Grace Broadcast Sales Celebrates 20 Years of Service to Local Direct Radio Advertising Sales Departments and Radio Advertisers

Posted on May 10, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

(reprinted by permission from Small Market Radio Newsletter, May 9, 2011)

20 Years of Service

The year was 1991. A radio seller and sales manager was about to take the leap of faith familiar to all business owners.  For years, Rod Schwartz had been enjoying success selling his clients the services of Jim Shepler’s radio campaigns at Broadcast General Company–first as a salesman in Winona, MN, and then as a sales manager in Pullman, WA. But in 1990, Jim Shepler died, and Broadcast General Company closed its doors.       

Rod told Shepler’s heirs that he was interested in continuing the business and ended up acquiring its assets. As a result, Grace Broadcast Sales was born. Rod recalls, “For months I’d been pondering whether or not this was something I should do, praying for divine guidance. The answer came, unexpectedly and dramatically, in the form of two cardboard boxes—filled with floppy discs and manila folders containing Jim Shepler’s scripts, mailing lists, flyers—left on my porch by the UPS deliveryman. No invoice. No correspondence. Not even a return address! Now you know why the business is called ‘Grace’ Broadcast Sales.”

The first features produced by GBS were for Memorial Day 1991: a series of one-minute vignettes showcasing American servicemen whose gallantry in battle led to the bestowal of our nation’s highest military honor, The Congressional Medal of Honor. Today, twenty years later, “Above & Beyond” remains a favorite of many GBS clients, and it’s one of Rod’s as well. He says, “I still get goose bumps sometimes as I’m producing these features and thinking about the extraordinary character exhibited by these ordinary Americans, sacrificing their lives, in many cases, to preserve my freedom.”    

From the beginning, Grace Broadcast Sales was a family enterprise. Rod’s wife, Paula, and his daughters, Heather and Rebecca, all helped with the business.

Heather, Paula, Rebecca

“Paula did the bookkeeping, and all four of us did the mailings to stations. We’d stay up until late at night, sometimes into the wee hours of the morning, affixing mailing labels and stamps by hand” to the one-sheet flyers they sent to the stations on Shepler’s mailing list. Eventually the company expanded its mailings to stations across the country and did some advertising in trade publications as well. Rod also brought in several outside voice talents to broaden the appeal of his features.    

Over the years, GBS has added new campaigns for holidays, seasonal celebrations, and special events to its catalog. Some of these “Sales Boosters,” as they are now called, were developed in response to requests from radio station sales departments looking for new ideas to present to prospective advertisers.

One of GBS’s most popular campaigns, “Shop Your Hometown Merchants,” was created twelve years ago in response to two separate requests within the same week by station clients in North Carolina and Louisiana, each looking for a way to impress upon their listeners the importance of shopping locally. The campaign messages immediately caught on. According to Rod Schwartz, “We had stations call us after they started airing these features, blown away by the fact that advertisers were calling them, asking how they could be included in the campaign. How often does this happen in radio sales?”    

Because their May anniversary coincides with National Military Appreciation Month, Rod encourages interested stations to download two free features the company has produced to honor members of America’s armed forces.    

May 2011 also marks the second anniversary of RadioSalesCafe.com (RSC), a professional network established by GBS specifically for radio advertising sales executives.  “I’d thought of social networking sites like MySpace and then Facebook as something ‘the kids’ were doing, but by 2009 it had become evident that older people—and more to the point, business people—were starting to nibble around the edges of the phenomenon. So, I asked my younger daughter, Rebecca, to research the applicability of social networking to our  business.” Rebecca saw an opportunity to provide a unique service specifically for radio advertising sales people, and urged quick action. Rod agreed to fund it, and he put her in charge of developing the site. Rod then asked a number of GBS’s best clients to visit the site, contribute comments, and offer feedback. A few weeks later, Radio Sales Café was officially launched; stations embraced it immediately. According to Rod, “Two years later, RSC has become a thriving, vibrant community of more than 1800 radio sales professionals from all over the world, with a passion for radio and their own work, sharing ideas and helping one another solve day-to-day problems.” (Thanks to SMRN publisher and editor Jay Mitchell for his encouragement and support of GBS and for his kind words. -RS)

It hardly feels like twenty years, until I start thinking about some of the things that are different now from what they were the year we started GBS.  In 1991, personal computing was slowly creeping into the mainstream (MS-DOS 5.0 was introduced that year), but photocopiers and fax machines were the instruments by which most small businesses transferred data.  Radio production was still being done on magnetic tape: reels, carts, cassettes.  Commercials from distant production houses were sent to radio stations by US Mail (although I recall one time when the USPS sent us their commercials via UPS Ground! True fact.)  And if they absolutely, positively had to get there overnight, they were sent by FedEx.  Mp3’s, FTP, email and the World Wide Web were still waiting in the wings.

