by smi | May 3, 2024 | Team News
As we watch the expansive reach of direct & brand response drive sales, new leads become new clients and new clients become SMI regulars. In keeping with our mission to outpace the industry, we brought on four new hires to help carry our brand into the future.
Meet Cameron Brown, Jeremy Glass, Kristy Martino, and Tyler Sewell. Read up on their roles, responsibilities, and goals below. Welcome aboard, all!
Account Manager | Client Services
Responsibilities: Optimizing campaigns via effective communication with clients, based on detailed internal analysis
Excited About: Learning the ins and outs of the audio advertising industry while growing client exposure and brand
Copywriter
Responsibilities: Writing compelling copy that gets people excited
Excited About: Collaborating with our team of experts to help our clients reach their goals.
Copywriter
Responsibilities: Converting listeners with well-crafted copy
Excited About: Exploring audio as the theater of the mind
Data Quality Analyst
Responsibilities: Collaboratively leveraging data analytics, creative thinking, and artistic talent to enhance operational efficiency and optimize campaigns that strengthen our clients’ brands
Excited About: Adding SQL and Tableau to my web-dev toolbox
by Jeremy Glass | Apr 23, 2024 | Uncategorized
The Best Data Event of The Year
Success can be a surprisingly difficult metric to measure without the right visualization tools. That’s where Tableau comes in.
Tableau is an interactive data visualization software company that has revolutionized the way thousands of companies – including SMI – track and report campaign performance.
Next week, SMI’s data & analytics team is heading to San Diego to attend the conference dubbed the “best data event of the year” by all who attend: Tableau Conference 2024.
Every year, Tableau hosts a massive conference where data fanatics from all walks of life gather together to develop their skills, inspire innovation, and bring home off-the-charts data learnings. Here’s what SMI’s data & analytics team has to say about Tableau.
Senior Media Analyst
“It’s a very hands-on conference, there are a lot of sessions to choose from depending on what you’re looking to accomplish with Tableau. We’ve gotten a ton of value from it in the past and our client reporting wouldn’t be what it is today without these conferences we’ve attended.”
Media Analyst
“We’re constantly figuring out how to improve client reporting, and there’s so many different directions you can go with data collection and telling our story at Tableau.”
Information Systems Manager
“Being able to collaborate with others to find solutions to the specific challenges that we face with reporting ensures the effectiveness of our reporting. Tableau Conference has helped SMI implement these best practices and improve the overall ergonomics of our dashboards.”
by Liz Iversen | Dec 20, 2023 | Team News
SMI Copywriter Payne Ratner has been writing ads for 30 years. He was recently named a finalist in Fractured Lit’s Flash Fiction Contest, and his story will appear in an upcoming issue of Fractured Lit. I sat down with Payne to talk about his award-winning story and how great audio ads employ classic story structure.
Liz Iversen: What was your flash fiction piece about?
Payne Ratner: It’s about a hoarder who, at the end of her life, makes an important discovery.
LI: Where did you get the idea for the piece, or what inspired you to write it?
PR: It began as a writing exercise from a prompt. I can’t remember the prompt.
LI: Where do you get your ideas for audio ads?
PR: First, from the product. It’s like the writing prompt that inspired the story. You look at the product and ask, how will this improve someone’s life? Say it’s a product that clears acne. Then, what is someone’s life like who suffers from acne. That’s what you begin with. Do you dramatize the problem? Maybe. Or do you address it directly? Maybe. Start with the problem, then present the solution and then, at the end, present the life changed by the product. It’s the classic structure of any story. Beginning, middle and end. There are many beginnings to choose from, many middles, many endings. But if it’s an ad, the ending is always going to be some form of happy.
LI: Do you think of developing a character or story when you write ads?
PR: Probably story. The conflict (or problem that the product will resolve), the quest for the resolution of the conflict (what discoveries/components make this product the product/resolution you’ve sought?), and the resolution. The conflict is resolved by the product. The character develops as the story unfolds.
LI: Do you think about theme when you write ads, and how does that influence what you write?
