Advertisers prefer talk radio for a number of reasons, explains David Moore, associate media director for Harmelin Media, in Bala Cynwyd, Pa., whose replacement contractor clients include Appleby Systems, in York, Pa., and Power Windows & Siding, in Brookhaven, Pa. Moore notes that most cities have just one major talk radio station whose programming can claim more of a captive audience than stations that primarily feature music — those listeners tend to jump around the dial. Moore also notes that talk-format listeners are usually better educated and have higher incomes than radio listeners in general.
Archadeck of Charlotte, N.C., which has promoted itself on radio for 19 years, runs about a dozen spots per week on WBT-AM (1110), where it has had a long-standing relationship with John Hancock, whose talk program “World Wide Hancock” airs 6–9 p.m. Archadeck of Charlotte’s president, Barry Klemons, who has a broadcast marketing degree, says that the one format that has never worked for his company is “the stuff you hear in the dentist’s office.” Pop and soft-rock demographic groups are generally seen by contractors as being too young for their products. However, several contractors say that other types of music programming work just fine. American Vision Windows, which spends many thousands of dollars each month on radio marketing, places ads with AM news, Christian, and, over the past few years, classic rock, which Herren says is especially good for branding purposes. (His wife, Kathleen, reads the copy for those ads.) Weathertite Windows places between 55 and 60 spots per week on 12 radio stations that reach Cleveland, Akron, Pittsburgh, and Columbus, and that feature a variety of formats, including classic rock, rap, and country-Western, Hollander says. He personally does 60- and 90-second live radio calls during morning and afternoon drive times on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. (Once a month, “to see if anyone is listening,” he’ll test whether those spots are working by offering windows free of charge to the first 10 callers.)
SOFTENING THE HARD SELL For more than three years, Alure Home Improvement in East Meadow, N.Y., has sporadically advertised roofing, siding, and windows on the radio, without drawing many leads. However, this contractor has had more success promoting Owens Corning Basement Systems exclusively on two sports channels, WFAN and ESPN. Seth Selesnow, Alure Home Improvement’s marketing director, thinks the reason for this is that while women initiate most remodeling projects, “basements are seen as more of a man’s place.”
Certain home improvement products do seem to sell better than others on the radio. During her 15 years in the business, Denise Phillips, currently marketing director for Appleby Systems, has concluded that radio just doesn’t attract leads for bigger-ticket projects. When she worked for Four Seasons Sunrooms several years ago, Phillips spent $30,000 over a two-month period to promote sunrooms on the radio, with very little success. That’s one reason why Appleby Systems isn’t using radio today.
Phillips believes that radio is better suited to promoting events, such as grand openings, or for recruiting employees. She’s less convinced, though, that radio can do much for a brand if a company doesn’t already have strong name recognition with customers. John Aurgemma of Rhode Island Home Improvement, in Warwick, where radio is responsible for only a small fraction of company leads, agrees. “It keeps your name out there and your brand awareness high,” he says.
Contractors say radio advertising usually takes a while to sink in with most customers and requires constant repetition to be effective. “You have to keep telling them over and over again,” Klemons says. “It’s a long-term commitment.”
It’s not surprising, then, that some contractors use catchy jingles to hook their radio-listening customers. State Roofing’s song, which sounds like something from Monty Python, urges listeners to “call the men who love to roof.” Weathertite Windows’ jingle comes with eight variations, including polka, salsa, hip-hop, Motown, and country.
Hollander observes that home improvement contractors need to be careful about pitching products too blatantly because radio listeners are less receptive to a hard sell. Several of Jancewicz & Son’s radio spots, which include the company’s tag line, “We do roofs plus a whole lot more,” emphasize quality and the purchasing experience. American Vision Windows’ radio campaign takes an even homier approach by retelling “The Bill and Kathleen Story,” about how Herren and his wife started their company eight years ago after having a bad experience with a contractor. “It’s not selling windows, per se,” Herren says, “but it’s a story customers can identify with.”
BROADER REACH Herren wishes more contractors would use radio to raise the profile of the industry and its products. And some have used radio to polish their image with customers. Dunbar says Jancewicz & Son runs ads for windows on the radio around the same time that trade magazines publish their annual Top 100 lists. “We’ll thank our customers for putting us on those lists,” he says, “and offer something free, such as low-E glass.”
But most companies aren’t planning to expand their radio marketing, and show only modest interest in the medium’s newer technologies, such as Internet radio, high-definition radio, or satellite radio. In certain markets, advertisers must negotiate separate rates for audio streams over the Internet, which in Washington state are priced 10 to 12 times higher than the number of listeners would justify, according to Golliver of State Roofing. In Rhode Island, on the other hand, ads on streaming audio cost a fraction of what Rhode Island Home Improvement pays for regular radio spots, Aurgemma says.
That being said, none of the contractors contacted for this article want to walk away from radio, either, because the leads it attracts are generally more eager to buy and are bigger spenders to boot. Archadeck of Charlotte, which gets around 8% of its leads from radio, closes 23% of those leads, compared with a 17.5% closing ratio across all leads. Klemons says that purchases made by customers coming to the company through radio routinely exceed his $13,000 average transaction. Marzarella notes that the stations at which All County Exteriors places its ads reach 400,000 households, and the average prospect, he says, spends more money and closes at a higher rate than leads from other sources. “Radio,” he concludes, “improves our credibility.” —John Caulfield is a freelance writer and editor based in New Jersey.