The Concept
 As egta wishes you a happy, spooky Halloween, egtabites brings you a new, multi-faceted campaign from the Australian commercial radio sector that blends emotional appeal and rational arguments to highlight radio’s enduring strength as an advertising medium.
Radio. It’s a Love Thing, launched by trade body Commercial Radio Australia (CRA), provides an umbrella campaign that positions radio as a medium of the future, supported by an exclusively-written song, comprehensive, multi-phased research and a content-rich online platform to help advertisers, media agencies and the wider radio industry to understand the medium’s effectiveness.
The campaign
The key objective of this campaign is to deliver compelling arguments for big brand advertisers to see radio as an essential platform on which to communicate to their consumers. The core message of the campaign is built around new research by Colmar Brunton, which demonstrates that 67% of surveyed respondents – the highest figure for any medium, including television, online and print – are open to advertising messages on the radio. The research found that respondents were nine times happier and more energised when they tuned into commercial radio, and for this reason they are more receptive to advertising messages.
The research demonstrates that radio is the medium that, more than any other, is able to drive business for advertisers. Furthermore, it showed that search and purchase increased by more than 40% for those brands who advertised on radio.
Chairman of the CRA brand committee and Australian Radio Network chief executive officer Ciaran Davis set out the significance of this research, stating that “this is the first research of its kind to draw these valuable conclusions about radio. We know people have a strong connection to their favourite radio station and this research confirms it.”
Generating the emotional hit
To turn the research findings into a truly impactful and integrated campaign, CRA teamed up with Eardrum’s Ralph van Dijk, one of radio advertising’s most respected figures. The initiative is anchored by an exclusive song co-written by Eardrum and the Australian band No Pictures. Inspired by the 80’s funk hit It’s a Love Thing, the song has echoes of Massive Attack and Bloc Party, with vocals reminiscent of Lenny Kravitz.
It’s catchy, cool and nicely affiliated with the media buying professionals the campaign is really looking to target.
Commenting on the initiative, CRA’s Chief Executive Officer Joan Warner said, “Whilst all stations are highly competitive against one another, it’s important that we continue to work together, to promote radio as a platform.”
The campaign begins with a series of four radio ads to air across 260 commercial radio stations, building on the fun and humour that previous CRA radio promotions have become known for.
The six-week campaign will drive traffic to the Radio. It's a Love Thing website – a one-stop shop for all materials relating to radio advertising, showcase resources, research, GfK radio ratings and a number of case studies. It will showcase resources that advertisers, agencies and members can use to understand advertising on radio.
Why this matters for egta members
This initiative has solid, independent research at its heart, and the approach of CRA demonstrates how radio can work to its greatest strengths: verify it’s power by independent means, construct a great story and package it in a way that will have maximum impact with the target audience! |
