RESTAURANT RADIO COMMERCIAL ADVERTISING CRITIQUE

A Loyal Reader submits a radio commercial for a critique.

“Like to get your thoughts on this one. I’m working from a fact sheet. It’s ‘live’ but actually not, if you catch my drift.”
— Jim Walsh, KLXX/Bismarck

I like the way you geographically place the advertiser: “On the south side of Bismarck, right across from the mall” — that’s exactly the way to do it.

In this spot, you give the location at the beginning and at the end.

But there’s no point in telling people where the advertiser is until after you’ve made the audience want what the advertiser is selling. So delete the first description of the location.

When you say, “Some new menu items to talk about,” you’re telling people:

1.  You’re talking about something because you’re supposed to talk about it, not because you find it interesting.

2.  The topic in no way is about the audience; it’s about the “things” the advertiser wants you to talk about.

The disconnect from listeners continues when you say, “Let’s talk about the burnt ends…a really big thing happening at Big Dave’s.”

Don’t “talk about the burnt ends.” Talk about the diner’s experience when eating the burnt ends at Famous Dave’s. 

Which do you think is more personal and one-to-one:

1) “It’s available as an appetizer or in a sandwich”

or

2)  “You can get it as an appetizer or in a sandwich.”

Because you don’t identify the restaurant’s “director of operations” by name, why bother to give the person’s title? It would be more conversational and real if you said, “They like to call it ‘meat candy.'”

I did, however, like your little laugh on that phrase, recognizing the silliness of the nickname.

A radio commercial — including a spot for a restaurant —should have a single Core Message. That’s the one thing you want the targeted listener to hear, to understand, and to remember.

This advertisement could have been all about the burnt ends.

But it also talks about catfish, the new brisket burgers, cedar plank salmon (about which you sound very unsure), wilbur beans, the greens, and bread pudding with raisins.

By the time you reach the end of this radio ad, the listener has completely forgotten about the “burnt ends.” (Probably some readers of this critique are realizing they, too, forgot all about those.)

“Even if you have been there recently” smacks of desperation. If they’ve been there recently and enjoyed it, the spot should be enough to reinforce their awareness of Famous Dave’s.

Although one of the radically different things I teach about how to write effective restaurant radio advertising  is to sell the experience the diner has and not the food, you need to create or recreate that experience, not simply say “enjoy the experience.”

Suggestion:

Don’t work from the fact sheet or long list of bullet points.

Find out what the one Core Message should be.

If your station’s account executive can’t tell you and can’t or won’t find out, you select the core message.

Get a real sheet of paper and a writing utensil that you hold in your hand (rather than a computer monitor and keyboard) and list bullet points of only the elements that are absolutely necessary to the spot.

Example:

• Famous Dave’s
• Burnt ends
  • Hickory smoked
  • Texas beef brisket
  • Carmelized in sweet, zesty BBQ sauce
  • Meat candy
• S. side of Bismarck, across from mall

Then, with an eye on the clock, genuinely ad-lib the radio commercial.

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