Hang loose on those waves
December 16th, 2008
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I was sitting here listening to my sister’s interview on WNPR \”Where We Live\” in Connecticut and wondering when and why radio fell so out of favor. (By the way, Jennifer is a research scientist at Yale University who studies obesity – she’s the smart one, I’m the fun one – just so you have that straight.) For whatever reason, a lot of radio stations don’t have enough paid promotions to fill up air time anymore - these could be interviews with guests, giveaways, live broadcasts from events and other spots that were slotted for advertisers. So guess what – shameless promoters like us have the chance, given a great pitch and maybe a little free swag, to get a message on the air without having to pay anything.
But everyone is hating on radio these days and I think it’s just because it’s not as sexy as the “new new” thing – social media. Still, the combo of radio and online promotion is one of the best promotional tactics a smaller company (or author) can use. It works! My favorite stations are usually public radio, satellite radio (for the highly targeted audience) and good old morning drive time. We’ve had campaigns this year that gave us great results and drove lots of traffic to ourclients’ sites. And there’s less clutter than on TV or online.
So don’t hate radio just because it’s old. Think about how you might include it in your strategy in 2009 instead. For some tips on how to do that, I love Gordon’s Radio List If you can get past the hype on his website, Joe Sabah has some pretty good tips and a nice list too.
The duck is a radio, by the way. It’s hard to find pictures of radios that aren’t boring.
