TOO MANY COMMERCIALS!
They’ve complained for decades but it has fallen on deaf ears because radio would rather sell more ads cheaper than fewer ads at a premium price and now, that’s all advertisers will buy.
Along with short spots that are annoying and seem like even more clutter.
Listening declines will continue as long as the problem is not addressed.
Quarter hour radio listening has gone down every year since the early 90’s.
So what to do?
Embark on 2 strategies to respond to this listener deal breaker – immediate and long range.
Immediate Action …
Run short spots in stop sets exclusively for short spots nothing longer.
Run longer spots together without short spots.
Longest spots run in shorter breaks.
Stop down for spots at different times in each hour (you won’t be punished by Nielsen if you do it right.
Put something so compelling in the middle of longer stop sets that will force listeners to stay tuned.
Never mention the word commercials.
Never tout commercial free music (they don’t believe it anyway).
Learn why today’s short attention span listeners are not attracted to continuous music sweeps because they like interruptions and how to take advantage of that.
Longer Term …
Raise rates – even modestly. Fewer ads bringing in more revenue.
Produce better local commercials (the ones you can control) – TV ads are as big an attraction for the Super Bowl as the game itself.
Run a one-year promotion to pay down listeners’ college loans, get advertisers to pay for it and generate high premium profit for you.
Details at The 2017 Media Solutions Lab
Curriculum: How to Stop Rate Cutting, Rebuilding Eroding Audiences, The Morning Show of the Future, Eliminating the 3 Biggest Listener Objections, Increasing Time-Spent-Listening, Dealing with Too Many Commercials, Programming to Shorter Attention Spans, Digital That Makes Money, Better Options for AM, Is Podcasting a Radio Format?
Presentations: More FM Chairman Jerry Lee (Reducing High Advertiser Churn), Millennial Makeover author and expert Morley Winograd (Attracting Millennial Listeners)
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