(Download)

Producing Radio Spots

• WRITING THE SPOTS

• 1.Be clear about your strategic purpose. How will the content and target audience for these ads contribute to achieving our goals? Why radio and not some other medium, or an earned media strategy? (See the tip sheet, “Paid Advertising: Pros and Cons.”)
• 2.Decide whether to do 30 second or 60 second spots. In many markets, 60 second ads are not much more expensive, and the added time may be needed to reach people on a new and complicated subject. On the other hand, if you can get your point across in 30 seconds, you may hold your audience’s attention better.
• 3.Focus on your main public interest point and the audience(s) you are trying to reach. You only have 30 or 60 seconds. So your choices of opening, sound effects, narration, voices, closing, and stations to book on should all be carefully focused on the one main point about the public interest you want particular listeners to take away. Otherwise, you can end up with an ad that may be clever but doesn’t help the campaign.
• 4.Devise an opening that will get listeners’ attention. Otherwise, the listener may never tune in, or may start paying attention only when the ad is already half over. This is usually done with a sound effect or surprising or provocative questions or statements.
•  
• A. Sound effects:
• <sound of lots of coins falling into a pile>
• Narrator: “A million bucks a day. Every day. From our tax dollars. That’s what the Governor is spending to oppose nursing home workers who want safe staffing…”
•  
• B. Montage of voices:
• Nurse aide #1:“She’s your mother.”
• Nurse aide #2: “Or your grandmother.”
• Nurse aide #3: “Or maybe a good friend.”
• Narrator: “Every nursing home resident in West Virginia is someone’s loved one…”
•  
• C. Catchy conversation:
• Woman’s voice: “Are you kidding me?”
• Man’s voice: “The Governor is doing what?”
• Woman’s voice: “With our tax money?”

• 5.Write in short punchy phrases, not long thoughtful sentences. Read the script out loud to make sure every sentence is easy to say (you don’t have to gasp for breath just to finish it and there’s no awkward phrasing or punctuation).
• YES: <sound of ambulance siren> “Going to the hospital. It can happen to you or your family at any time.” <hospital sounds> “But what if when you get there, there’s not enough staff to give you the care you need?”
• NO: “There is a crisis in working conditions in our area hospitals that is jeopardizing the quality of patient care. Years of low pay and poor benefits have forced many experienced hospital workers to leave, resulting in dangerously low staffing levels.”
• 6.Ask yourself whether actual worker/community voices can be featured. It won’t work in all situations – but those voices give us credibility when talking about the community interest instead of putting the focus on organizational goals. Suggest what a person could say and see if they can say it in a spontaneous sounding way. Or interview them with provocative questions to get them to respond from the heart with the message you need. Many ads have both a narrator and worker/community sound bites.
• 7.Consider using sound effects and/or background music (ominous, friendly, serious, etc.) intermittently during the ad (not just at the beginning) to add interest and entertainment, but don’t overdo it to the point of distracting from what is being said.
• 8.Repeat key words, slogans, and phrases to drive home the main points.
• 9.Avoid introducing too many facts and figures and numbers that bog down the ad. Keep it simple, and step out of the nitty-gritty debate with your opponents.

10. Close by reiterating the key message and punchy phrasing that will stick with the listener: “Tell the Mayor to stand up for the American Dream."

11. Decide whether you want to give a phone number to call. If it’s a number for your organization, is someone ready to take the calls? If it’s the number for a corporation or public official, are you sure they will get lots of calls?

12. Use the tag line to emphasize community members, not organizations. For instance, “Presented by the working men and women of __” instead of “Presented by ___."

13. Make the script a few seconds shorter than the maximum. A good rendition of voices and sound effects in the studio often requires slower pacing or more pauses than when you read the script to yourself. Don’t forget to leave time for the tag line.

14. Supervise production of the ad if possible. Choose voices based on demographics you are trying to reach. Be available for the taping -- preferably by being at the studio but if not via telephone -- so you can hear how the script was read before the narrator(s) or worker/community members leave the studio. A good script can be ruined by a reading that emphasizes the wrong words. Listen to music or sound effects to be sure they work.

15. Be prepared to document your claims if questioned by the station.

PLACING THE SPOTS

• 1.Work with an agency you can trust. In most cases, it won’t be a good use of time for you to try to puzzle out the technical details of a radio buy if there are ad buyers in your community who already have that expertise. In general, using an ad agency or p.r. firm to do the buy shouldn’t add to your cost because they can charge you the regular ad rate while paying only a discounted fee to the stations, leaving them with a profit that, in effect, comes from the stations. Ask around to find a public interest or progressive firm that does buys for other community groups or like-minded elected officials.
• 2.Be clear about your target audience. Are you trying to reach people of a certain age or background or with certain interests? Buy time on stations that appeal to that audience and at the time of day when they are most likely to listen.
• 3.Think about where your opponents advertise. Depending on your overall campaign strategy, it may sometimes be useful to place ads where an employer or politician has their ads.
• 4.Consider front loading the buy. Employers, politicians, and community allies often develop an impression of how serious your ad buy is by how often they hear the ad at first. If you are running an ad for several weeks, you may want to run more spots in the first week and fewer as time goes on.

SAMPLE

(An ad to show hospitals that a union is prepared to escalate a campaign on patient care issues)

[sound of ambulance siren]

Narrator: Going to the hospital.

It can happen to you or your family at any time.

[hospital sounds]

But what if when you get there, there’s not enough staff to give you the care you need?

Right now, major area hospitals don’t pay enough to keep many of their experienced staff.

Things are so bad that hospital employees had to hold a one-day protest to try to get management's attention for quality care.

Hospital workers want management and public officials to fix our health care system and put patients first…

[hospital sounds]

….so when the time comes, your loved ones will get the care they need.

Presented by Baltimore’s health care workers of SEIU Local 1199E-DC

Courtesy of TheWorkSite.org