A form of advertising that still gets a lot of exposure is Radio. I have used this medium a number of times over the past few years.
When I first opened my Laundromats I started to see what stations were in the area and found there were 9 based in my market. This did not include ones from other cities that could be heard in the area. The range stretched from AM Gospel stations to FM Rock stations to Talk Radio. I was surprised by the amount and diversity.
I used different promotions with the stations I worked with. Some did not actually have a radio spot but was part of a weekly promotion. The station ran a Birthday Club promotion where people could call in each day with a birthday announcement and on Friday one was chosen for a Gift Package. This consisted of items from local businesses, A birthday cake, flowers, meal coupons and a Drop Off Laundry Gift Card.
During the Holiday Season, the station ran almost non-stop Christmas songs and each hour was sponsored by a different business. This was my first venture into an actual radio ad.
Usually, I run a limited amount of targeted ads each year. This helps to maintain the advertising budget and get the most exposure.
The next year I started to move into full 30-second commercials that covered all of the facts and details about the business.
As I learned more about advertising methods and how to explain benefits and not features the commercials took a different approach.
The size of the washer and the temperature of the water are features, getting the comforter cleaned is the benefit.
As I developed the businesses and started to determine the base markets for each location the advertising became more specific to the store. Washin Golden Springs is a partially attended store with a Drop Off Service that could target a different customer base. So instead of splitting the pie, the thought was too make a bigger pie or more pies.
So where to go from here? We have covered the basics of the store locations, features, and benefits, hours and size.
Now it was time to start having some fun. I had worked with the Radio Personalities for a couple of years and they had a better understanding of the business so they wanted to make some changes to catch the audience’s attention.
I took a bit of a break and used some other advertising methods that you can check out at LaundromatHowTo.com
But like most things you have fun with you can only stay away for so long. The ads can be featured around seasons, events or other particular days depending on your target market and area so there was a Special Day coming up so it was time to give the audience something completely different.
Let me set the stage for the first time I heard the ad on the radio.
I was driving home and tuned to my local Rock station. This wasn’t Old Rock, or Soft Rock but real screaming guitars and beating drums. I had it turned up listening to Godsmack 1000 HP and when the song ended it blended into my ad.
There is a term in advertising called a Pattern Break where you make a drastic change to re-engage your audience. I believe this fits the term very well.
There are a couple of effects to the audience when this happens. First, they stop what they are doing and look to see who messed with the radio, next they listen to find out what they are hearing and third they listen to the next ad to see if they are back where they feel they should be.
It was a bit of a risk for the station to mix this drastic of a change into their lineup but I received a lot of feedback from people who heard the ad on the radio.
Another more reasonable entry into radio ads is to sponsor the traffic, weather or news. These are typically short 10-second ads instead of the full 30-second spots. The ads are short and to the point and maybe not so much fun but the listener will focus in on them as they want to hear the weather or traffic updates or they may use the news as a “timer” during their daily routine.
Here’s a sample
Recently I installed some new large capacity washers and dryers at my unattended store. With the increase in volume, I am able to direct more traffic to the store.
In this ad, one of my attendants from the other store did part of the voice over. It is for a set time frame and target market and I will be working with a couple of local stations to determine the best timing of the ads.
After using the radio ads they don’t need to go to waste. They can be mixed together with still pictures and turned into a video for use on Social Media or even some of the local Cable Advertising Channels.
I hope you got some enjoyment and ideas from these commercials. As I mentioned earlier look from some local stations and see if you can work with them a few times during the year to expose your business to new customers and have some fun doing it.
After reviewing all of the ads for this PodCast I realized I should probably be in one myself. After doing hundreds of videos I don’t really have an excuse not to and as small business owners it’s good for our customers to get to know us.
All the show notes and a couple of videos are available at LaundromatHowTo.com/PodCast
Videos
https://youtu.be/1CakGJhVW2E
Ken
