North American radio traditionally has committed malpractice in the way it discharges its professional obligations to its clients.
All the time and money go into sales training, and nothing is invested in hiring & training the people who are charged with the task of making the client’s investment pay off.
Especially on the local level, businesses do not come to you with “advertising needs.” They come to you with their dreams.
To them, their businesses are not your “accounts.”
That restaurant, that hardware store, that supermarket, that automobile dealership, that real estate firm — all of them represent someone’s dream.
Someone dreamed of having the best pet store in the world. Of making tasty snack foods that their fellow diabetics could enjoy. Of helping struggling young families buy their first homes.
Your clients come to you with their dreams and say, “Help make my dream come true.”
They put their trust in you (because you told them they could trust you).
And yes, Reach and Frequency and Targeting can help. But you don’t need much training to be able to see if your audience matches the client’s consumer base or to make sure they schedule enough commercials.
On the other hand….
Writing and producing a radio commercial that motivates the targeted listener to act…that sells, rather than simply entertains or annoys or is ignored or not heard….That’s a serious responsibility.
How seriously does your station or agency take that responsibility?
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Knowing what i know and hear , some clients are getting ripped off , with awful commercials , badly written and voiced , no quality control at the staion i work at…….
some of the least paid employee’s are the best….i’m talking of couse about prod-peeps…..but, overall? you are correct.
A lot of advertisers, especially new ones, like to be in charge of their own creative, no matter how ineffective it may be. Our account and sales managers let them, because “the customer is always right.”
It’s the most important part of the entire sales transaction, and it’s usually treated with the least amount of respect.
Most local Ad Agencies are the worst when it comes to copy. Their copy is beyond lame, and they’re easily offended when you point out mistakes or offer suggestions to improve the commercial.
I would love to forward this to the GM of our station, but because she didn’t think of it, it will be ignored.
If I had shared this with our GM, he would have said “let me tell you why that won’t work”.
Um, is debating it here gonna change anything?
No.
It IS what it IS. You can’t make an AE care about good versus bad ads. You can’t make a GM care. Maybe you can make the client care, but that’s the only chance you have — and it’s a very small one.
Save yourself the heartburn. Give up.
Get the cash! Make the sale!
Problem is that Salespeople are in a bad position:
The pressure’s on to SELL SELL SELL or they’re out (and what a revolving door!).
The pressure ISN’T on creative, however that responsibility falls on Sales there, too. BUT, ‘radio sales’ is a numbers and contacts gig. Analytical. Left-brained.
The actual commercial is treated as the absolute LEAST important part of the equation.
The worst thing to do is complain about it behind closed doors. The best thing? Find radio people who have left the building (and politics) who are free to do the killer creative, without the weight of the salesperson’s daily distractions. The literal payoff might not be instant, but it WILL come…. as will clients.
.. sounds like it ..
When I began selling radio advertising in 1973, my first sales training was morning coffee with the station manager, during which he described the package-of-the-week.
Period.
Later, at another (and very good) radio station in a smaller market, I received excellent sales training, but minimal advertising training. The latter I had to acquire on my own – by reading, watching videos, listening to tapes, etc. I’ve been fortunate over many years – decades now – to have been able both to sell a great deal of advertising and to make it work for the client, not every time, of course, but most of the time – with failures providing indispensable instruction on doing it better the next time.
The opportunities for radio advertising salespeople to learn the art and business of advertising are out there, in abundance. So, there’s no excuse for a sales professional not to become proficient at his craft. For this reason, I’ve never entirely appreciated the line you suggest your students use – Did you know that at some stations, the person who sells you the advertising is also the one who writes it? (I’m paraphrasing, of course; and to your credit, a few years back you did add a qualifier to the statement, without professional training), because I’ve known quite a few radio advertising sales professionals over the years who do take the matter as seriously as I do, and to their credit they have become trusted advisors to their clients. Unfortunately, there are many who view their job as simply to get the order, make the sale, and not to make it work. Maybe in the large markets that’s how it is, but in the smaller markets – at the mom and pop staitons – most employees wear several hats of necessity. Still, it’s not so much a matter of economics as it is a matter of character – at least that’s how I see it.
Wouldn’t it be great if every radio station in the country decided tomorrow that they were going to charge for commercial copywriting and production, as our TV brethren do? We’d have to justify the price, of course, and therein lies the chief benefit of doing so.
But I’m dreaming.
Nice piece! I cringe when I hear a really bad spot and they are on a heavy schedule. Arrrgggg!!!