I’d shared my aspirations to produce the Memorial Day series with my boss, Bill Weed, who expressed his support and offered me the use of the radio station’s production room at night to record the features.  He even let me make some calls to stations from the office.

The GBS “demo line” was an answering machine hooked up to our home phone.  A few years later, we were able to rent a voicemail box for that purpose.  The features purchased by our very first radio clients were dubbed cassette-to-cassette on a “boom box.”  High tech, indeed.  But we did the best we could until we were able to afford professional recording and duplicating equipment.  Paula did the bookkeeping manually, entering each transaction by hand into a Dome’s Book.

Amazingly, a few of our original clients are still clients, 20 years later!  They’ve endured our growing pains and occasional setbacks, encouraged our efforts, cheered our successes…and given us the privilege of serving them all these years.  They’ve seen us move from reels and cassettes to CD’s, then to online demos and MP3 downloads, available 24/7 at our client-friendly website created and maintained by my lovely webmistress (Paula).   Email has replaced direct mail, and now we’re Facebooking and Tweeting, Skyping and networking, blogging…

And just now, taking a few minutes to look back.

Twenty years is the blink of an eye.   Yet how much has happened in the space of that blink!

Posted in Advertising - Radio, Communication, Sales & Marketing, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Problem With Groupon-style Deals

Posted on April 16, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

Earlier this month a friend shared a story about a bakery owner who lost $8000 cash honoring an ill-advised experiment with Groupon.

Not surprisingly, their unfortunate experience isn’t an isolated incident. 

An article in Milwaukee Journal Sentinel detailed a Milwaukee restaurant owner’s costly experience with Groupon.

Suzzette Metcalfe, owner of Milwaukee’s Pasta Tree restaurant, picked up some marketing advice at a recent restaurant industry seminar in Las Vegas: Do not do Groupon.

“But I’d already done it,” Metcalfe said.

As I read the article, I was struck by the similarity of Groupon-style offers to another promotion popular with consumers: the Going Out of Business Sale.

Both promotions attract the very same customers—and for the very same reason: a ridiculously low price.  Period.  End of story.

Of COURSE shoppers will flock to your 50-80% off sale!   Who wouldn’t take a deal like that?

Of COURSE shoppers will strip your business to the bone, if you give them permission to do so.  That’s just the nature of consumerism.

At first blush, the idea of attracting throngs to your business might seem enticing.  I can just hear the Groupon salesman singing his siren song. “Wouldn’t you love to have hundreds, even thousands of new customers come into your business?”

If you care about the health of your business, my friend, you’ll think twice before taking the bait.  Because the important question isn’t: Is This a Good Deal?

The real question is: Is This a Good Deal FOR YOU?!

Remember, consumers attracted to bottom-feeder prices don’t care a whit whether your store ever makes a profit, or even whether you stay in business.  There are other places to shop after you’ve closed up.

“The desire for instant gratification.”  It tops Roy Williams’ list of The Twelve Most Common Mistakes in Advertising.  The desire for instant gratification is what will drive most retailers to try a Groupon-style promotion.

And methinks it might also drive them out of business if they don’t stop to give it a second thought.

Posted in Advertising - General, Branding - Positioning, Communication, Sales & Marketing | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Taming Room Noise Harlan Hogan’s Way

Posted on April 6, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

I’ve recently started experimenting with a new microphone, a Lawson L47MP condenser mic I purchased some time ago.  Among the differences I’ve noticed, compared to the Electrovoice RE-27 N/D dynamic mic that’s been my mainstay since 1992, is the Lawson condenser’s much greater sensitivity to ambient room noise.

My home office and recording studio share the same space, a large recreation room re-purposed and reconfigured for the business.  On the other side of the long interior wall is the gas forced-air furnace, which doubles as the blower for central AC during the summer months.  As you might imagine, between the HVAC noise in the next room and the constant whirring of fans and disk drives of the several computers in the room, noise control can be a challenge.

