "few and far between."
Many of the 235 million people who listen to radio each week would agree. Creating great radio ads is hard work and an acquired skill. Sitting down at a computer to write a radio commercial - without an art director or any other help - is one of the loneliest jobs in the business. By failing to overcome these challenges and not expecting more of ourselves, though, we could be short-changing our clients.
Each medium has its inherent strengths and interacts with its consumers differently. One of radio's real strengths is the intimacy it enjoys with its listeners. It's one voice speaking to one person, sharing the same moment in time. When a Boston station fired one of its most popular hosts, the station was deluged with more than 8,000 emails and quickly restored him to his old slot.
A 2004 study by Wirthlin Worldwide for the Radio Ad Effectiveness Lab confirmed radio's unique one-to-one relationship with its listeners. The study showed that radio is an emotion-driven experience more powerful than television or newspapers. A 2008 follow-up study by Gallup & Robinson evaluating 16 different ad campaigns showed radio ads have the emotional impact on consumers equal to that of television ads - at a much lower cost.
Emotions are key in turning viewers, readers and listeners into consumers. Many researchers believe emotions are the gatekeepers for further advertising processing, which is hard to dispute as people typically don't become emotionally involved in a positive way with a poorly conceived commercial. The bottom line is that people buy emotionally and then justify with logic. If the commercial is not compelling enough to touch them emotionally, all logical reasons to buy probably won't make a difference. There is nothing emotional about a litany of facts swiped from a print ad and inserted into a radio ad.
If Droga was right in criticizing the quality of radio ads - and if people's engagement with a commercial is directly tied to its quality - it's safe to conclude that the persuasive power of radio can be greatly enhanced with stronger creative. With all of the effort, focus and scrutiny on the planning and buying of media, there's clearly an opportunity to enhance a radio campaign's effectiveness by holding ourselves to a higher creative standard. A study by media agency OMD showed that ad engagement has an eight times larger impact on sales than gross rating points.
We are hardwired with an "orienting response," which alerts us to some new sounds and stimuli in our environment. If there is a novel sound in our environment, we automatically focus on it. If it's of interest to us, we maintain that focus; if it isn't, our attention wanders.
That's why long and cumbersome beginnings to radio commercials are ineffective. A commercial has three to four seconds to grab a listener's attention or lose it. Bud Light's Real Men of Genius ads are a perfect example of commanding a listener's attention from the get-go with humor and anticipation. The entertainment factor of these little 'vignettes' was memorable as consumers, especially younger groups, would look forward to listening to the ads because each one possessed a bit of social currency.
The bottom line is that it's no longer possible to succeed with mediocre communications. We in the radio industry have a golden opportunity to take advantage of this enhanced appreciation of the power of sound and how it can be deployed to communicate a commercial message.
Since a brand is nothing more than the sum of all its impressions on a consumer, every brand touchpoint should be seen as an opportunity to impact the consumer's perception of the brand. If an advertiser's copy is an intimate encounter with the consumer, why blow the opportunity by airing something that doesn't enhance the perception of the brand?
Good strategy paired with poor creative is no better than poor strategy. That's why we think it's the right time to learn - or relearn - what great radio advertising sounds like.