National ads that have nothing to do with your market

There are a couple of (obviously) national ads running on the local Citadel stations, one of which is causing a ton of confusion among listeners and headaches for those that answer the phone at the stations.

One is for Wachovia, which we don't have in this market. The other, the one that is causing the problem is for Macy's. Obviously, Macy's has done a great job of having stores everywhere and having national buys instead of local buys. But what should a local do when a Macy's ad is running in nearly every break and the closest location is 3 hours away?

How should the people answering the phones explain to listeners why those ads are running (and in such high rotation) when they call to ask where the Macy's is?

BTW, we are the second largest city that Macy's doesn't have a location in.

Both of those companies have web sites, and residents of your city can take advantage of offers made through the national ads that way. It's a bit more difficult with CiCi's Pizza. That becomes more like an institutional ad.

That has always been an issue in small markets across the U.S. 7-11, CiCi's, Target, etc. I think listeners understand its a national ad.

The thing is, this isn't considered a small market (in the 70's), and we're not talking about satellite-fed stations here. These are stations that are mostly live and local (except for some syndicated talk).

Luckily, Macy's has cycled off for a bit and the switchboard isn't lighting up with "Where is Macy's?" calls.

Maybe they are network ads - make goods for not carrying a newscast but the station still needs to run the ad. LOTS of major market stations (even wgn/wls) do that.

If they're not network spots, they're trade-outs. Stations barter for jock prep services, production libraries, comedy drop ins, etc.

jh said:

If they're not network spots, they're trade-outs. Stations barter for jock prep services, production libraries, comedy drop ins, etc.

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True, but don't the bigger markets/owners just pay cash for the stuff and forget about the national ads? I think cash is an option in most contracts.

Most stations don't HAVE cash for those kind of services. Neither do the jocks. But the station does have unsold inventory.

Mainedude2007 said:

jh said:

If they're not network spots, they're trade-outs. Stations barter for jock prep services, production libraries, comedy drop ins, etc.

Click to expand...

True, but don't the bigger markets/owners just pay cash for the stuff and forget about the national ads? I think cash is an option in most contracts.

Click to expand...

Arrangements on many programs and programming services offered to stations are bartered or cash and barter. Barter is where you agree to play their commercials in lieu of paying for the programming. Many times these commercials include businesses not found in the listening area.

This is a smaller market and one live-local top 40 FM station (no network or news) is always running spots for Rite-Aid, Lowe's, Toys R Us, and other national clients who don't have a store within at least 150 miles. They're part of a Townsquare cluster that includes an ESPN AM station, that may have something to do with it.