Acoustic foam on that interior wall and a few other places, carpeting on the floor, soft tiles on the ceiling, and special multi-layer insulating shades on the windows have all helped to mitigate the room noise, but have not eliminated it completely.

I entertained the thought of purchasing a Gretch-Ken sound isolation booth but eventually decided against it.  Its footprint would take up too much valuable office space, and I couldn’t justify the expense, given the type of production work that is my bread-and-butter.

Reading a back issue of Radio and Production Magazine recently, I noticed a post by someone who’d built a makeshift sound booth, using a PVC pipe framework, mover’s blankets, and acoustic foam.  It wasn’t pretty, but it seemed to do the job for him.

This led to an online search, which ultimately took me to Harlan Hogan’s article on how he came to build his own portable voiceover booth or “Porta-Booth.”  He wrote:

[E]ven a very quiet room – and this applies to homes and apartments, too — can sound like a “big, boomy box” to your microphone, instead of the tight sound booth quality we are used to in purpose-built studios. That’s because in addition to picking up the sound of your voice directly, the microphone also “hears” the ambient sound of the entire space.

Until last year, I’d build myself a tiny little fort out of every pillow and comforter I could scrounge from housekeeping when on the road, even though my wife found my constructions less than pleasing esthetically. Then I remembered the brilliant idea of audio and video guru, Douglas Spotted Eagle, that Jeffrey P. Fisher and I described in our book, A Voice Actors Guide to Home Recording.

Douglas realized that for a microphone to sound good and tight you didn’t need to be inside a sound box – only the microphone did. So, he built a simple two foot by two foot five-sided box out of foam core, lined it with acoustic foam (often available 24″ X 24″ tiles), stuck his microphone inside, and spoke and sang into it.

Dubbed the VO Box, the results were amazing. The sound of the recorded voice was warm, full, and resonant no matter what room it was in.

So I decided to construct a road warrior’s version a.k.a. The Harlan Hogan “Porta-Booth”

The more I read, the more I realized that this small iso-booth, built to accommodate only the microphone and not the performer, might be the ideal solution to my problem.

In his excellent article, Mr. Hogan provides instructions for the DIYer who’d like to build his own version of the Porta-Booth.  Since I already had some 2′ x 2′ squares of pyramidal acoustic foam, all I needed was a Whitmor Collapsible Cube.  A quick visit to WalMart’s website led to the purchase of a two-pack in coffee-brown, on sale for $13 or so, delivered free to our local store.

It took me literally just a couple minutes this evening to cut the necessary three pieces of foam, using an electric carving knife I picked up at Goodwill many years ago specifically for cutting and shaping sheets of acoustic foam.  (It’s by far the quickest and neatest way to cut this material.)

Here’s the result…

Right away I ran into a glitch: the L47MP stands 18.5″ tall fully extended.  I had to reposition it on the mic stand, bending it down as you see on the left in order to fit it into the 12″ enclosure, so I could still side-address the mic.  (I can’t imagine how this in any way would compromise the function of the capsule, but I just might call Gene Lawson to double-check and be on the safe side.  Can you tell I’m not an engineer?)

——————————————————————————-

The only other adjustment I had to make was to come up with some sort of platform on which to rest the enclosure, to bring the mic up to a comfortable height for reading.  Two 12″ x 12″ acoustic foam bass traps nested together formed a perfect base, providing the additional benefit of isolating vibrations that might emanate from the hard desktop surface.

So far, so good.

I know that many radio station production rooms suffer from similar noise pollution problems, whether it’s bleed-through from adjacent studios, sales office conversations, people talking in the hallway, whatever. So, I wanted to share this nifty and inexpensive solution with you.

One other radio application: for salespeople who record clients at their place of business, carrying one of these might be just the ticket for improving the quality of those on-location recordings.  That’s what I’m going to do with the other Whitmor Collapsible Cube and sheet of acoustic foam I have on-hand—make a second Porta-Booth to carry in my vehicle.

Thanks to Harlan Hogan for coming up with this inventive solution for taming room noise when recording voiceovers.

Posted in Advertising - Radio, Communication, Sales & Marketing | Leave a comment

Happy April First!

Posted on March 31, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

This is one of eight different commercials running heavily all day April 1st on all six commercial radio stations in the market.  (If the local NPR affiliate would allow it, they’d be running there, too.)  It’s a special one-day campaign, replacing the advertiser’s usual radio commercials.

