TORONTO – Canadian results from RadioGauge, a UK pioneered radio measurement and effectiveness study, have provided six major Canadian advertisers with valuable feedback on individual campaigns conducted in the fall of 2011 and spring of 2012.
In conjunction with Canadian Broadcast Sales (CBS), the company conducted two research waves for major Canadian brands in the petroleum, banking, full service restaurant, appliance, furniture and gaming sectors. The next wave is to be conducted in November with three additional advertisers.
RadioGauge was initially launched in 2008 as a way of combating the lack of accountability that advertisers had for their radio campaigns. The Radio Advertising Bureau RAB decided to meet this challenge by offering free research (funded by the commercial radio groups) to advertisers to provide them with a way of robustly measuring the effect radio was having as part of their media plan. RadioGauge has conducted 600 radio studies for clients as diverse as McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, Ford, Volkswagen and Fosters.
A total of 800 online respondents in the desired demographic reflecting the Canadian population were divided into self-selected test and control groups based on their radio usage. The control group was exposed to all media except the radio stations carrying the campaigns while the test group also listened to the radio stations running the ads.
Respondents were asked a series of brand awareness questions prior to hearing the radio commercials used in the test and providing additional feedback.
“Results from the confidential Canadian studies closely tracked the average UK experience and, in fact, showed marginally stronger results,” said Patrick Grierson, President of Canadian Broadcast Sales. “General ad awareness for the client scored 31% higher while first mention brand response indexed 20% higher than the control group.”
Results included:
Unprompted brand awareness: Respondents asked to list first three brands that came to mind. The Radio test group scored 20% above the control group.
Prompted brand awareness: When prompted, 10% more of the test group were aware of the product or service compared to the non-radio control group. When asked, “Have you seen or heard any ads for (brand x) within the last four weeks?” the radio test group scored 31% higher.
Brand perception: When asked to agree or disagree that (brand x) “is for people like me” the Canadian radio test average was 24% above the control average.
Brand consideration: When asked, “If you were considering buying (product category), how likely would you be to consider (brand x)?” the radio test respondents indicated a 22% higher preference for the product.
To measure the ad’s credibility, respondents were asked to what extent the radio ad fit with their image of the brand. “Fits very well” and “Fits well” totaled 63.5% of respondents. This measure slightly exceeded the UK average results of 62.5%.
“In addition to brand measurement and awareness, RadioGauge provides insightful creative diagnostics for involvement, identity, impression, information, and integration of the radio advertising,” said Grierson. “This allows advertisers to tweak or revise future campaigns based on this feedback.”
“We are excited by the fact that average Canadian results from our six studies mirrored the average findings from the 600 plus RadioGauge studies conducted in the UK, Ireland and South Africa,” added Grierson. “We’re looking forward to sharing these results with Canadian agencies and advertisers and reinforcing the power of radio with them as RadioGauge results in the U.K. show consistently more money invested in radio after clients participated in the studies.”
