Even during a pandemic, by almost every key marketing metric, radio advertising remains the best way for a Boston business to market its goods and services.
To prove the point, here are five statistics that vividly demonstrate the value of advertising on Boston radio.
Each week, according to Nielsen, over 3,345,477 local consumers tune-in to a Boston radio station each week. More than are reached by any other media option including, TV, cable, social media, streaming media, or newspapers.
A study by Nielsen found that the reach of an advertising campaign is critical to the success of an advertising campaign. The number of different people exposed to an advertiser's message has proven to be more important than branding, recency, targeting, and context.
According to a 2020 study from the Journal of Advertising Research, audiences are more than twice as likely to stick with the radio station they are tuned to during commercials than they were nine years ago.
In the current study, the authors combined portable people-meter data ratings to measure loss of audience during advertising. They discovered a new benchmark of 3% for avoidance of radio advertising.
In other words, 97% of consumers stay glued to the station they are listening to during a commercial break.
The conclusion of this study affirms the decision for local small business owners who choose to market their goods and services on Boston radio.
"This first independent academic study of radio-advertising avoidance based on portable people-meter data," say the study's authors, "has contributed a new (low) benchmark for radio mechanical advertising avoidance."
"These findings will help advertisers to abandon unfounded beliefs and may encourage more of them to consider using radio advertising. On the basis of these results, radio advertisers now are free to focus on those times when the greatest number of potential customers are reached."
Between April 30 and May 27 of 2020, Nielsen analyzed the sales results of a retailer who conducted a radio advertising campaign during that period. The results showed that for every $1 spent, the business saw a $28 return on investment.
These findings confirm 21 previous studies by Nielsen, which demonstrate that, on average, radio advertising returns $10,000 in advertising for every $1000 invested. The chart below shows the range of returns from each study.
AdAge, a trade magazine for advertising professionals, calls these types of return "eye-popping". The magazine goes on to say radio's ROI is superior to commercials on TV, online, and social media.
Many Boston small business owners have seen their marketing budgets ravaged by the pandemic. More than ever, it is necessary to make sure every advertising dollar has a positive payoff.
Website traffic has become crucial to the survival to many Boston small business owners.
Every time a radio commercial runs on Boston radio, 10 consumers, on average, will visit the advertiser's website within 8 minutes. This is based on an analysis of more than 74,000 commercials tracked by Analytic Owl, an advertising attribution service.
Typically, 87% of the traffic driven to advertisers' website by Boston radio are first time users.
As the pandemic slogs on, more and more consumers are shopping online.
During the past week, says Nielsen, 67% of all consumers shopped online. This compares to just 46% pre-pandemic. Most remarkably, just over 1/3 of all digital shoppers last week were brand-new users.
Furthermore, 23% of all consumers now shop online multiple times per week, according to Nielsen.
Boston radio's ability to drive significant traffic to an advertiser's website is due to the medium's tremendous reach among local, online shoppers.
50% of consumers say that AM/FM radio is the audio medium used most while driving. According to a study by Edison Research, no other option comes close.
Consumers who listen to local radio in their cars are a treasured audience for Boston small business owners and retailers.
A study by USA Touchpoints, a cross-platform measurement company, studied the time-lapse between audio media use and time of purchase. Radio was, by far, used most often within one half-hour of a purchase.
"Radio ads heard in the car on the way to the store have a significant effect on purchasing intentions according to new research on fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) advertising," says WARC.
The study conducted by Touchpoints indicates that these radio commercials heard in the car increased purchased intent among loyal customers by 38%.
Purchase intent among non-loyal brand-customers rose 39% among those exposed to in-car radio commercials.