"Radio is, in many ways, the redheaded stepchild of advertising. There is more glamour and glory in television and print..."
Here’s a scary thought. What if their perception of Earth’s civilization is based on auto ads? Advanced extraterrestrials are picturing us as a primitive, belligerent people who scream at one another in big, booming echo-filled voices. Odds are, they’re aiming the laser cannons at us right now, ready to obliterate us for the sake of the universe’s well being.
If these same aliens have been picking up Atlanta radio broadcasts, however, their thinking may be changing. Over the past few years, such campaigns as Turner Fernandez Turner’s work for the Georgia Department of Transportation; WestWayne’s “Life’s calling” spots for BellSouth Mobility; Austin Kelley’s Georgia Lottery commercials; and Kilgannon McReynolds “Earl” spots for Southern LINC have been setting new standards for originality and humor, painting a better picture of the denizens inhabiting the third stone from the Sun. These clever commercials may some day be credited for saving the planet.
Radio is, in many ways, the redheaded stepchild of advertising. There is more glamour and glory in television and print, and many advertisers treat radio as an afterthought to other aspects of a campaign. As a result, radio is often consigned to junior copywriters who would rather be doing something else. All too often, this attitude shows up in their work.
“The reason most radio is really bad is because most writers are not very good,” says veteran Atlanta ad man Virgil Shutze, President of the T G Madison ad shop. ”When a writer sits down at a keyboard, there’s no reason that it shouldn’t be the best radio commercial ever done. If it’s not, it’s their fault. They can’t blame it on an art director. They can’t blame it on not having enough money because radio is inexpensive to produce and inexpensive to run. They can’t blame it on a temperamental casting director, because he’s the one handling that. All the support systems a writer has in place for print and television are denied him. At the same time, he doesn’t have such things as interruptions. It’s him or her and a blank screen.”
"Radio is a different animal altogether...."
Unlike other advertising where a writer is teamed with an art director, radio finds the copywriter alone in his or her cubicle fighting a lonely battle to come up with something clever, entertaining and informative in a 60 second framework. There is no one else to bounce ideas off, and once the copywriter comes up with a good spot, subsequent radio assignments become their domain.
“Radio is a different animal altogether and…it’s treated differently,” says Rudy Fernandez, Partner/Creative Director at Turner Fernandez Turner. “TV, print or outdoor are one thought or one quick line communicated in a headline. In radio, you’ve got 60 seconds, which is a tremendous amount of time. You have to come up with a mini-play that will fill up the air and keep people’s attention for that time and still say something. It’s really the most difficult mass medium to write for.”
Fernandez states there are several keys to create successful radio advertising. “You have to enjoy it,” he explains. “Very few people do and it comes across. They end up with the same damn executions you hear over and over again. You have to have fun, because that comes across in radio. If you’re not having fun while you’re writing it or producing it, that comes across. You have to learn the process of thinking in 60 seconds. You can’t say, ‘Hey, this print ad is really good, convert it to radio.’ You have to think like a radio spot and you have to give it an intriguing enough story to tell.
“The other aspect is production,” Fernandez continues. “Going in, you have to know how much money you’re talking about and you have to know about production before you write the spot. You can write a great spot for four talents, but only afford one—and you’re screwed. You have to understand production parameters so you can go in and be within your budget and know if you’re using talent from Georgia, L.A. or New York. You have to know about that before you can write it.”
Shutze says one of the major problems with radio is a writer who sits down and tries to write snappy dialogue. “They ought to have their thumbs broken because they’re not ready to write snappy dialogue,” he declares. “What comes out is a bunch of forced, stilted copy points delivered by people. But, people don’t deliver copy points. That’s why God created announcers. People should just be people. They talk with emotions and feeling. Most writers can’t get inside people’s heads. When I write radio, I have that character or characters in my head. I can tell you how old they are, what kind of clothes they’re wearing, what kind of car they drive, what movies they like and magazines they read. I let those people do the talking. I just take dictation.”
The lack of a visual element presents a challenge to agency creatives who don’t face it in other media. For the most part, creatives enjoy the opportunity to devise scripts for what is called the “Theater of the Mind.”
A trend to avoid, according to many creatives, is overdoing it with sound effects.
“Radio is one of the coolest mediums because it allows the listener to provide the art direction,” says Tommy Smeltzer, a Principal at Sixty Second Airborne, a company specializing in creating and producing radio spots. “Radio is a very visual medium, it’s just that all the visuals are occurring in the listener’s head. All radio commercials, in one way or another, create a theater of the mind. Commercials that don’t acknowledge that create a negative visual image. When you have a commercial where an amateur is doing the voiceover and he’s screaming and yelling, listeners create an idea of what that company’s image is in a visual way. They may create an image of the spokesperson being a seedy guy wearing a cheap suit. That guy could be wearing an Armani, but if he sounds like a goober, then he’s going to look like a goober in the mind of the consumer.”
