I’m a bit of a smart ass. Sometimes that suits me just fine but lately it seems to be something of a curse. I’m trying to do some extra advertising you see and apparently my money is just no good because I haven’t had a single taker yet. It’s hard enough in this market to explain to people that I want to advertise a podcast or an internet radio show, it’s even harder when no one seems to know what the fuck that is.
First, The Media Buyer…
It would seem that the average media buyer around the greater Portland metro area is about as hip to this newfangled Interwebnet thing as Raj Thomas from What’s Happening. I’ve never felt quite so cutting edge as I’ve felt these past few weeks when all of these buzzword-happy ROI-touting dickwads don’t seem to know what a podcast is to begin with, let alone how much it should cost me to buy myself a billboard, radio time, etc. I’ve even gone out of my way to try to find media buyers with fancy websites, proclaiming themselves to be “digital experts” and so on. No dice. I’ve not found a single Portland media buyer that was born after 1960, let alone one that knows how to connect with me on Twitter or Facebook. If you don’t “know digital” then simply say that you don’t “know digital”. It’s a waste of my time when you know the fancy buzzwords but are clueless as to their meaning. And I was really hoping to get that billboard on Highway 99 eventually too…
Maybe I could just buy direct…?
Undaunted (mostly), I pressed on. I started calling radio stations because I figured, hell, they need the money for one, and wouldn’t it be a bit of a gas to advertise streaming radio on a terrestrial radio station? Maybe I’m the only one that sees the humor in it but who cares, it’s my money. Well, it turns out that you really can’t just call a radio station to buy advertising. Nope. You have to call the sales dick in charge of the region and talk to him. Cool. I tried that too. The problem though is that they don’t return phone calls. Not here, not in Seattle, not at Entercom, not at CBS. I’ve been leaving voicemails but my phone ain’t ringing. And I’m not even explaining to them what I want to advertise so it can’t be that. Shit. No wonder radio is in the crapper.
How about other podcasts?
Last stop, my fellow podcasters. I started in on this two weeks ago, figuring I’d end my three month “experiment in advertising” resorting to ad placement through my peers. Here again, for every fucking email door I knock on there’s no one home. The few responses I manage to get either wanted way too much money for a :30 second spot (on a podcast with a mere 400 listeners a week) or they told me to go fuck myself because they didn’t want to advertise my podcast on their podcast. I even offered a trade. Again, no luck.
Fuck it.
So that takes care of that. My money is either no good or the entire recession is a big fat lie. I figure I could probably buy something in print media but why bother, no one really reads anymore anyway. The rest is just completely bizarre. Either no one knows what the hell I’m trying to advertise or they apparently just don’t need the money quite as much as the news media says they do. Now, I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that someone is going to read this and say “hey moron, media buying is much more complicated that your pea sized brain can understand”. Cool, I get that. My reply to that though would be “really? and I suppose you’re going to tell me that only a fucktard that can’t understand how to use twitter can grasp these high math super media buying concepts?”.
I’m going to trust someone to get me “ROI” in the “digital space” using “a mix of traditional and social media” when they can’t even fucking use Twitter?
Don’t make me laugh.
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A lot more goes on behind the scenes of a media buy than your dull witted brain can comprehend my friend. Media buying is all about relationship building and who you choose to represent you can mean the difference between buying desirable time or undesirable time. Your money spends as well as the next but with your approach to the market you will hit a brick wall. Air time isn’t sold to cockamamie ideas because your business plans don’t help those of us in the media buy biz continue to sustain those important relationships.
H.,
If you’re wanting to say “we’re an elitist bunch of impotent windbags that belong to a dated, mildly retard, and completely out of touch old boys club” then why not just say “we’re an elitist bunch of impotent windbags that belong to a dated, mildly retard, and completely out of touch old boys club”?
At least I could respect you in the morning. Now, put your pants on and go make me some breakfast.
Hey Robert. You can put your podcast onto cellecast and advertise it all at once. Neat, clean, and without pomposity.