Radio Keeps Local Brands Top Of Mind Before They’re Needed.

It’s an advertising basic, but one that’s in danger of being forgotten in the digital age: using ads to make products or services known before they’re needed. AM/FM radio has proven to be highly effective in getting that job done.

“To win sales at bottom of funnel, [brands] need to win the mind at the top of the funnel first. Mind share equals market share,” Cumulus Media/Westwood One Audio Active Group Chief Insights Officer Pierre Bouvard says in Westwood One’s blog. “We have all sat through monthly digital meetings with local businesses that show tremendous growth in impressions, click-throughs, etc. Yet the sales have not improved. More and more, business owners are not seeing the connection from digital impressions to increased sales.”

The importance of brands being known before needed was proven in a WPP Media study based on a decade of research of 1.2 million consumer journeys across over 200 categories in 47 countries, which showed that most consumers already know which brand they will buy, with 84% of purchases effectively decided before shopping begins. “As such, the major job of advertising to ‘create future demand,’ influencing people long before they come in market,” Bouvard says.

Focusing on Nielsen market 131, Springfield, MO, the blog shows how four home improvement businesses based there have used long-running AM/FM radio ad campaigns to successfully build awareness. According to Quantilope, the businesses — Kitchenland USA, A-1 Roofing, Dave’s Discount Carpet and Ozark Fence — showed strong levels of aided awareness and ad recall with, in several cases, significantly stronger brand awareness among AM/FM listeners vs. the overall market.

Quantilope’s study found that brands need to constantly advertise since new people are always moving to town who don’t know the local brands. A closer look at the Springfield, MO brands studied shows lower aided awareness among those having moved to the market in the last 10 years, with awareness much higher among those who have lived there for 10 years or more.

The study also shows that for many local services categories the top brand is “don’t know.” “This shows how hard it is to build brand awareness,” Bouvard says. “However, it’s easier to build a brand in a category with a high ‘don’t know.’”

How can brands increase awareness and ad recall? The blog suggests: trying long AM/FM radio advertising flights with frequent airings; using host-read endorsements to take advantage of the personal connection hosts have with audiences; enhance creative with jingles to increase memorability; creating a two-pronged drive to the website and physical locations through repeated address mentions in ad copy; and creating a strategy to increase favorability/purchase intent/brand used most often, such as including customer testimonials highlighting a brand’s strengths in copy.