Though the advertiser’s delivery and jingle sound the same as always, the copy is…a little different.  Listeners hearing these spots for the first time will do a double-take.  They’ll shake their heads and chuckle.

More than a few will spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about this advertiser, grateful for both the surprise and levity.

We know this because it’s what happened last year on April 1st when we did this for the very first time.  The response was delightful.  So, this year we’ve added three new spots to the five we produced last year.

To say that these guys have learned how to talk to their customers on radio is an understatement. Since shifting their focus from promotions to branding, and their ad budget from a print-heavy media mix to 90+% in radio, they’ve nearly doubled their annual sales.

No foolin’.

Posted in Advertising - General, Advertising - Radio, Branding - Positioning, Sales & Marketing | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Got Originality?

Posted on March 30, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

Give me a break. “Got Botox?!”

Imitation, the Rev. Colton insisted, is the sincerest form of flattery.

In the annals of American advertising, no slogan has attracted so many imitations—trite or inane as they may be—as the legendary Got Milk?, created in 1993 by Goodby Silverstein and Partners for its client, the California Milk Processor Board, which today owns and licenses those famous two words to other national dairy boards, merchandisers, and manufacturers.

GS&P turned to radio for its unique ability to create great theater-of-mind (and thirst-for-milk), as here: and here: Then came the white-mustached celebrities.

Over the past 18 years we’ve all seen or heard local advertisers’ pathetic attempts to coopt the “Got [Insert Product or Service]?” slogan for their own businesses. Remember any of them? Did any succeed in making themselves endearing or memorable as a result?

Of course not. They simply reminded us of milk and we forgot about them.

Just the other day, driving up to Spokane, I passed a Prius sporting a bumper sticker that read: “Got Yoga?” Do these lemmings honestly believe that their customers think of that as clever advertising?

Clever?? No, what it really communicates about the advertiser is that their marketing people are lazy. Or incompetent. Perhaps both.

If you’re in business, you have a story that belongs to you and no one else. Tell that story, your story, instead of borrowing someone else’s and trying make it fit you.

Truth is better than creativity. – David Ogilvy

Posted in Advertising - General, Advertising - Radio, Branding - Positioning, Communication, Sales & Marketing | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

The Original, One and Only

Posted on March 30, 2011 by Rod Schwartz
Uncle Sam—an American original

Here is a one-word reason advertisers should give serious consideration to participating in their radio commercials:

originality.

 

Each of us is, in the strict sense of the word, unique. An original, not a clone.

As a business owner/operator, your role as a spokesman for your business is also unique.

Although some advertisers are able to take a radio commercial script and make it theirs, others find it difficult to read convincingly from the printed page. Fortunately, it is not necessary that they be able to do so in order to create compelling commercials featuring their own voice. Listen to this example of a local “original,” sent to me a few years back by a client who runs a radio station in a small Missouri market: Tell me you didn’t wish, if only for a moment, that you could sit down to one of Maxine’s home-cooked dinners!

One of my favorite longtime local advertising clients manages a wine, beer, specialty foods shop in Moscow, ID. Terry has been the voice of his commercials for many years, though I’ve never had him read from a script. Rather, I engage him in conversation about the product(s) in question and record his responses. Here’s a commercial typical of his approach: Terry sounds like an expert because he is one. Wine Company customers frequently seek his advice on wine or beer pairings with a particular food, and all would agree: he knows his stuff.

Personalization makes such a huge difference in an advertising campaign, its importance cannot be overstated. Geico Insurance is one of radio’s biggest spenders. Most listeners are familiar with Geico’s slogan (“Fifteen minutes could save you hundreds on car insurance.”) and the distinctive voice of its spokesman. But who is he? Do we know him? Do we really care about him? By contrast, here’s another popular radio advertiser with a distinctive slogan. The difference is, we know their spokesman by name. For twenty years, he’s been dropping by to chat with us, leaving us with a smile and a promise. And what an impression he’s made!

Originality. There’s nothing like it.

Especially when it comes to building your brand on radio.

Posted in Advertising - General, Advertising - Radio, Branding - Positioning, Communication, Sales & Marketing | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Accentuate the Positives: Client-Voiced Radio Commercials

Posted on March 16, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

I’ll admit there are advertisers who should be discouraged from doing their own radio commercials. (Here I would love to insert a few perfect examples, but let’s be charitable.)

