Reach your target market with radio advertising.
Businesses have a myriad of advertising and marketing methods to choose from when promoting a business. One of these options is radio advertising. Before launching a radio advertising and marketing campaign, take the time to learn the benefits, disadvantages and costs associated with radio advertising.
Benefits
Several benefits exist for using radio to market a business. One of the benefits of radio advertising is the cost to produce the radio advertisement is less expensive than other types of advertising, such as television commercials. Another benefit is that radio advertisements tend to be memorable because radio advertisements run multiple times over a specified period of time, and when stations are chosen according to your target audience, then you're hitting large pools of your potential customers each time. Radio advertising provides an entertaining way to promote the business.
Disadvantages
One of the major disadvantages of radio advertising is the advertisement is intangible. Unlike a print advertisement, a radio spot cannot be cut out and saved for later use. Prime-time spots to place radio advertising is morning and evening commute times, which tend to be more expensive than other play slots. With limited spots during these time frames available, it may not be possible to reserve these spots to run the ad.
Creating Ads
Radio stations typically offer its advertisers different options when it comes to creating and producing an ad. Most stations work with advertisers to create the copy for the ad and then have one of its on-air personalities read the ad on the radio. For more complex radio ads with jingles and music, advertisers typically have to pay for this type of production in addition to paying for the ad to run. The station typically still helps advertisers with the production, or the advertiser can choose to have a third party produce the radio commercial.
Geography
Radio advertising has geographic restrictions in the sense that radio stations have a coverage range. However, many radio stations now offer listens the opportunity to listen to the station live online. Not only does this reach beyond geographic boundaries, but it also opens up times other than commute times as prime selling opportunities because people can listen at work, etc. when researching radio stations, also be sure to find the stations with audiences that have demographics that match the target market of the business. If the target audience is 25- to 35-year-olds, the radio stations tend to be different than listeners between the ages of 45 and 55.
Cost
Cost for advertising on the radio can range from $100 per radio spot (each spot runs between 30 and 60 seconds) to $400. One of the best ways to research the cost is using the radio marketing research firm Arbitron (see resources). Arbitron allows you to read the results of its marketing research for radio stations all over the country. When you choose a radio station to narrow down the stations that serve your area to the ones that also serve your target audience, you can also contact the advertising department of the station and request a media kit. A media kit contains all of the information you need on the costs of running radio advertisements.
Tags: radio advertising, radio stations, radio advertisements, target audience, your target, advertising marketing