Have I ever mentioned how much I love a good question?
I gave Ms. Morrow an example of how two different voices have very different gender targets. Literally, I read a line from a NASA press release in a voice which will cause a favorable female response then the same line in a voice will cause a favorable male response. This reminded me of doing some audio A/B testing.
A commercial, classical radio station had a format which was long standing, familiar to its listeners and because of both had a loyal following. The only problem was that the loyal following was aging and not being replaced. They were losing listeners purely because of their success in capturing their demographic. Oh-oh.
Compounding their problem was that advertisers who had also been loyal were starting to go away. If not directly go away they were spending fewer advertising dollars at the beloved radio station. Okay. Losing listeners we can live with to a point. Losing advertising dollars was a completely different question.
The radio station decided on a radical plan. They engaged in audio A/B testing.
One of the most noted things about their existing format was that "the commercials never intruded on the listening experience." This was something they were quite proud of. It was the case that advertisements' sound quality, tenor, imagery, etc., so well matched the music's and announcer's sound quality, tenor, imagery, etc., that listeners didn't notice the advertisements when they aired. Obviously they did to some degree because advertisers often mentioned that customers would mention the station's call letters to get advertised offers and discounts.
They also mentioned that these customers were becoming fewer and fewer in number. Again, Oh-oh.
Next up, what they did and how well it worked.
Links for this post:
- Beth Morrow
- Gender based marketing posts
- Gender-Specific Marketing Discoveries Podcast
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