Still, my tendency is to err in the direction of giving the client a try at it, at least, before deciding to go in a different direction, because:
1) Client-voiced commercials are distinctive. The client is unlikely to be mistaken for any other voice, personality or advertiser on the air.
(2) The authority and expertise of the spokesman adds to the credibility of the message.
(3) Over time the advertiser becomes a familiar voice, no longer a stranger even to listeners who have yet to patronize his business.
(4) And yes, the client is more likely to have people mention hearing the ad. What’s wrong with that? If it makes his investment in Radio more tangible, that’s terrific.

Writing ad copy for clients to read requires fine-tuning to fit their personality, vernacular and style. Be prepared to edit or even rewrite copy on the fly, i.e. during the recording session. Also, most clients need coaching and feedback, requiring equal measures of persistence and patience. It can be frustrating for both parties to have to do 15 or 20 takes to get everything right. Stay focused on the objective: an effective commercial that will stand repeated listening.

What about advertisers with pronounced accents?

Avi, the Good Deal Guy

Meet Avi Levy. Avi purchased a floor covering store back in 1992, the same year I purchased my present home. I bought a houseful of carpeting and other floor coverings from him and he became a regular radio advertiser for many years. From my experience as his customer I picked up on a phrase he was fond of using: “Don’t worry—I’ll make you a good deal.” So, it was only natural to cast him in his own commercials as Avi, the Good Deal Guy, which caught on immediately and stuck fast.

Avi was born in Morocco and grew up there and later in Israel. He was fluent in French, Hebrew, Arabic (in recent years he’s added Chinese to the mix)…and English. Well, sort of. Between his pronounced accent and occasionally stilted pronunciations, conventional wisdom would have suggested letting someone else read his commercials. But one man’s drawback is another’s challenge, as Inspector Clouseau might say it, and I hoped that Avi’s distinctive approach would work to his advantage in a radio campaign. My favorite line in the spot is where Avi urges his prospective customer to use that tried-and-true tactic for postponing a buying decision, Let me think about it…on his competition!

Although Avi left the airwaves years ago as he migrated away from local retail into international wholesaling, people in the market still remember his commercials, still refer to him as Avi the Good Deal Guy.

Here’s another successful radio advertiser whose distinctive individual style—obviously ethnic, a little rough around the edges, and in-your-face—creates a compelling commercial for his Las Vegas-based company: (Thanks to one of my favorite radio people, TalkRadio Guru Holland Cooke for passing along Mr. Elliot’s spot.) Honestly, don’t you find yourself wishing there were a 24/7 Private Vaults branch near you?

Not every client is comfortable reading from a script. But even those who for whatever reason can’t read or even ad-lib well from the printed page may still find a way to participate meaningfully and effectively in their own radio commercials. I’ll share some fun examples of this next time.

Posted in Advertising - General, Advertising - Radio, Sales & Marketing | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Creating Profitable Radio Advertising: the Advertiser as Expert

Posted on March 14, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

Advertisers who voice their own radio commercials often find it a powerful way to leverage their knowledge and expertise, their accessibility, even their personalities to competitive advantage.

After all, as owners their words carry more weight. They are the local experts in their business or profession. Theirs is the voice of authority.

Their additional investment of time and effort in voicing their own commercials multiplies the value of the dollars they’re spending, compounding the effectiveness of their advertising.

Here’s an example of one optometrist’s skillful use of radio:

Over the past 12 years or so, Dr. DeVleming has answered hundreds of questions in his radio spots, which run on a daily basis every week of the year, with copy changes every 3 weeks.

When we first put this campaign together, the objective was to establish the good doctor as the local authority or expert on eye care. His decision to close his spots with “talk to your eye care professional” instead of “come into my office” might seem counter-intuitive, but actually has worked to his advantage. It confers his radio messages with an aura of objectivity and professionalism that lifts them above the usual “ad speak” and gives them greater authenticity. So, even though these are paid radio commercials for his business, they don’t sound like it!

How has this campaign worked for Dr. DeVleming? He says that “new business alone” more than pays for his advertising. His name and practice are widely known and his business is thriving.

This approach, the advertiser-as-expert, represents a tremendous opportunity for radio stations and radio advertisers to collaborate profitably on exciting, effective, long-term advertising campaigns that engage listeners and turn them into customers. Recently a radio station client in Michigan shared a successful campaign he’s been doing for an advertiser whose specialty is dermatology. Good stuff. And there’s the restaurant guy in Arizona whose folksy spots and homespun wisdom have made him a local celebrity.

