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Surreptitious Advertising on RDS
- Thread starter DToTheJ
- Start date
I think RDS mentions are a requirement in Anidjar & Levine's advertising contract because I see it on all the corporate-owned Tampa stations.
I don't remember the exact advertiser but they would show their logo on the album art.
WWBF in Bartow doesn't have PAD, they will alternate messages in the RT field and they have a few 15-second sponsor mentions along with upcoming programs and PSAs.
I don't remember the exact advertiser but they would show their logo on the album art.
WWBF in Bartow doesn't have PAD, they will alternate messages in the RT field and they have a few 15-second sponsor mentions along with upcoming programs and PSAs.
There's nothing "surreptitious" or "sneaky" about this. If you're a station owner in 2026, you get your revenue any way you can, and that includes monetizing your RDS and your HD PAD data. There are several vendors who specialize in enabling this, including Quu. Anyone who's not selling this way is leaving money on the table.
One problem with this approach is people with older receivers (the ones without the full screen displays) that are RDS capable. Yes, those are out there. Instead of station/artist/title, every station (except the non-coms) displays only ads for trial lawyers. Makes RDS pretty much worthless for me.
I'd swap it out for a screen-type, but my current one does have HD Radio, which I like.
I'd swap it out for a screen-type, but my current one does have HD Radio, which I like.
What might be really nice is if this sort of advertising could be made interactive on modern in-car entertainment systems. Have a display where a screen tap could send some sort of coupon or discount incentive to your phone.
Thoughtful implementation matters. At the station where I'm running RDS ads, they alternate with title/artist during the song, so you still get see what's playing.
ZoneCasting™️ — GEO Broadcast Solutions
www.geobroadcastsolutions.com
That of course is geographically narrowly targeted, hyperlocal advertising. I was thinking of something similar to much of the advertising I see on TV streaming services where a click of the remote will send a special offer or other information and incentives to your phone, which then can be presented at a business just like what is commonly used within text messages or emails.ZoneCasting™️ — GEO Broadcast Solutions
On my car radio and depending on the station I'm listening to the RDS display is like in a separate section by itself with song/artist ID and station info and others it's a scroll up just after the station static call letters and frequency. I'm guessing it's just the way it's programmed at the station.
This ad placement has been in place for years now. Can't say that I like it as sometimes you can't catch the song info in time before another song comes on. But thats what money hungry big budget advertisers are doing.
If the automation software you represent does RDS ad insertion duties, here's an idea to float to your programmers: ensure the artist+title remains continuously visible during every song's final 30 seconds, even if the title/ad alternation timing pattern would otherwise call for the ad to be visible during that interval. There's nothing worse than deciding you want a song just as it is ending, only to look down and realize you're missing your chance to find out what it is because 1-900-ACCEDENTLAWYERS is hogging the display.
Of course!If the automation software you represent does RDS ad insertion duties, here's an idea to float to your programmers: ensure the artist+title remains continuously visible during every song's final 30 seconds, even if the title/ad alternation timing pattern would otherwise call for the ad to be visible during that interval. There's nothing worse than deciding you want a song just as it is ending, only to look down and realize you're missing your chance to find out what it is because 1-900-ACCEDENTLAWYERS is hogging the display.
Any of the systems that can do this, whether it's my Myriad software, Quu, MetaRadio or others, start with the default assumption that the ad insertion rotation won't begin until X seconds after the track has started and will stop X seconds before the track ends, for exactly the reason you cite.
That's also a user-adjustable setting, and once a user has the software, it's up to them to decide if X is 60 or 30 or... 0. The best we can do is offer recommendations.