Radio Drives Recall Results For Automotive

Do radio and TV drive sales for car dealers? Can it be proven? Questions the Utah Broadcasters Association wanted to answer.

In 2014, Ken Garff Automotive, a top Salt Lake City car dealer, advertised in TV and radio. In 2015, they only used print, digital, and billboards.

Working with the Utah Broadcasters Association, Ken Garff Automotive agreed to a six-week radio and TV campaign.  The broadcasters funded a Nielsen advertising effectiveness study.

In his most recent blog posting, Pierre Bouvard, CMO, Cumulus and Westwood One writes about the six key findings:

• Radio’s ad recall (36%) was nearly as strong as television (39%), despite the fact that twice as much money was spent in TV.
• Digital and print ad recall were minimal (PC: 9%; newspapers: 9%; smartphone/tablet: 4%; magazines: 3%).
• Radio is the TV accelerator: purchase consideration increases significantly when consumers were exposed to both TV and radio ads.
• Radio and TV boost all stages of the auto purchase funnel.
• Radio ads earned the highest consumer association for being the most informative and believable.
• Radio’s “cost per awareness” is nearly two times as efficient as television.