Over the years I’ve had the privilege of working with professionals in diverse fields—dentistry, podiatry, accounting, real estate, automotive service and repair, even house paint and painting supplies—who have found that by becoming their own spokesmen, they’ve created distinctive and effective advertising campaigns. But that’s not all.

They’ve also become the dominant players in their category.

More on this next time.

Posted in Advertising - General, Advertising - Radio | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Words and Voices, the Art of Persuasion

Posted on February 28, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

I create radio advertising campaigns for a living. Words are the tools of my trade.

Words give wings to ideas and make them soar.

Words move people, products, and services.

Words turn strangers into customers, and customers into evangelists.

But the words we speak convey only part of what we mean; how we speak them conveys a great deal more.

For instance, take this short piece of advertising copy from a previous post:

“You can afford to have your wedding at the Davenport. TheDavenportHotel.com/weddings.”

How would you read that spot?  (Just for fun, take a moment to read it aloud, just as though you were recording it as a radio spot.  You’ll understand why momentarily.)

At first glance, my tendency would be to emphasize the word can.   Everyone knows that The Davenport Hotel is a posh place, elegant and expensive.  A bride on a budget might be inclined to dismiss it as a venue choice, assuming it to be financially out of reach.  That’s the stereotype the Davenport hopes to overcome.  Miss-Bride-to-Be, you CAN afford to have your wedding at the Davenport!

But wait.  Another voice talent looking at the same script might focus on the word your: (“Yes, it’s true that some people aren’t able to afford the Davenport, but YOU can.  And it’s YOUR wedding.  So, why not choose the best?”) You can afford to have YOUR wedding at the Davenport!

To illustrate the diversity of meaning that different voice talents might distill from the same words on paper, I enlisted the aid of eleven friends across the country, accomplished voice actors and talented radio producers, each reading the same short spot for the Davenport.

Diversity, indeed.

Good radio advertising—which is to say, effective radio advertising—begins with a good script.

But it doesn’t end there.

Somebody has to snatch those words off the printed page and breathe life into them, infuse them with personality, with meaning that engages the listener and triggers the appropriate emotional response that will lead to the desired result.  This is the job of the voice talent, and, as you’ve just heard, no two sound exactly alike.

By taking time to audition a number of voice talents on the same script, you have the opportunity to hear and compare their interpretations.  You might discern different shades of meaning or nuances of emotional engagement that were not previously apparent.

In the higher echelons of advertising and entertainment, producers hire casting directors to help choose the best spokesman for the brand, the right actor for the role.

Much further down the food chain, at the level of local radio in small and medium markets—where budgets are smaller and everyone wears several hats—little thought and even less money are directed toward casting talent for radio commercials.

Whether you’re a radio advertising salesperson, station manager or owner, or a radio advertiser trying to grow your business, if you agree with my premise, that the choice of voice can have a significant impact on outcome of your commercial or campaign, and if (as a station rep) you understand that the best and probably the only sure way to keep your advertising clients committed to your station is to provide them with commercials that bring a return on their investment, then perhaps it’s time to reconsider your approach to choosing voice talent.

You DO have choices—affordable choices—beyond the overbooked and overexposed  production staff at your radio station.  Here are a few to consider, that are either free, relatively inexpensive, or that cost-a-little-more-but-your-client-is-worth-it:

1)  Look for talent in unexpected places.  You may be surprised at the quality of latent talent available right in your own little corner of the world.  They may need a little coaching or cultivating, but they’re capable of quality work. Darci, the bank teller, ended up doing a couple of Mercury-finalist spots for me.

2) Consider talent exchanges with radio stations in other markets.  Several members of Radio Sales Café (a free networking site for radio advertising sales professionals) have been actively involved in facilitating such exchanges over the past 18 months, with participants working strictly on an informal barter basis.

3) Another good bet is Radio and Production magazine’s website, which offers producer forums and classifieds.  I’ve seen more than one solicitation there to trade production work.

4) Seek out radio production companies that offer “bulk production” services on a subscription basis.  One such company is Randy Lawson Productions, based in Indiana.  Randy’s talent roster includes 17 voices, mainly from radio though some have backgrounds in theater.  For a monthly retainer of $195, stations can have up to 20 spots produced by their choice of talent; $295, 30 spots; $395, 40 spots.  Àla carte production is $15 a spot.

