R
Radioman100
Guest
Chuck said:
Yup. We couldn't do much worse. If I were a competing media like TV or newspaper and I wanted to paint radio as an extremely ineffective competitor, I'd use the nationwide HD Radio campaign as a prime example. Think of the dollar amount spent in advertising vs. the results. Absolutely pathetic, but what else could you expect from an ad campaign this poorly organized and with NO USP! The promise of a product that does SOMETHING obviously isn't much of an allure.
The fact that programmers are allowed to, or in the case of the Clear Channel stations in my market, seemingly REQUIRED to confuse the issue by broadcasting liners that say "Now in HD digital!" with no context whatsoever makes it really easy to believe that most people probably think they're getting HD already.
The question I'd like to have answered is why? The guys running the big radio companies aren't stupid. They wouldn't be in their positions if they were, but they MUST realize that this is a horrible promotional campaign. None of them would dare sell such an ineffective campaign to a big client for risk of losing them. Why is the industry shortchanging itself with this lousy campaign?
I have two theories. My best guess is the industry is just preparing now for an eventual, real push. We're just marking time until HD becomes standard in most new cars and most radios available at retail. They had to build the infrastructure to get manufacturers and Detroit interested, and they seem to be coming along, although slower than many HD supporters would like. This wholly ineffective campaign is getting manufacturers interested, but doesn't harm the golden goose.
My other theory is the whole HD rollout is a product of the snowball effect. Radio execs may have found themselves caught up in a collective frenzy and committed to something they're really uncomfortable with. They can't back out now for fear of losing face (think Martin Stabbert) but they fear audience fragmentation. If you're in such a quandry, what do you do? Pay lip service to the concept with a totally ineffective marketing campaign while quietly wishing it would just go away.
Having met a few radio CEOs, I think it could be the latter, but REALLY think it has to be the former. Why? None of them are prone to simply throwing away large sums of money. They will eventually want to see a return on their investment.
A good friend of mine and chief engineer for a Clear Channel cluster that's fully HD converted in a market barely inside the top 100 told me a while back that Clear Channel would start its "real" HD promotion across all of its stations at once. This push is supposed to coincide with the day they start selling airtime on their HD2 and HD3 channels. I tend to believe him because he said his GM and sales manager were rather pissed and worried about this directive from corporate. He said they will be given sales goals for HD2 channels and they will be expected to meet them. I have to think that if this does happen, Clear Channel at least will suddenly get very serious about generating listenership for their HD2 channels.
So does anyone know what day Clear Channel plans to start selling ads on their HD2 channels? I'm betting that's the day you'll start hearing HD Radio promotion that might actually get results.