In many markets—and especially Atlanta—most people listen to the radio while driving. It’s critical to engage their attention quickly, or else fingers quickly move to the car radio buttons for another station. The challenge for creatives is making sure those itchy fingers stay on the steering wheel.
According to Mark Getner, Executive Creative Director for Fitzgerald+CO, the way to retain the driver/listener’s attention is to give them something fresh. “You need a hook that carries you through the length of the radio spot so you don’t find yourself wanting to turn the dial after three or four seconds,” he explains. “You want something you haven’t heard before. Something interesting, and not just gimmicky. You hear a lot of real bad radio out there. It’s somebody talking with sound effects like doorbells ringing, beepers and other noises. The trick is to deliver the information in an amusing, interesting way.”
A trend to avoid, according to many creatives, is overdoing it with sound effects. A number of recent commercials have used such sounds as horns, police sirens and wrecks. This is not only distracting, but it makes listeners angry, not the effect the advertiser was hoping to achieve.
Humor is the main tool in the creative’s bag of tricks for winning radio spots. With the exception of PSAs for serious causes like disease and poverty, most commercials have a humorous touch to them.
Says Rena Kilgannon, Principal at KilgannonMcReynolds, “Humor in radio is almost a must in order to get attention. There’s so much clutter out there and so much noise, it’s easy to turn your brain off when you’re listening to something that just doesn’t hit you anywhere. Humor will stop you long enough to grab your attention, to help you decide whether or not you want to listen anymore.”
Scott Biear, Senior Copywriter at WestWayne, says that while he’s undertaken a serious approach to writing radio ad copy, 95 percent of the time he comes back to humor because, “No one wants to listen to radio spots. They want to hear music or what the talk radio host is talking about. So usually the best way to keep them listening and not changing the station is to entertain them. Humor is the best way to do that.”
“One reason humor is used so much is that you don’t have pictures,” says Elizabeth Baskin, Principal/Creative Director at Match. “Anytime you’re giving a marketing message, you need to sugarcoat it, make it palatable for the consumer so they get something out of the deal beside your message. Humor is one of the best ways to do that in radio because you can’t give them a beautiful photograph or television footage. Humor is giving the consumer a little gift to thank them for listening and hanging with you to hear your message. On the other hand, comedic spots tend to wear out rather quickly, so you can have people turn on you. If your humor is rather broad and doesn’t age well, then it can work against you.”
JUST GIVE ME THE MICROPHONE
If there is one critical element in crafting a radio spot, it’s casting the right voice talent. The right voice, giving an on-the-money interpretation of the copy can be the difference between capturing a listener’s ear or causing their finger to reach for the car radio’s “seek” button.
“You only have a couple of seconds to establish a character in a radio spot, which is why they’re always exaggerated and often cliched.”- Rudy Fernandez
Kilgannon compares casting to theater. “If you see a great show done by lousy actors, it sucks,” she declares. “If you see the same show done by incredible talent, you can’t believe how great it is. It’s even more important in radio because there’ no face to go with it.”
“Casting is imperative,” says Smeltzer. “It’s probably as important as the creative because great creative poorly executed is bad creative. Having a message that’s delivered believably and sincerely in a way that’s not offensive to the ear is really important.”
Shutze says the casting process begins when the copywriter sits down at the computer and starts imagining the character who will be delivering the message. “If you don’t have that character in mind,” he explains, “and you don’t hear his or her voice when you’re writing, then you’re starting off in a hole. You better get out of it or forget it. You’ve got to have a very clear idea of who that person is, otherwise when you hear a voice on the casting tape, how can you say, ‘That’s the one.’”
Fernandez also believes that the character needs to come alive before it can be properly cast. “You have to outline the character, understand where that person is coming from and why they’re saying it,” he explains. “You only have a couple of seconds to establish a character in a radio spot, which is why they’re always exaggerated and often cliched. What you look for in a voice, is someone with timing, someone who is able to become different characters and be believable.”
Once chosen, creatives say it’s critical to give the talent leeway to play with the delivery and have the freedom to ad lib. If he has a good budget for talent, Fernandez often writes spots that are 55 or 56 seconds because he knows the talent will bring something different to it. “They’ll add some pauses or ad libs or something to it I’ll want to keep,” he explains. “If I’m buttoned up in 60 seconds, I’ll have to cut that out. If you have great talent, let them do their work and make the spot great.”
“The best radio comes about when it’s a collaboration between the creative and the voice talent,” says Getner. “You picked them because they have the best attitude, you’ve explained to them what you want them to do and have gotten them in the right frame of mind. Often times, they will ad lib some stuff and it will top whatever the writer has. It builds on what you have and it becomes great. You’ve got to have good stuff and the right talent who understands it and can take it to the next level.”