5) You can set up free account at Voice123.com, Voices.com , and similar sites that provide matchmaking for voice talents and businesses needing their services.  As a voice-seeker you post your project, specify the amount you’re willing to pay the talent, and how many auditions you’re looking for.  Voice talents who meet your criteria receive information on your post, and those interested send their auditions directly to you.  More than a few people I know have likened the process to a cattle call.  With nearly 200,000 registered voice talents on the leading site alone, you can bet there are more voices available than there is work to keep them all busy.

6) If you have the time and inclination to delve deeper, you can do a Google search on “voice talent” and put on a large pot of coffee.   Many voice artists, union and non-union alike, have hung their shingles on the world wide web, with distinctively branded websites, online demos, and accolades from satisfied clients.

Expect to pay more for the services of well-established voice actors, commensurate with their talent and the benefits that attach to it.  That said, don’t automatically assume that high-profile talent is beyond your means.   Negotiation comes with the territory.  If you hear a voice you think would be perfect for a particular project, contact the talent.  Be upfront about what you expect and what you’re prepared to pay.  They may decline your offer or they may accept it.  But you won’t know until you ask and most voiceover pros that I know would prefer to be asked than not.

“Advertising is fundamentally persuasion and persuasion happens to be not a science but an art.” – Bill Bernbach, from a May 15, 1947 letter to the owners of Grey Advertising, his soon-to-be-ex-employer

Words and voices.  The art of persuasion.  Radio advertising.

Now we’re talking.

________________________________________

My sincere thanks to the eleven gentle souls who graciously lent their considerable talents to this article: Tim Burt, Scott Chasty, Rowell Gormon, Bruce Martin, Scott Nilsen, Perry Anne Norton, Rich Owen, Blaine Parker, Bob Souer, Natalie Stanfield Thomas, and Brian Whitaker.

Posted in Advertising - General, Advertising - Radio, Communication, Sales & Marketing | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Remember Your Customers’ Birthdays and They’ll Remember You!

Posted on February 16, 2011 by Rod Schwartz

One of the definitions of elegance is simplicity.

When it comes to promotions, I’m a big believer in keeping things simple – especially in this age of the 11-second attention span.

Here’s a promotion any radio station or advertiser can put together easily and at minimal expense.

Its appeal is universal.

Can you say: Happy Birthday!

Take the total population of your market, however you may define it—whether your city, county, region, customer database, or what-have-you—and write it down.

Divide that number by 365.

The result equals the average number of birthdays taking place in your market every day.

Yes, the actual number will be lower on some days and higher on others.  But the point is, each and every day represents an opportunity to wish your listeners or customers a Happy Birthday.

It’s easy enough to start your Birthday Club.  Simply invite people to register via email, a form on your website, your Facebook page, or whatever.  Be sure to collect at minimum a name, email address, and date of birth; mailing address and telephone number are also desirable for building a useful database.

Each day you publicly recognize the people whose birthday it is.  If you’re a radio station, mention them on the air several times throughout the day.  Congratulate them on your Facebook page (and theirs), in your Twitter feed.

Add to the fun by drawing at least one name each day to win a birthday prize: a cake, a birthday meal, a special gift, etc. – traded in whole or part with advertisers who help sponsor the promotion.

If you’re in a business other than radio, use all the means at your disposal to recognize your customers’ birthdays.  Design a “Happy Birthday” whiteboard or print up sign to post prominently near the door, in a window, at the service counter, or behind the till where everyone can see it.  Maybe put up a community bulletin board for this purpose.

If you can afford to send a hand-signed card, do so.  If you have an email address, you can send an e-card.  Dayspring, Hallmark and many others offer them.  My personal favorite is Jacquie Lawson, a British artist whose intricate and whimsical e-cards are little works of art; the cost is just $12 a year!

Consider offering a free meal, a special birthday discount (make it meaningful) or a small gift—a Happy Birthday balloon or candy bar—even the littlest things can leave big impressions.  I used to go to a dentist who had carnations delivered to his office each day.  Every patient went home with one, and it lasted in water for at least a week, a fragrant reminder that the family dentist had a heart.  The cost was minimal; the delight factor, huge.

One of the members of Radio Sales Café, “Jingle” Jim Reilly, sends his clients and prospects an email on their birthday.  When the recipient clicks on the link as requested, singers start singing a special “Happy Birthday” jingle.

Want to surprise and delight each and every one of your customers?  Start your own Birthday Club and watch their faces light up as brightly as the candles on their cake.

Posted in Uncategorized | 2 Comments