Making a (Gross) Impression

Like all industries, radio has its own jargon. Industry-specific acronyms and terms are designed to keep outsiders out and protect those already inside the tent.

That is great … unless you are trying to bring someone from outside of the tent inside. I won’t mention what President John Kennedy said about the tent. If you really want to know, call me at 410-956-0363. Oops, back to the subject at hand.

How do you take the terms that are used every day among radio people and use them effectively with potential radio advertisers? If I am dealing with an un-savvy potential radio advertiser, I would break the quantitative part of the sale into two terms.

Cume: If you have not put a potential schedule together, I would talk about the reach of your station. Here you take the industry term, cume, and instead talk about reach. Instead of saying “my station has a cume of 200,000,” you say “in an average week, my station reaches 200,000 consumers.” They don’t know what cume is, but they can surely understand the concept of reach.

Gross Impressions: Once you have put a projected schedule together, you can get into specifics with the prospect. Because of the growth in digital advertising, many advertising sales reps talk about gross impressions. But what is a gross impression, and what does it mean to a novice radio advertiser? Instead of using gross impressions, talk about how many times your message will be heard. Instead of saying “this 24-spot schedule will deliver 150,000 gross impressions,” you say “with this 24-spot schedule, your message will be heard 150,000 times.”

These simple changes in wording are a better way of communicating the benefits of your radio station and help the typical non-radio guru become comfortable with using your outlets to promote their product or service.