Does this sound familiar?
Your radio advertising client has provided you with a bunch of bullet points. All you need to do is speak them into a microphone:
- The retailer has the widest selection in the county.
- They have the best prices in town.
- They have lots of free parking.
- Every staff member has been to a special school that taught them how to make sure the customer buys exactly the right item and never makes a purchasing mistake.
- They accept major credit cards.
- They’re open seven days a week.
- They’ve been voted the county’s #1 Whatsis dealer three years in a row.
Here’s Someone Talking About the Craft of an Actor.
“As soon as some details are removed, those which remain will have greater emphasis, merely because there are no other details competing for the attention of the audience.”
— F. Cowles Strickland, THE TECHNIQUE OF ACTING
In That List of Commercial Bullet Points, What if We Removed…
- Widest selection
- Good prices
- Free parking
- Major credit cards
- #1 dealership
We would be left with one detail upon which to build the entire spot.
And if we created a good enough radio commercial, that one detail would stand out, be heard, and be remembered.
Comments on this entry are closed.
one spot. one thought.
I have been preaching the “one, simple, clear, broad message” gospel for a long time, but it remains a tough sell in local direct radio. A few months ago an AE forwarded me an e-mail from her client in which he listed six different things he wanted in his 30 second commercial. He concluded the e-mail with “what else can we get in there?”
@Nick Summer: If you avoided giving any of the several responses to immediately leap to my mind, my compliments on your self-discipline.