Sponsor (Oct-Dec 1964)

IHf (lOWtH 01 a MARKIT ir T»J HEADY I^EfERf^ NECO MARKET gram schedules — something that gives me a better indication of what Swinging Serenade they're talking about. That could be anything from top 40 to Mantovani. . ." Gordon Gredell. "Station promotion can, and should be, very important, but there are all kinds of station promotion: pretty girls, cheap ashtrays and gimmicks. None of these really help the buyer to select a station. Anything that tells the story of the station and/ or the market is what we want and what we keep. To be important, promotion must be current and factual. It must tell something about the particular station. . . "First let's talk about the program schedule. How can we identify a station without a schedule? We need to know how often a station has news, weather, sports and other features. . . "Next, I would say, comes the coverage map. Where does the station go? Some stations don't even cover all of their own city; many, not the home county or the metro area. We need to know this. "Then, program and personality profiles tell us something of the background and experience of our air salesmen. "Next, we want research, and this is a subject as long as your arm. We have rating books, or we can get them from the rep. But there are other considerations. In my case, I'm buying for a product that needs to be advertised during so-called drive-time. Different markets have their own variations of drive-time. Usually the police department or traffic department can help stations by showing hourly breakouts of moving autos. Some markets have staggered working hours to relieve traffic congestion. We need to know about this. . . "What about the station's audience? Is it made up mainly of men? Are these men blue-collar or white-collar? Well paid or underpaid? Do they drive old clunkers or the most recent models? "The more stations can inform us about the demographic structure of their markets, the more we appreciate it, and the more it helps us to substantiate our buys. Stations should sell hard but honestly. They must assume that the buyer's knowledge of their station and their market is their responsibility. "Of the material we get through bulk mailing we keep very little — too little. We don't have that much room for filing and our minds can't possibly store the information. But I'll tell you what we do like. "When we get ready to buy or rebuy in a market we advise the reps in that market of the number of stations to be bought, the anticipated penetration and the budget allocated to that market, whenever possible. The rep then prepares a suggested plan for our consideration. Along with this he tells us as much as possible about the market and his station. This is the time for station promotion. Now we really need to know about the programs, the coverage, the air personalities, audience comp, unusual traffic conditions and features particular to one station. The rep sorts out the salient promotion pieces and includes them with his presentation, and it is this material that we are likely to keep on file. "I don't disqualify the pretty girls, ash trays and gimmicks. I simply mean to say that they don't sell anything. They only remind us that the station is on the air. Some cause comment for a brief period of time; some are simply ridiculous. They require station and representative follow-up to be effective. "I believe it takes more than an artist, copy or a layout man, or an expert in making paste-ups to provide good promotion. The socalled creativity can be summed up as follows: (1) What does the customer want to know? (2) What should we tell him to help him? "It is obvious to me that in many instances the promotion director and the sales manager are not in communication. A promotion director should not be expected on his own to know all of the problems of selling. The front-line salesman, alone, knows that. Therefore these two must get together, plan together, work together for a common interest. The salesman knows what we want because he is in contact with buyers who ask him questions. He digs the answers out. These answers are prime material for a promotion director to work on. My suggestion is that we add a prefix to the promotion manager's title and call him a sales promotion manager. Even if he creates an audience promotion, he is still selling. In selling us, his duty is to help us by supplying documentaries of his station and his market. Some of the documentaries he works up today can be used again next year, but some can be used next year only if updated." ♦ 44 SPONSOR