Sponsor (Nov 1947-Oct 1948)

can do a real job for you! The Texas Rangers, stars of stage, screen, and radio, are America't largest and finest group, playing and singing Western tunes. The Texas Rangers have just released a new Bibletone "Cowboy Hymn" album —first of its kind. The Texas Rangers music is anscribed vertically for high fidelity— America's only vertical cut transcriptions of western music You'll find them ideal for either FM or AM. They are priced right for your market and your station: THE KEY TO QntAct/t ^//i/t/mcta MINNESOTA'S IRlPll MARKET ♦ SSll.OOO IN n K\A I lONAL visitor'. ♦ 34.000 MITROPOLH AN residents ♦ 8". 200 RURAL consumers in the primary coM'r.iKC .irt,!. EVERYONE IfDAf Minn Network DIALS TO lml%WV N. W. Nolwork Southern Minnesota's Oldest Radio Station Is/uh/ifhei/ ;9f5 IN ROCHESTER, MINNESOTA Nationally i«prcttnted bv the John E Pearson Co. to see these salesmen after business hours and talk about my favorite sport. I'm perfectly happy to see them between 10 and 4, as long as I know they won't strug' gie to sell me for every second of the interview. Information sells too." Account executives who don't control accounts have, say they, an unhappy life. They are constantly worried lest their accounts be cut out from beneath them by new-business men of other agencies. Frequently the account executive goes to the client armed with instructions from his agency's plans board, but when he arrives he finds that to follow instructions would be suicide for him and the agency. He's required to be more than a diplomat. He must, say most of them, be a magician besides. "It would be fine," says a young account executive, "if I had only to keep my client happy. That isn't the case. I walk a tight rope. I have to keep my client happy and still satisfy the copy man, the art director, the radio vp, and the research executive of my agency that I'm carrying the banner for good old XYZ. Seldom do our copy vp and radio director see eye to eye. There have been times when I've left to see a client with instructions that I couldn't follow even if I had four shoulders on which to carry water." These contact executives seem to have a general lament, in so far as radio is concerned. They just don't know what it's all about. No matter how much information they're supplied, they have discovered, countless times, they don't have the answers the client desires. For years account men have been told that radio is a "new" advertising medium. They've used that approach countless times, when cornered on a problem for which they've had no answer. Suddenly they're finding that it's wearing thin. "For years," says one of these contact men, "I've been told that broadcasting is an infant advertising medium. How young can you be? How long does an industry wear three-cornered pants?" They feel it's time that broadcasting delivered to them something to replace its "youth" as an answer. They realize of course that advertising itself is ver>' young. Far less than a century ago advertising was a never-never land without a guide, without a sales curve. They don't expect any advertising medium to have all the answers, but they do expect that there will be answers available to them on standard questions. One contact executive expresses himself directly. He says, "I know that there have been a number of great broad cast advertising successes. I also know that there are many advertisers who have used network radio and dropped it. What I would like to know is the reasons for both the successes and the failures. Trade publications endeavor to supply me with the information I need to do a creditable job, but it's the job of the medium to deliver facts not fancies to me. I want them all in one package when I'm about to justify our agency's selection of radio as part of a campaign. Not a single network or station has been able to supply me with what I require at the Board of Directors' table. "Sometimes I bring along our radio head to a client meeting, but although he has an amazing record of successful programs and commercials behind him, he fumbles when he attempts to justify the use of his medium to sell. Our media men can spout all sorts of figures on the use of the other media — even come forth with information on sales increases through the repackaging of products — but when it comes to information on effectiveness of broadcasting, they're stopped. Even our agency's research department becomes confused when presenting case histories on broadcast advertising. They have information available from Nielsen, Hooper, Industrial Surveys, Pulse, Schwerin, and a number of lessknown survey sources, but when they put them all together ihey spell 'zero.' They don't enable me to justify our use of broadcasting. It's a great advertising medium don't misunderstand me. I'm not anti-radio. I just don't want to look like a nincompoop when I sit in on budget meetings with m>' clients' Board of Directors." More than any other group at an advertising agency, account executives need constructive help from media. Since broadcasting is a personal advertising medium which comes into the home of practically everyone concerned with advertising, the a.e. requires more assistance from radio than he has to have from other media. And if the account executives to whose complaints sponsor listened are an adequate cross-section (and sponsor believes that they are, since agency men from New \ork, Boston, Chicago, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Philadelphia and a numt)er of nonmetropolitan areas were sampled), broadcasting gives them less than any other national media. Account executives know that they are in the middle, and that no matter what they do they can't satisfy everyone. There are few jovial account executives and broadcasting, as a medium, hasn't helped sweeten their temperaments. * * * 124 SPONSOR