Now I have nothing against the "Radio Heard Here" campaign, other than the fact that it's a non-solution to a non-problem dressed in a bow.
Today I see a bonafide research study which "proves" the value of the effort. Here are some of the statistics:
What we learn is that almost everybody responds positively to obvious radio positives, regardless of whether or not they recall hearing the spots.
No surprise there.
But we also learn that folks who heard the spots respond higher still than those who don't.
This suggests, the argument goes, that it was the spots that made folks respond more positively about radio. That is, the effort presumably worked!
Or did it?
As anyone who knows anything about research will tell you, this data doesn't prove that case at all. In fact what it really suggests is that people who recall the spots probably listen to more radio than folks who don't, thus explaining why they're more likely to remember spots others can't.
And what would you expect people who listen to more radio to think about the medium relative to those who don't?
You got it. You'd expect them to be more positive.
So what this elaborate research stunt really proved is that folks who spend more time with something like it better than those who don't.
No matter what dumb and pointless industry branding effort they're forced to endure.
