DAN O’DAY TALKS ABOUT RADIO

A radio station sales manager asked if I had any ideas for a relatively new client: a small, independently owned hardware store. Just one location, in the center of a small town. The store didn’t seem to have any obvious Unique Selling Proposition.

So I thought about my own rare ventures into hardware stores and quickly realized a key emotion that I suspect is felt by many customers: Fear.

Not heart palpitating, sweat producing, shortness of breath inducing fear. More like uneasiness, a pronounced uncomfortableness.

Will I be able to find the tool or accessory I need?

How will I know which item to buy?

How will I know how many or what size I’ll need?

If I can’t find what I need, will a store employee be able to help me? Will they laugh at my ignorance?

This immediately led me to suggest a very powerful strategy utilized by too few advertisers: Education.

I suggested a series of commercials in which the store owner answers the most common questions posed by do-it-yourselfers in a relaxed, conversational, non-threatening manner….

Hi, I’m Ed Proprietor of Ed’s Hardware Store. A wrench is a pretty simple tool. But if you ask someone to hand you a wrench, they might say, “Which wrench do you want? Pipe wrench? Monkey wrench? Crescent? Open-ended? Box wrench?” Here’s a quick & easy explanation of the differences. (EXPLANATION GOES HERE.) The reason we carry so many different kinds of wrenches…and hammers, and saws, and screws & nails all kinds of thingamajigs and whatchamacallems… is because we want to make sure we have exactly what you need. Having helped thousands of (LOCAL) handymen & women, carpenters, electricians, and part-time fixer-uppers over the past 15 years, you can pretty much count on our having what you’re looking for. And if you’re not sure what it’s called, don’t worry; we’ll know. I’m Ed Proprietor of Ed’s Hardware Store on Main Street in Smalltown. Stop by today; we’re here to help.

Where would YOU rather shop: At a hardware store where the clerks don’t know and don’t care…or at a hardware store where the clerks are eager to answer your questions without making you feel stupid?

In our heart of hearts, all of us believe that the kind of radio we grew up with is the way God meant Radio to be.

My parents rued the passing of The Shadow and Inner Sanctum. Older Baby Boomers long for stations that program first & second generation rock ‘n’ roll; younger Boomers wistfully recall their Golden Age of Music: Disco.

I cannot with intellectual honesty state that radio today is worse than “my” kind of radio (lots of personality, lots of fun, lots of music that I like). It is what it is, and it doesn’t need my validation to exist.

Radio has become a “mature” industry. When an industry matures, it consolidates, streamlines, standardizes and economizes. The little hamburger joints run by colorful characters give way to thousands of McDonald’s.

Is McDonald’s “good”? Not to me; I won’t eat there. But to millions of kids, it’s great. Who’s right — the kids, or me?

This is not unique to radio. Hamburger stands, movie theaters (how many readers pine for their local, double-features-on-Saturdays-for-50-cents theaters?), newspapers, carpet cleaners, appliance dealers….The same complaints in today’s radio world resound in those markets, too.

That said, I do have two questions that haunt me:

Is there anyone on this entire planet who has a “favorite” McDonald’s?

And…

Is there anyone on this entire planet who wakes up in the morning thinking, “Oh, boy! I get to go to work at McDonald’s today!”

Buried within my December 18 posting — “Don’t Water Down The Good Stuff” — is an important lesson of which I first became consciously aware during a conversation with Dick Orkin. He was telling me about a particular campaign the Famous Radio Ranch had done in South Florida.

The big U.S.P. was the superiority of the client’s service over that of the established market leader: the dominant regional newspaper. They made that the focus of the entire campaign: how lame the newspaper’s service was compared to their client’s (which was just being introduced to that market).

One of the local radio stations balked at airing the spot, because they didn’t “want to upset the newspaper.”

“How much money does the newspaper spend advertising on your station?” asked Dick.

“Uh…Nothing. They’ve never advertised with us.”

“So what’s the problem?”

The campaign aired as written, and it was hugely successful: Soon the client had a larger market share of that particular service than the newspaper.

As Dick told me the story, I had an aha! experience. When writing copy, I’ve always looked for strong themes and strong lines. But until that moment I never consciously sought to pounce on them; I viewed them as vehicles to help deliver the sales message.

But now when I find myself writing an “edgy” line that powerfully drives home that message, I’m quite willing to throw away the original script and start all over, with that provocative line as the commercial’s focal point.

To use a boxing metaphor: If you discover your fighter has a powerful left jab, don’t just hope that he occasionally throws it; build your fight plan around that left jab.

Okay, so you’re thinking, “Good grief. Yet another stupid radio commercial that says nothing, in a cutesy way.”

I’m confident, however, that the creators of this spot were attempting to engage the rhetorical device of litotes — affirming something by slyly denying its opposite. (You suspected that, too, huh?)

“I’m not going to tell you X,” she says…and continues to tell us what she said she wasn’t going to tell us.

How clever.

How witty.

How pathetic.

Let’s start with the goal of this campaign: to tell Nordstrom’s fans in the vicinity of Thousand Oaks that a new Nordstrom store is opening near them. If you’ve never shopped at Nordstrom, this message isn’t intended for you.

If you’ve never shopped there, it will take more to get you in the door than being told the store has:

• Exciting looks from the best names in fashion for men, women and kids

• An array of shoes

* Knowledgeable salespeople

Yes, I know that Nordstrom provides service that outstrips most of its competitors. But non-customers don’t know that, and they won’t be convinced with those mindless clichés.

Meanwhile, Nordstrom customers know that Nordstrom sells nice, fairly expensive clothing and is famous for its personalized service. Those vacuous bullet points don’t reinforce their relationship to the brand. If anything, they hurt the brand by making it sound like every other department store.

(Okay, let’s be fair: It does set Nordstrom apart from department stores who advertise boring clothing from third-rate designers, a few shoes scattered about, and salespeople who don’t know the difference between Pierre Cardin and Pierre Trudeau.)

And the call to action? “To learn more, visit” their website. Yep, I can’t think of anything more interesting to do with my life. I think I’ll go online and learn more about Nordstrom.

Here’s the entire message that spot should have attempted to convey:

NEW NORDSTROM STORE OPENS FRIDAY IN THOUSAND OAKS — AT THE OAKS

That’s it.

Deliver that message any way you want. Sing it, yodel it, rhyme it in iambic pentameter. But that’s the message.

Best delivered sans litotes.