At times it seems that there are a limited number of people providing the voices we hear on the radio. This is somewhat true, thanks in part to technology that allows someone sitting in a studio on the other side of the continent to sound crystal clear on a speaker in an Atlanta studio; but also because with voice talent being so critical, agency creatives want to go with a sure thing.
“Anytime a writer takes a spot into the studio, and the talent makes it better, they tend to use that talent again,” Baskin explains. “The talent brings a lot to it, and if they don’t, it’s the death of the spot.”
In some cases, writers may be thinking about a favorite spot prior to casting and subconsciously reach out to the talent on the commercial. That’s usually a safe road, but it’s a well worn path that many creatives follow.
Says Getner, “You’ll never get heat because you’ve used somebody who is good and proven versus going out on a limb and saying, ‘We’ve never heard this voice before, let’s take a chance.’ Nobody really wants to take a chance. Maybe the creative wants to take a chance, but the client gets nervous, saying they have never used the person before.” Indeed, clients might be the reason why a radio spot doesn’t work. Creatives say they often have to educate their clients on radio, ending misconceptions they have about the medium.
One problem occurs when clients realize they don’t have a television budget, and instead go to radio. However, there’s an expectation level that it can do what television can, but, the creatives have to explain it’s a very different medium, treated differently by consumers and heard in an environment where it doesn’t command the consumer’s attention. Sometimes, these lessons are not always well received by the client.
A common roadblock is a client asking that their name come in at the beginning of the spot, within the first 10 to 15 seconds. When faced with such a client, Biear says that it’s more important to earn the audience’s attention.
“They’re not out there to hear [your client’s] commercial, they’re there to hear music,” he explains. “Mentioning your client’s name at the beginning of the commercial is more of a reason to change the station than listen to your spot. You tell them you have to try to hook the listeners in by making it funny or engaging right up front, and then get to who it is. Hopefully, listeners would have liked the spot and when they hear the client’s name, they will have a favorable impression because it’s an entertaining spot. We try to explain it to them, and sometime it works, sometime it doesn’t.”
The client’s misunderstanding of radio may have its beginnings in how the material is pitched to them. In these situations, the agency personnel have put on their performers’ faces to give a good sense of who the characters are and how they speak. Unlike other media presentations, mock-ups, animatics and other tools are not available.
Mark Robinson, Senior Vice President/ Executive Creative Director for Austin Kelley Advertising, says that his shop has had great success with its presentations. “It all depends on how good a presenter you are,” he explains. “You can stand up there and be the character. If you’re doing it right, they’re buying into it, because you’re creating that little moment in their head during the presentation that you’re hoping to do with a consumer in his car or home. If you can present radio well, it’s an easy sell. If you’re a lousy presenter, it can be hard.”
Smeltzer says Sixty Second Airborne takes great care in how it presents to clients. “So many times, a performance can’t be revealed on paper,” he states. “We don’t just slide a black and white piece of paper in front of our clients and say, ‘Here’s the radio.’ We demo almost everything we do, even if it’s a very rough demo of just the three of us reading. We’ll make all the sound effects with our mouths. We give them a sense of how the rhythm of the spot works. Just giving them a CD or an MP3 file of a read through of a spot really helps the client understand how the end product is going to work.”
For an advertiser looking to hone in on a specific target audience, radio is a highly effective medium. The AM and FM bands provide numerous opportunities to reach exactly the market they seek. If a person is into modern rock, country music, religious programming, news, sports or talk or whatever possible format under the sun, there’s a radio station ready to meet their wishes.
This stratification sometimes means that the ad agency needs to refine its message to fit the format. “I’ve done that in the past,” says Robinson. “I’ve fine tuned it for country stations, urban stations and middle of the road stations. There is value to segmenting it and talking specifically to a market and really fitting in with a radio station’s format so it’s not jarring. But for the clients we have now, it’s not necessary for what we do. I don’t think it’s ever an advantage for a client to be that segmented unless you have a really niche product. I’m sure a client would want all their customers to be in one spot so they can do one message and get them all at once.”
Baskin feels that tailoring a spot to a format is counterproductive. “We don’t generally consider our consumers to be one dimensional,” she says. “Somebody who listens to 99X also has an NPR side. We try to get to know the consumer, and we would try to think of them as a whole person who listens to both 99X and NPR. There’s a tendency because of demographics to think of people as cookie cutters—i.e. this is a country person, this is a rock person—and that’s rarely true. Generally, people are more complex than that.”
If Baskin’s theory is right, the commercial radio business must be as complex as its audience. All the agency has to do is create a hook that works, devise a character that works, and do it all in 60 seconds recording time. And if those ears in the cosmos are listening, they are also responsible for the perception of the earth throughout the universe. Using a little humor and a lot of intelligence, we can save the planet.