This month the MPR’s of Programming continues as our focus turns to the third "M" on the list…Marketing. In review, the MPR’s are a programming checklist which help a radio station analyze their Music, Morning Show, Marketing, Management/Morale, Promotions, Production, Positioning, Personalities, Research, Ratings, and Revenue.

Over the last several months I’ve dealt with music programming and morning show development. Once you have a focused music product and a strong morning show, it’s probably time to look at marketing your radio station. But what are the most effective ways to accomplish this task?

Let’s take a look at some of the "basics" involved in marketing your product.

First and foremost is deciding the proper way of imaging your radio station. This form of "positioning" is one of the fundamental keys in developing an effective marketing plan.

Marketing gurus Ries and Trout wrote the landmark book on marketing back in 1981. The book "Positioning" sparked a revolution in advertising that really changed the way people looked at marketing. The basic concept of positioning is NOT what you do with a product or service, but what you do to the mind of the prospect.

Ries and Trout felt it was vitally important to "position the product in the mind of the prospect." After all, with consumers having more and more choices today, this so-called "battle for your mind" is the most effective way to be seen and heard in the overcrowded marketplace.

With this groundbreaking concept in tow, Ries and Trout went on to write several more respected books on positioning products and services including "The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing" which included a plethora of commonsense suggestions for marketing.

Radio programmers would do well to review the concepts and strategies laid out in these Ries and Trout books for marketing their radio stations. One of the basic laws that is broken on a regular basis is advertising your radio station when the product isn’t right.

If It Ain't Fixed, Don't Market It!

A few years back I was doing a market visit with a radio station that had spent over $50,000 on a major billboard campaign and wondered why they actually went DOWN in cume. This was my initial market visit and my analysis found the music very unfocused with a morning show that created little or no impact.

When I suggested that they shouldn’t market the station until they got the product right, they actually looked at me and said….."we have the budget for it…so we might as well spend it".

Far too often radio stations will spend thousands of dollars on marketing a less than stellar product. The moral of the story here is similar to the old restaurant adage of not advertising the restaurant until the food is good.

You can do much more harm than good by marketing your radio station when the product isn’t right.

Once you’re confident your music is focused, the morning show is on target, and the rest of your product is ready, the next question is, what’s the best way to market your radio station?

The traditional forms of advertising present a varied set of challenges. One of the biggest debates is just how effective is using television to market your radio station? There’s no question that a major TV advertising campaign can really enhance a station’s cume.

But there are so many variables involved in using this mode of marketing. How much should you spend on the production of the spot? How effective is the actual spot itself? Who’s doing the TV time buy and how cost effective is the buy in targeting your demo effectively?

Depending on your radio station’s format, certain target demos and psychographics, particularly "20-something" rock and alternative listeners, really don’t spend that much time watching television anyway. The price of doing an effective TV marketing campaign is far too many times cost prohibitive for most radio stations to make an impact in their market.

Billboards

While TV advertising can definitely help increase a radio station’s cume if the spot and time buy are effective, billboards are a great way of stabilizing and reinforcing your product’s image in the minds of the listener. It’s also one of the most effective ways of introducing a new radio station to the market, particularly to radio formats that target the 18-34 demo.

I’ve done numerous Focus Groups where the 18-34 year old rock and alternative listener’s mention that billboards are the most effective way a radio station can advertise. The simple fact is, this target demo lives an active lifestyle where they spend lots of hours driving…..everywhere!

Similar to TV advertising, there are several key questions to ask before you embark upon a billboard campaign. What’s the message you need to convey?

How many boards can you afford in attractive locations around town? How long do you need your billboards up to create the proper showing to make an impact?

One of the major keys to effective billboard advertising is the old concept of "Less is More". Your message should be short and simple. After all, you only have a matter of seconds to get your message across to thousands of drivers zipping by your billboard. Make it memorable!

A few years back, the Internet was considered a non-traditional form of marketing. But the explosion of new users borders on the staggering. A recent study shows a new user joins the Internet approximately every 1.1 second, which is equivalent to about 64,500 new surfers per day, according to an estimate by an Internet survey company called Iconocast.

In the last year, the Arbitron Company and Edison Media Research conducted an in-depth study of how radio listeners utilize the Internet, who is listening on-line, and what the potential impact of new media might be on radio.

Beyond TV and billboards, the Internet is fast becoming one of the most effective ways of marketing your radio station.

It should be treated as the three-dimensional arm of the radio station…the visual extension. Webcasting could boost at-work listenership beyond a station’s signal limitations, simply because as Internet penetration in the workplace increases, so can at-work listenership.

The Arbitron-Edison study found that radio is the best possible medium to drive people to visit Web sites. This is not only important in marketing the product of radio, but extremely effective in reeling in more potential radio advertisers.

There are a number of great opportunities for radio to market itself over the Internet via their own website:

• Develop a stronger bond with your listeners…offering freebies, monthly newsletters, contest information they can’t get on the air, and a chance to offer feedback to your station.

• Recycle listeners….use your broadcast power to drive traffic to your site and back to the radio. Have your listeners go to the website to vote on music that you’ll play over an upcoming special weekend. Or use your internet power to drive traffic to your dial position where your website sets up contests. Listeners have to listen to the radio station for music or other features, then go back to the website to enter the correct information to win prizes.

• Make your site fresh and compelling….this is the visual brand extension of your radio station. Make it a place to visit EVERYDAY. Put items on your web site that you can’t put on the air for whatever reason (content, time, etc.). And most importantly….make sure you update your site regularly with fresh and exciting information.

While the Internet continues to gain momentum, the old traditional form of marketing through print advertising has really taken a back seat over the years. But effective print advertising still has it’s merits in marketing a radio station, particularly if they’re creative and long term. Local weeklies and music sections of newspapers and magazines that directly target your listeners are the best places to do your print advertising.

A great use of print marketing is tying in the other major forms of advertising like TV and billboards. If your TV or billboard campaign utilizes a special positioning slogan, you can use print to support your marketing through creative visual content that targets your listeners directly.

Alternative rocker KFMA in Tucson did a very creative print ad campaign to support the "Hong Kong" radio TV spots they ran in the market. The key positioning statement in the TV spot was "KFMA is Tucson’s New Rock station…we fight to prove it!"

The spot featured cheesy samurai warrior fight sequences. The station capitalized on this by producing a series of hilarious print spoofs with shady warrior characters, wrestlers, etc. all tagged with the "we fight to prove it" positioner. This became an effective use of print in supporting the TV campaign. The station traded the ad space for a six week run in the Tucson Weekly, the local alternative print outlet.

There are other forms of non-traditional marketing that you can do that are cheap and can be very effective. These are two of the oldest marketing ideas in the book, so just for giggles, these just might work in this age of high tech marketing:

• Sandwich boards…..a great way to promote your station or morning show

and very cheap to produce. Send station staff and interns out to major community events wearing these and you’ll definitely get noticed.

• 60 Second Critic…..most hotels still use these short "How are we doing?" critiques. Use your station frequency (i.e.: 95 Second Critic) and have these available to fill out at station events or sent out with all station mailings. Select listeners receive prizes for filling them out. This can be a great research tool and a good way to start or add to your database.

No matter what form of marketing you choose, make sure your product is right before you advertise it. And always strive to image your radio station with an indelible brand in the listener’s mind.