Advertising with your local radio station

Are you a business owner looking for ways to advertise to your customers? Check out this Q&A with Randy Hart, Senior Advertising Executive at WMNC 92.1 FM & 1430 AM, to learn about advertising with our local radio station… Q: How does it work? Randy: Once we have decided what information needs to be in your ad, we will work together to write the ad copy. Copy is the script or text of the ad. You can write the copy, or we’ll write it for you.  Once you approve the script you can come in and record the ad yourself or we can send it to one of the various production companies we work with to produce it. The creative options are almost endless. You just tell us what you want and we’ll make it happen. Usually we can turn an ad around in 24 to 36 hours. Once it is produced there are options for when it will play. You can choose the days, how many ads per day and approximate times that you want it to air. We can also run (rotate) different ads in the same schedule to give you a variety of different messages. Q: How many people will hear the ad? Randy: The simple answer is that our station reaches over 40,000 local listeners weekly. We’re the number one ARBITRON ranked station in Burke County and the Big Dawg is heard in 22 North Carolina counties and in parts of Tennessee and South Carolina. Q: Who listens to WMNC? Randy: The best thing about Big Dawg listeners when it comes to ads is that they are in their prime purchasing and earning years. The median age of our listener is 40. Fifty percent of our listeners have at least one child in the home and 50% of our listeners also have a household income of over $50,000. Q: How much will it cost? Randy: Pricing varies greatly depending on what type of package you are interested in, whether you choose 30-second or 60-second ads, how often you want the ad to run, if you commit to a monthly or yearly contract, if you want the ad run during specific times and many other factors. For example, prices for a :30 ad that runs fifty times per month in “prime time rotation” would range from $7 to $12 per ad, depending on the length of your contract. If you commit to a yearly contract, which is what a lot of our local businesses do, prices start as low as $4 per ad. The key is that we will work with you to accommodate your budget. If you say that you have $200 a month to spend on ads then we’ll find something that works at that amount. Q: Is it effective? Randy: We think so – and so do our advertisers. Seventy-five percent of the ads that we run are for what we call ‘regular advertisers’, businesses that use us consistently every month. A high percent of the businesses that advertise with us have been doing ads with WMNC for five years or longer. That tells me that they are happy with the results they get and they know the Big Dawg is working for them. Q: Why should I advertise with WMNC? Randy: We’re number one here in BurkeCounty and our primary coverage area is a 50-60 mile radius of Morganton, so we’re reaching  listeners in a large area. Our demographic is the type of customer that local businesses are trying to reach – they have families, jobs and money to spend. Q: How do I get started? Randy: Call the station at (828) 437-0521 or email us at wmnc@bellsouth.net, ask for someone in the Advertising Department and  we’ll take it from there!