Clear Channel Bows Contextual Radio Ads

radio

Broadcast radio is getting contextual advertising placements courtesy of Clear Channel Radio, which is offering advertisers the ability to automatically insert audio spots after specific types of programming or other commercials based on the content of these preceding units.

The new service, which allows advertisers to take advantage of continuity in subject matter to keep the listener's attention, is intended to bring Internet-style semantic relevance to the broadcast medium.

Clear Channel has already run a number of test campaigns for national advertisers, including Visa, GEICO, and Wal-Mart. The deals -- brokered by OMD, Horizon Media and MediaVest, respectively -- tested different contextual placements, all of which produced strong results, per the radio company.

For example, Wal-Mart and MediaVest matched ads to programming content by positioning spots touting its exclusive retail deal for AC/DC's new album, "Black Ice," immediately after AC/DC airplay.

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Similarly, Geico and Horizon tried contextual targeting around other commercials, dynamically placing 15-second spots after ads from vehicle makers. And Visa and OMD positioned 15-second spots after ads by any one of 25,000 Visa-affiliated merchants in 120 markets nationwide; Visa was pleased enough to identify the campaign as a corporate "best practice."

With the new contextual ad service, the nation's largest radio broadcaster is taking a run at an idea that has been widely discussed, but almost always in vague, theoretical terms.

In the past, individual ads could be positioned in contextually appropriate time slots based on their surrounding content, but this was a relatively labor-intensive process, requiring constant coordination between media buyers, station managers, and on-air talent, which made it difficult to achieve significant scale.

Even Google's ill-fated radio foray struggled to deliver the kind of contextual placement that served search advertisers. It was especially difficult because Google would not even allow advertisers to choose which stations their ads would run on, meaning that most big clients would not even participate.

By contrast, the automatic, computer-mediated process developed by Clear Channel promises to surmount the scale obstacle within the context of traditional broadcast advertising business practices.

1 comment about "Clear Channel Bows Contextual Radio Ads".
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  1. Jonathan Mirow from BroadbandVideo, Inc., January 15, 2010 at 1:53 p.m.

    They also just moved KBCO - the long-time Boulder, Colorado mainstay college station down to the tech center. The management said "nothing will change" - but how will those poor Boulderites ride their bicycles down I-25 to the Tech Center? Have any of them been to the Clear Channel offices in the Tech Center? I have - 95% is computers sitting in rooms spewing out unmanned programming. Uh-oh.

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