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Is Your Station Getting Talked About…. For All the Right Reasons?

By David Kidd, BPR

Can you think of the last time you saw, heard or did something and you just had to tell your friends about it?

That awesome restaurant…. the new Netflix series…..the customer service that was so good it went beyond anything you’d experienced before.

You just have to tell your friends.

This is word of mouth marketing and it’s an important reason why some radio stations are successful and others are just “on air”.

“Did you hear what (insert great Morning Show) said this morning? It was hilarious!”

Word of mouth marketing is free…. just one reason it’s so valuable.

Listeners trust their friends.

Word of Mouth marketing is not just an ad …it also contains a recommendation from a trusted source.  Another reason it’s so valuable.

According to a Nielsen study, 92% of consumers said that they believe suggestions from friends and family more than they do advertising or promotions.

Of course it can cut both ways. Just as a terrible dining experience can create negative Word of Mouth marketing for a restaurant so too can a particularly dreadful debut for a new morning show or a poorly executed major format shift result in bad Word of Mouth Marketing for a radio station.

In BPR’s Strategic studies, we examine how likely the listeners are to tell their friends about certain radio stations. The P1 scores are particularly interesting. In a recent study, a client station had a P1 score of 75% for the question…. a direct competitor scored 36% from its own  P1’s. Only 36% of the station’s P1’s said they Would Tell Their Friends About the Station! It should come as no surprise that our client is the market leader while the competitor struggles for both ratings and revenue.

Never underestimate the power of Word of Mouth marketing in the perceptual battleground for the listeners’ minds…. it’s the cheapest and most authentic form of advertising you’ll ever get!