Radio ads?

In Columbus, I asked Mike Feazel at Feazel Roofing how he finds most of his clients for his mutli-million dollar roofing company.

He said about a third is from repeat and referral clients (next posting I will share his referral form).

A second third is from "everything else" -- Internet, newspaper ads (a dying resource, he says, which works when he can get highly discounted rates) and publicity (he is called frequently by local media when they need comments on roofing issues).

So where is the remaining third? Radio ads. Yes, radio. Hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of ads each year on local radio stations appealing to the middle-adult, middle of the road demographic.

"Our market isn't the super rich," he said. "It is the working people who need roofs repaired."

Feazel knows he has a competitive edge with radio -- it only works if there is enough continuity, saturation, and time -- in other words, if you were to try to engage in a competing radio campaign, you would have to budget enough to spend upwards of $20,000 a month for six to nine months -- without worrying about results.

Obviously, this won't work for the little contractor struggling to get by. Most smaller contractors rely on repeat and referral business as the primary source of clients -- but Feazel says this doesn't work if you want to grow the business to a really substantial level. You've got to advertise, he says.

This posting, therefore, is relevant to only a small number of this blog's readers. That is fine with Feazel and contractors at his level -- when the barriers to marketing entry are high, you don't have to worry too much about the competition.

The radio ad

Taping a radio commercial in support of Algonquin College's Centre for Construction Trades and Building Sciences.

Algonquin College, the regional community college for Eastern Ontario, invited me to tape a radio ad in support of the college's planned Centre for Construction Trades and Building Sciences -- designed to meet the need for skilled tradespeople within the industry. We've made it our policy in Ottawa Construction News to support this project, of course, so when college communication officer Andrew McKelvery asked if I would volunteer to tape an endorsement commercial, I hesitated, not.

Of course, the college -- with its radio and television technician and journalism programs -- has facilities on-site for this type of commercial production, but this initiative is definitely not a student project: The commercial where I am quoted, along with several others from community/industry leaders, will be broadcast on three Ottawa-area commercial radio stations in the next few weeks. (I'll post the actual radio tape once I have it.)

I learned a few things in the taping process. First, since this is not live radio, bits and pieces can be pasted together to create the whole, and fuzzy details can be corrected to create 'perfection'. Second, the whole thing is really not intimidating -- again, because you can fix anything not right, you don't need to stress out about the script. (McKelvery told me to smile as I talked -- it makes the thing sound more natural.)

Of course, from a marketing/branding perspective, this is an all-round win. I'm quite happy to effectively promote my publication while showing support for the college. And the college, in inviting me to the taping, encourages us to provide more publicity and support within our own publication for the project.

You can learn more about the Algonquin initiative by visiting http://www.algonquincollege.com/expansion/