The Objection Collection^SM

I’m sorry that happened. Other people have had that experience, and it usually turns out to be either the ad schedule or the message.

We specialize in helping our clients deliver the right message to the right people. Let’s start by talking about what you want your prospects to know about your business …

For County Studies

1. The only widely-recognized ratings are from Nielsen, and they sample about 50 or 60 people in each county, at the most. Don’t you suppose we have 50 or 60 people listening to us? What would have happened if all of them were asked?
2. In an attempt to make the ratings more accurate, Nielsen will combine the results of two surveys, which means that some of the information is up to a year old. Things change a lot in a year. Don’t you want to invest in reaching the customers you want today?
3. [… they sampled 50 or 60 people …] You think we could get 50 or 60 people in the door for you, don’t you?
4. We have our own ratings. They’re called, “customers through the door and money in the drawer.”

For Adjacent Bigger-Market Surveys

1. That survey is taken for the stations that cover that city. We don’t — we serve your community — so the numbers for all of us out here are worthless. They’re based on a tiny fraction of the people who participate.

These responses are best delivered in a good-natured manner. The most important thing to do, when faced with this situation, is not to fight fire with fire. In whatever way is comfortable for you, demonstrate to the prospect that these rating numbers have nothing whatsoever to do with how your station can help him or her achieve results.

Background info

(1) We are a local medium. We carry local weather, news, sports, and most important, ads from your fellow local businesses.

(2) I’m here to talk about all our local listeners—your prospects and customers—in this area.

(3) Many other businesses here have found that advertising with us brings in new customers and reinforces your message with existing ones.

Television is a great move for you. Have you ever heard of something called “imagery transfer”? They’ve found that if you use your TV soundtrack for your radio ad, it really boosts results.

Adding radio to your TV will help in a couple of ways.

First, you get to reach people everywhere they go, all day long. You might have heard that radio reaches people closest to the time they make a purchase, so it’s great reinforcement.

Second, by adding radio you’ll be able to reach more people, more often, than with television alone, which is more restricted in terms of when and where people watch.

Many other advertisers in our area are doing just that: using their radio ads as the audio for their TV ads, or using the audio from the TV ad as their radio ads. (Give examples.)

TIP: Spec ads, in general, are a great closer … why not go the extra mile and tape the prospect’s TV ad, then play it to him/her as a radio ad? (Most of the time this will work very well.

This objection, like many others, comes when the prospect hasn’t been convinced that advertising on your station has value. So while you have to respect the expressed objection, understand that it’s usually not the real one.

(1) I fully understand. There are two reasons why spending a few minutes together would be productive. First, we can look at how we can get you some good results when your budget loosens up a bit. Second, if we come up with some good ideas for reaching your market efficiently, you might even be able to divert some budget even sooner.

(2) I’m sorry to hear you put it that way, because that tells me that you ended up spending instead of investing—that you didn’t get the return on your ad dollar that you deserve. Let’s take a couple of minutes here to discuss how you can get a decent return on what you invest in advertising.

Our customers tell us that we’re a good value. We’d go out of business fast if people didn’t think so. Let’s spend a few minutes talking about your business objectives and whether advertising with us would be a good investment for you.

Background info

Wouldn’t you like to form a closer bond with your present customers? You want to make sure they are still your customers a year from now, don’t you? That’s where we can help.

What is it that you don’t want to do? Increase traffic? Increase sales? Increase profits? Remember, [name], I’m not talking about buying advertising here … I’m here to help you overcome your business frustrations.

It’s a good idea to reserve a some of your ad budget for peak times. It’s also a good idea to advertise consistently throughout the year, to keep your name and what you stand for fresh in your prospects’ minds. It’s more efficient that way because you don’t have to start from a dead stop when you advertise during peak periods.

We’re not talking about your tax budget here, we’re talking about your marketing budget. We are in the business of helping you continue to send huge chunks of money to Uncle Sam. None of us is excited about doing that, but it is the sign of a healthy business.

Of course you do. Most of those bills are costs, and a few are investments that bring you returns. That’s what we’re talking about here—not a cost, but an investment.

Spreading out your ad dollars might not be the best way to get the best return on your investment. The most effective way to advertise is to pick your media carefully and dominate those media. Let’s spend a few minutes to see whether our station deserves to be part of the mix for what you want to achieve.

You’re right. A long-term advertising program might not be the best thing for you. What we want to do is work out the most efficient level of consistent advertising for you, based on your objectives and budget, with some built-in slack so we can take advantage of peak times and other opportunities. I’m sure you’ll agree that taking a little time right now to develop your program will save you a lot of time in the future.

I’m sorry to hear that your sales are off, and I don’t blame you for wanting to conserve your resources. That’s why we need to talk about your advertising program on our station. For the market you need to reach, Our station is about the most efficient and economical way to go. Let’s sit down and design a really powerful campaign that will get those sales picked up fast.

Advertising is all about concentration. You need to use a medium that delivers your prospects most efficiently, with the least waste. Let’s discuss whether our station might be the right medium for you.

Many of our best advertisers relied on word of mouth, and they found that radio is even more effective. Here’s why.

If we have a good experience with a business, we’ll tell three other people; but if we have a bad experience, we’ll tell eleven people.

To get an idea of how this works, try this:

If you came back from holiday and the airline lost your luggage, would you tell friends and colleagues the next day?

If you came back from holiday and your luggage arrived safely and on time, would you tell your friends and colleagues the next day?

Another thing about word of mouth: you don’t have any control over it. But with radio advertising, you have complete control over your message.

And, whereas word of mouth is one-to-one, radio is one-to-many. It takes a long time to spread the news through word of mouth, but a very short time to spread the news through radio advertising.

In addition, how many times are you likely to repeat a story to one of your friends? Once you’ve told it once, you probably won’t repeat it – and chances are, especially if it’s a positive experience, your friend won’t remember it. But radio advertising tells your positive story over and over, ensuring that the listener will hear it more than once – enough times to get them to do something about it.

Word of mouth is great, and radio – we call it “controlled, enhanced word of mouth” – is better. Word of mouth is mostly negative, uncontrollable, limited in reach and frequency. Radio advertising is all positive, completely under control, with high reach and frequency.

Which do you think will benefit your business more?

Our site gets about ___ hits a month … but that might not be the best information for you as an advertiser.

Hits is a big number, and perhaps a misleading one. It’s the number of individual elements viewed by all the people who visit the website. For example, if a page has, say, ten pictures (buttons, etc.) plus the text on the page, then one person who visits that one page registers eleven hits. It’s not a very good measure of activity, because it’s highly inflated.

A better number to go by is Page Views. That’s the number of actual pages viewed by all the people who visit the website. This is the measure that is most meaningful for advertisers because this tells how many “eyeballs” the site gets. Generally, we get about ___ page views per week.

Not many. Throughout the Internet advertising industry, the number of “click-throughs” is very low – about six-tenths of one percent – and that’s true of our ads as well.

If you think about it, you can see why. When people go to a website, they are there for a reason. They are not inclined to go to another website right there and then.

Online advertising is a lot like billboards. You have a short time span to make your point and make your business memorable – so people will visit your website (or better, your store!) when they’re ready.

Having the Number One website in the region, we can help you come up with an ad that will motivate your customers to come to you.