Sponsor (July-Dec 1953)

Radio ™d now a message ho»ouisjg« l>\ Hob Foreman M ti keeping with this issue, it has been suggested that I discuss what the '53-'54 fall season will, perhaps, hold for us in broadcast media. Since memories are short and time is fleeting, the idea gives me little cause to worry. Therefore! This season ahead, I believe, in the words of John Keats will be one of both "mists and mellow fruitfulness." There is no doubt that many of our most mist-ifying problems will still be with us. Furthermore, correct use of these media will be fruitful for those engaged in them. In radio I look for even stronger sales appeal (to advertisers) of the late night and early morning hours — a far greater understanding of out-of-the-home listening and a much more accurate method of recording same. I believe, too, that radio, having taken the brunt of TV and most of the suffering so far from budget reallocations that TV has caused, will at last start to become more competitive with printed media. This is as it should be. There is no valid reason why so many advertising dollars that went into television had to come out of radio. Except for the historical fact that radio and TV are primarily delivered by the same facilities, corporations, and talent, there is small justification for withdrawing automatically radio money to feed and clothe the new baby. Actually, the two media are now far easier to dovetail. Reaching non-TV homes by means of radio and reaching into TV homes via radio during the weakest TV viewing hours should be comparatively simple to do now with most of the facts in and the patterns of view ing fairly well established. So I look for more of this type of timebuying in the future. Some time ago, I recall, I predicted in these austere pages that a great deal of TV-plus-radio network buying would be done in a way that radio coverage would supplement rather than duplicate television coverage. To date I've been pretty wrong. Advertisers aren't doing this except with spot radio, mainly because the networks themselves haven't packaged a radioTV time buy as yet. Evidently they still feel they are able to hold enough radio billing without so doing. (For another view on this subject see Network Radio section. ) As was obvious even a year ago the future of daytime TV is growing brighter — and the very early morning hours of broadcasting, long successful for local radio operators, have gone over big in TV. I refer primarily to that slow starter which is today one of NBC's most profitable ventures — Dave Garroway's Today program. This program, I'm sure, will be sold out by fall thus evoking perhaps ARC or CBS competition. Another phenomenon of this past year, the soap opera, seems to have given up the ghost pretty well. NBC does however seem to be out to revive it. CBS helped kill the T^V soap opera rather neatly with its lower cost and more popular audience shows, loosely formated talent wing-dings and "just-visitin' " programing. This season brings us more evidence that a personality who dominates a program and does the selling is the medium's most successful commercial approach. For one, I relish this. In fact. I revel in it. Also I feel somewhat vindicated in looking back on the many highpriced radio stars I've dealt with who refused even to mention a sponsor's name. A pox on these! Unfortunately, it is fairly tough to develop a super salesman-entertainer. But there will in the weeks ahead be new ones who will assuredly get their chance — and since exposure breeds familiarity and familiarity breeds confidence, we'll see some good new faces and sales results. For example, I'll wager someone will latch on to Mike and Buff Wallace and someone will discover a disk jockey or two working on other-than-N. Y.and-L.A.-stations, thus finding new folks of the caliber of Garry Moore, Garroway, and others. There will still be with us those "big names" who believe that mere mention of a product name coming from their lips is enough to cause cash registers to jingle. And there will still be those who insist that their own copy ideas are far sounder than what the agency dishes up — this fodder turning out to be their own brand of nit-witticism and Hollywood-scripted funnies. This "copy" some advertisers will discover, to their dismay, is a poor substitute for a down-to-earth, basic reason-why theme. To the perpetrators of tomorrow's brand of this sappery I suggest a course in Godfrey with special note paid to what Mr. G does to the verbiage but not the theme — with studied attention to how he tells his audience about the briskness of the tea and the garden vegetables in the soup and the medical report on the tobacco and the three kinds of hair and three best types of curlers. i Please turn to pope 50) Do you always agree with Bob Foreman when he lauds or lambasts a commercial? Bob and the editors of SPONSOR would be happy to receive and print comments from readers in rebuttal; in ire; in qualified agreement. Address Bob Foreman, c/o SPONSOR. 40 East 49 St. 46 SPONSOR