Three ways your radio advertising can bore your targeted listener:
Talk to them about something that isn’t relevant to them.
I’m an American, which means that, for me, soccer is a boring sport to watch.
When I used to attend my young son’s soccer games, during the times when he was on the bench I’d shake my head and wonder, “Why are all those other parents watching when Matthew isn’t playing?”
When Matthew wasn’t on the field, the game lost its relevance to me.
Talk to them in a way that doesn’t make the relevance absolutely clear.
You know the cliché, “It’s not what you say; it’s how you say it.”
With a radio commercial, it’s what you say and how you say it.
Talk to them in a way that is completely predictable, based upon the expectations that have been established by most commercials.
If the first words or sounds of a commercial trigger a response of instant, complete recognition, then the listener will mentally tune out.
If you know what the weather forecast is, then as soon as you’re told, “And now the weather,” you stop listening.
And — think about this — if you do know what the weather forecast is but you don’t know the score of last night’s basketball game and immediately before announcing the score the radio station says, “And now the weather,” you stop listening.
Because they were too predictable, you stopped listening…even though your prediction was wrong.
It sounded as though it was going to be nothing more than a forecast, and you didn’t need a forecast….
So you stopped listening.
When an advertisement begins and the targeted listener thinks, “Oh, it’s another car dealer commercial where some guy screams at me over bad, loud music,” the listener’s mind is freed to attend to other, less predictable (and therefore more interesting) diversions.