PR: Again, the theme is really how a conflict, (a problem) can be resolved. It’s all about entering into the struggle or desire of the “protagonist”. The person who wants or needs the product and will benefit the most from it. The better you can really feel what they feel, the better you can relate to them and understand their eventual relief.
LI: Do you enjoy writing ads or stories more? Why?
PR: Ads and stories share similarities in structure. And working out the problem/solution is always – or almost always – fun.
Want to learn more about creating effective radio ads? Read SMI’s “Top Ten Keys to Creating Great Radio Ads.”
And find out how the experts at Strategic Media, Inc. can help you craft a great radio ad that motivates listeners to act. Contact SMI today.
by Liz Iversen | Nov 9, 2023 | Uncategorized
’Tis the season for holiday cheer, and radio stations across the country are ready. Some stations, including “94.5 Prime FM” in Salina, KS, and “Mix 94.5” WMXL in Lexington, KY transitioned to an all-Christmas format on Halloween. “97.9 The River” WMGA in Huntington, WV flipped the switch even earlier, in mid-October.
SMI monitors music format changes across all the stations our clients’ ads air on, and we notify clients of impending format changes so they can make marketing decisions accordingly.
“We have a comprehensive list of stations that flip each year, and we dust it off in early October as we plan for Holiday campaigns that lean heavily into the format,” said SMI’s Senior Media Buyer Pam Wolfgram. “The station list doesn’t vary much year-to-year, but the timing of the switch can change,” she said.
By Thanksgiving, 100% of stations that are going to change their format have done so, Wolfgram said. “We track change dates in Media Monitors so that we can accurately inform our Evergreen campaigns of any flips,” Wolfgram said.
The format change brings with it added listeners, roughly a 40% AQH (average quarter-hour audience) increase, according to Wolfgram. Added listenership brings with it the potential for increased customer response. As a result, SMI’s clients tend to be optimistic about the format change, Wolfgram said.
Do you want to reach growing audiences with radio this holiday season? Contact Strategic Media, Inc. to get started today.
by Liz Iversen | Sep 15, 2023 | Uncategorized
SMI’s Podcast Strategist Lisa Risk shared her expertise as a panelist at Podcast Movement, the world’s largest podcast conference, which took place in Denver, Colorado in August.
Risk participated alongside other podcast industry professionals in a panel titled “What do buyers want from the podcasting industry?” Panelists discussed current challenges faced by podcast advertisers. For instance, there is a lack of industry standards in terms of measurement and attribution, and in what is considered a download. According to Risk, “There are several third-party options for data, measurement, and attribution currently available. They are all very similar but each has unique aspects.” Risk said that with a shift from baked-in to dynamic ad insertion (DAI) for ad delivery, there has also been a shift from selling and buying by download to selling and buying by impression. But there is some discrepancy regarding what counts as an impression. If an ad is served twice in one listening experience or downloaded episode, for instance, does that count as two impressions? “In my opinion, it should count as one,” said Risk, “but many groups are counting those as two impressions.”
According to Risk, adding impression caps of delivery to schedules could prevent advertisers from hitting the same listener over and over again. “But there are no industry standards around that,” she said, “and only some groups are even able to do it.”
The panel also discussed why podcasting and audio perform poorly in mixed media modeling (MMM). On this topic, Risk said that audio does not have the same reach and lift that we see from video, and overall lift is how these studies are measured. But, Risk said, “When we look at structured tests with measurable KPI’s, we can see and measure the impact of audio.”
Despite certain challenges, Risk said there are new sources of new money coming into podcasting. Podcast budgets often come from digital and TV. “Brands are seeing success with digital and look to podcast to further growth,” she said.
“Transparency and industry standards are two important pieces that buyers want from industry partners and networks,” Risk said. But even as the industry moves toward these things, the podcast medium continues to be an exciting, profitable medium for advertisers looking to grow their brand.
Want to learn how you can grow your brand on podcasts? Contact SMI today to hear our expert recommendations for reaching new audiences on podcast.
