Archive for the ‘Advertising’ Category

Did you know that in the early days of radio, advertisers owned and controlled entire programs?  Sponsors ruled the air waves with variety, comedy, drama, live music, and quiz shows. Where do you think the "soap opera" got its name?

"The term 'soap opera' was coined by the American press in the 1930s to denote the extraordinarily popular genre of serialized domestic radio dramas, which, by 1940, represented some 90% of all commercially-sponsored daytime broadcast hours. The 'soap' in soap opera alluded to their sponsorship by manufacturers of household cleaning products; while 'opera' suggested an ironic incongruity between the domestic narrative concerns of the daytime serial and the most elevated of dramatic forms."

In the 1930s and '40s, show sponsors included cigarette brands, tire companies, and soap brands. Even after the launch of television in the early 50s, radio evolved to meet the needs of its listeners, and both local and national advertisers enabled stations to broadcast their programming.

But, after the launch of digital technology, it's a wonder that radio still breathes. It is, and remains, a very viable advertising channel.

Radio revenues edged up in 2011, finishing the year at $17.4 billion, up about 0.6% from $17.3 billion in 2010, according to a February 2012 report from the Radio Advertising Bureau (RAB).

It's funny how some things change, yet remain the same. AT&T was the leading advertiser on spot radio in 2011, spending $364.9 million. In 1923, WEAF in New York accepted the first radio ad, giving the station owner a monopoly for a short time on what was then called, "toll broadcasting." And guess who the station owner was? Yup, AT&T."

Check out which types of companies spent the most on radio in 2011.

Sources: "The History of Radio Advertising", "Radio Broadcasting History by Decades," The Museum of Broadcast Communications, Marketing Charts

Is it Presidents Day, President's Day, or Presidents' Day? Ask any grade school teacher and the grammar is straight forward. The third Monday in February is a day to celebrate all American presidents. That's a plural word – as in more than one president. 

So, why do U.S. advertisers have such a challenge with the holiday name? I took a look through the Sunday paper, online, and watched TV and here's a list of some of the brands that got it right and wrong:

Got it Right – Presidents' Day

Macy's, Sports Authority, Ashley Furniture, Kohl's, Jo-Ann, Sears, Big 5 Sporting Goods (western states), Lord & Taylor, Honda, Coach, Dell, Toyota, Restoration Hardware, kmart, Amazon, Bon-Ton

Got it Wrong – Presidents/President's Day

Michaels – Not surprising, since the company doesn't use an apostrophe in its own name!
Office Max, Direct TV, Sleep America, GMC, Bath & Body Works, Pearle Vision, DKNY, Mazda, Golfsmith, Forever 21, La-Z-Boy, MattressFirm

And these are just samples of the brands advertising Presidents' Day sales and promotions. Got any to share? 

Place a multi-generational group of people in front of a 55" TV broadcasting Super Bowl XLVI and you get the perfect pseudo-focus group. Based on a rating scale of 1-10, we took the average score after each spot. 

Interesting that our group didn't find that many exceptional ads. In fact, none scored a 10/10. However, four of them did get a score of 9:

1. Pepsi's ad, "The X-Factor Winner" with Elton John and Melanie Amaro.
2. ​Volkswagon's ad "The Dog Strikes Back."
3. Sketchers' ad "Mr. Squiggly." 
4. NBC's 24-hour Sports Network (maybe not part of the regular lineup, but a good one, nevertheless)

Here are the spots in the second tier – with average scores of 8.5:

• Audi's "So Long Vampires"
• Doritos' "Baby Slingshot"
• Chrysler's spot with Clint Eastwood
• Acura's "Transactions" with Jerry Seinfeld and Jay Leno
• Bud Light's "Here Weego _Rescue Dog" (which also had a social marketing message for rescue dogs)
• Chevy Sonic's spot with animated bugs on the grille

The rest were a mixture of 6-7.5 with a few coming in really low like Best Buy, Bridgestone (with Steve Nash), H & M, HuluPlus, and Go Daddy's "Wild Dream."

Do you agree with this analysis? Which were YOUR faves?

Related articles:

The Winners and Losers of Super Bowl Commercials in 2012 (Forbes)

The 5 best Super Bowl commercials (and the 2 worst ones) (The Globe and Mail)

Super Bowl 2012: a commercial break punctuated by a game of football (The Guardian)

New research from Edelman (with chart compliments of Marketing Charts) shows that your audience needs to hear your message 3-5 times in order to believe it to be true. Does that surprise you? I actually thought it would take more exposure than that.

What does this tell us?

Right Message + Right Time + Reach + Repetition = RESULTS