“Don’t get caught up in the latest, trendiest new shiny thing. Focus on what works best for your customer and put the most effort there.” – Dennis Host, vice president of marketing, Coborn’s, Inc.
demographic or the Style magazines that cater to a female demographic. Regardless of the publication, Birkland said, the readership is a “strong, engaged audience.” Likewise, every radio station has a clear audience demographic and identified peak listening hours. From talk radio to news and sports radio as well as country, light rock, classic rock, new rock, and hot hits—target audiences are tuned in throughout the day. As Townsquare Media’s Engberg put it, “What else can entertain, inform, and keep you up to date
on current events while keeping your eyes on the road or you working in the shop or whatever it might be.” Not an either-or decision Incorporating traditional and new media into the marketing mix is not a question of using one or the other. Instead, the question is about the best way to reach your target audience. Cross-media integration is an important consideration for keeping a marketing message in front of consumers. “All marketing gets results,” Engberg said. “The sign on a
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business building stands alone and gets results.” But studies show that audience ad recall increases by using the same message across different media, he said. To that end, Leighton Broadcasting, Times Media, and Townsquare Media offer packages that span both traditional and new media to maximize reach. They also offer teams who help business owners make sense of all the options. To be honest, they’ve had a steep learning curve with new media the last few years themselves. Part of that learning curve has been learning to be resilient
with technology. “The biggest challenge is the constantly changing environment that new media represents,” Birkland said. “What we know today is only the basis for what we will have to learn tomorrow.” And they are not the only ones adapting. Consumers are too. “Today’s consumers are more time-starved than ever before,” Host said. “People are busy with multiple distractions and are hit with thousands and thousands of media messages every day. The challenge is cutting through all that clutter.” Heidi L. Everett is owner of Watab Communications and adjunct professor of marketing communications at SCSU. She has more than 20 years experience in strategic and tactical communications, reach her at watabcomm@gmail.com.
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