Advertising With Radio

The following appeared as part of a campaign to sell advertising time on a local radio station to local businesses:

"The Cumquat Café began advertising on our local radio station this year and was delighted to see its business increase by 10 percent over last year’s totals. Their success shows you how you can use radio advertising to make your business more profitable."

Discuss how well reasoned . . . etc.

There was a time when radio was written off by many. Emerging technologies like television, cassettes, CDs, DVDs, satellite TV and then digital media made the radio look primitive. Till a certain point in time it seemed just like that. However the entry of private sector entrepreneurs and FM helped to stage an unexpected comeback for radio. This has seen radio getting transformed from a monolithic national entity to small, vibrant regional chunks. This is turn has turned them into potent advertising mediums for local businesses.

Hence I feel that the writer has reasoned diligently and effectively for the most part. He has provided a concrete name, a concrete growth figure and a concrete time period. This makes the message seem sincere. However it may have helped if the reasoning also hinted about the radio's intended audience segment, if any. If the radio has a defined theme (like some music genre, comedy, youth etc.), highlighting the same could also help. Since the invitation to businesses is also generic, it does not hurt the reasoning. However adding them may make the reasoning more targeted, compelling and informative. 

For example if the campaign had clearly identified its target audience, it could have appealed to all Cafe and restaurants or small and medium businesses in this part of the campaign. 

Concluding, I feel that it is well reasoned with concrete data to back it up. However it is a bit generic and does not target any specific business segment. This makes the campaign seem to be following undifferentiated marketing with no clear idea about whom it wants to target. This is fine if the number of segments is really small. However for a large market it needs to be reasonably targeted in order to be effective.