EndorsementRadio.com

I love it when hosts do this.

Rush Limbaugh goes from an article about identity theft right into an ad for LifeLock. This is an advertiser’s dream.

You get no tune-out (the listener doesn’t know you’ve hit the ad pod yet), the copy is absolutely relevant, the product is a solution to an important problem, and you get what radio stations and networks are always promising: “we want to be your partner, not just a vendor”.

Awesome job, LifeLock. You came out of nowhere and now rule the identify theft world. I know you’ve got TV and event sponsorship in there, but you built this thing on the back of radio: congratulations.

MediaDailyNews had a nice little article about the following conundrum: millions of people listen to radio yet the revenue is shrinking. While ratings are holding relatively constant, despite satellite radio, Ipods and internet radio, somewhere around 90% of adults listen to at least some “terrestrial” radio every single week.

But the article also talks about something that I had heard before, but needed reminding: creatives don’t like working in radio because they don’t see a lot of payoff. TV, Print…likely even billboards seem sexier than radio to many copywriters. And so creatives don’t give the radio copy their best efforts. From there it’s a trickle down effect: the poorer the ads, the worse the results. The worse the results, the lower the spend. The lower the spend, the less you have for creative costs dedicated to radio. And so on…

And that’s why I love radio endorsements. You only need to create some key bullet points with your value propositions. The

hosts

then get to be the creative ones. And usually, on a national level, the hosts fees are wrapped into the unit costs.

So, in effect, you’re still capturing all of those millions of ears listening to talk radio with better than “produced” ads, without having to pay a dime to some “creatives” who would rather work on tv ads.

I think endorsement radio could put the “hospitality” in hospital. In my experience, hospitals are grim places. Death and pain lurk in every corner. You hear stories of massive infections, people dying in waiting rooms, insurance hell; not to mention terrible food and overpriced flowers.

I do hear some decent hospital ads. The problem is, they all do it. And there are some hospitals and health groups out there with the best ads but the worst reputations.

But better than any ad telling you what a great hospital they are and how many awards they’ve one, is a friend telling you the great care they received and the nice rooms they have…with decent meals and plasma screens.

Now, how about if that friend is the person you listen to every morning?

It’s like a good bedside manner reaching out through your radio. If any hospital takes my advice, please please please make sure that the promise of the endorsement actually happens in those corners: let’s keep death and pain at bay, if you don’t mind. And nurses, please try not to roll your eyes.

If there was any bank in dire need of endorsement radio, it would be WaMu. In September 2008, they are taking a beating –WaMu is one of the big banks that is sorely hurting from the whole mortgage crisis of 2007/2008.

A sexy ad campaign is not going to get me to give my money to Washington Mutual right now, but some well placed endorsements could.

Plus, I almost feel like WaMu deserves what it’s getting for it’s horrible “The bank that makes you go Woo Hoo” campaign. I want to gargle nails every time I hear it. This cutesy little saying that no man should say. It comes across at best as insincere and at worst…what’s the word? Whimpy, I guess. It’s especially painful when the traffic guy or news gal has to say the line. See, WaMu’s agency can

make

a station say the line, but they can’t coach personality and inflection, the only thing that would save a dumb line like Woo Hoo. I laughed today when I heard the money guy on NPR say “I never understood that campaign”.

I understand it. They paid some ad agency to create something new and different…something that people will remember…that will capture the way their die- hard customers truly feel about free checking. They likely paid a few million just on the creative concepting. They got Woo Hoo for their money.

I’m getting off track here. Oh yes, I was talking about endorsements. With the trouble WaMu has gone through financially and to make good on a horribly conceived campaign, someone like a Jim Rome saying “look, WaMu is stable, they still have their free checking, their interest rates on CDs are outstanding, and I’VE got a lot of money over there…you gotta see what WaMu has to offer. For you small businesses, WaMu doesn’t just promise service…they deliver. They’ve helped me figure out this, that and the other and their advice has been dead on every time”.

With an endorsement, you’ve also just broken out of the clutter of every bank saying the same thing. And people are hearing the ads from someone they trust.

Otherwise, it’s more boo hoo and less customers.