Abstract:

When respondents are asked to recall ads in a “real world” context radio does well both in absolute terms and relative to television. Aided ad recall in this study averaged 32% across ninety-one radio ads vs. 38% a cross seventy-four ads for TV. Brand recall averaged 10% for radio and 17% for TV an index of 60. Results varied by category of ad and by the type of programming in which the ads ran. In particular brand recall for ads aired during radio news programs was roughly comparable to brand recall for ads aired in TV news programs. These results are particularly encouraging for radio considering the fact that in this study almost all of our respondents reported not having listened to the entire radio time slot which the ad aired or said they had been doing other things while listening.