‘I would never advertise on radio again’: Sam Wood
Radio ads are ineffective at building brand awareness and don’t have enough transparency when it comes to their effectiveness, Sam Wood has claimed.
The former Bachelor, social media influencer and now owner of online fitness business 28 By Sam Wood, said agencies frequently tried to convince him to spend millions on radio ad campaigns, “but we would never do it again”.
Wood (right): Radio can’t give us figures on advertising’s performance
Wood admitted that when his business began to grow “it was chaos” with little read on which campaigns, initiatives and changes were working. Now, however, the business knows which levers to pull and which mediums are working – and radio is not one of them, he said.
“We have advertising agencies trying to sell us radio space. It’s just not attractive. We’ve done it as brand awareness stuff in the past, but we would never do it again,” he said at Mumbrella’s Health Marketing Summit.
“They’re trying to get us to spend millions of dollars on national radio campaigns and they can’t give us any real figures of how that changes your business, as much as they try and spin it that they can. They’re not convincing me, and they’re not convincing Matt [Morgan, head of growth].
“That’s the beauty of our business. You can really pull the levers and control your own destiny.”
By comparison, Wood said he can tell exactly, to the cent, how much a customer costs to acquire on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Google.
Wood also advocated for having a team of professionals in house, noting Morgan had been more effective, and cheaper, than the agency he had on retainer.
Mumbrella’s Josie Tutty and 28 By Sam Wood’s Matt Morgan and Wood at Mumbrella’s Health Marketing Summit
“I much prefer to have everyone under the one roof, which I know gets expensive and is a bigger commitment, but… you have people that just understand your business… We’ve outsourced marketing, and then we found Matt. And Matt is cheaper than – not that Matt’s cheap – but Matt is cheaper than the agency retainer that we were paying on a monthly basis and 10 times better.
“So it’s just about finding the right experts.”
Wood also warned against shady operators in the digital media and marketing space, who claim to be experts in business growth and transformation.
“Everyone sort of says they’re an expert in this space. I think people claim to be a guru of social media marketing or digital media marketing or app development, or whatever it is, and a lot of them don’t really know what they’re doing,” Wood said.
“And I know that sounds a bit harsh, but you kind of learn that the hard way, particularly when you do meet the person who really does know what they’re talking about and they tell you more in a day than that person who worked for you for six months has been able to help you with.”
Morgan said in order for a business to execute a marketing strategy like 28 By Sam Wood, it had to be on top of its data – “live and love your data”.
Morgan (left): You need to measure everything you’re doing
“It was chaos [when the business first grew],” he said. “And therefore when we did something, it was very hard to say ‘Well did that have an effect? Positive or negative?’ We had no idea. We just kept doing stuff.
“So over the last couple of years, we’ve really put in place some very, very structured data infrastructure so that we can really measure everything that we’re doing.”
Morgan said when it comes to online marketing activity and changing processes, it’s better to tweak things gradually – rather than undertake a complete overhaul.
“Change one thing at a time. That’s rule of thumb. Don’t change 40 things. Just go one thing at a time. We move really quickly. We change one thing at a time, let it run for a couple of days, see how it works, measure it against, but if we didn’t have benchmarks to measure that against, it would be really, really hard to pinpoint what works and what doesn’t.”
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“Dense reality TV star has an opinion on brand awareness stuff”
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“Sam Wood sez facebook is great coz u can measure it”
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Dude. check this out… perhaps what you popped in what was likely to be an over-written 30 seconds wasn’t delivered to your clients…. how is that for transparency?
https://www.productreview.com.au/p/28-by-sam-wood.html
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Who was the agency? What type?
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Somebody might want to check the latest Effie’s paper for 28 by Sam Wood.
The agency that entered it claimed radio drove outstanding results.
Let’s hope for the Comms Council’s sake it doesn’t win anything on Thursday evening…..
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A bit of last click attribution going on here maybe…
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It should be ‘radio doesn’t work for health advertising’ – dangerous assumptions in there.
Very in favour of in-house movement.
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So radio doesn’t work because its not trackable & digital is… yet another case of marketers thinking they understand media and ragging on agencies because of it. Anyone can drive quick results for a small brand through BTL digital. We’ll see what happens when their growth stagnates and they have no idea how to build their brand. Also, a bit of an irresponsible headline don’t you think?
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Says a lot about the credibility of this Mumbrella event when a ex-bachelor is given a soapbox at a marketing event. It’s crazy how people will click to your site when they are on the Facebook or ” the Google”, but won’t instantly go to your site when they are driving, almost like it’s against the law to be on your phone while driving, almost like radio is for top of mind awareness.. you aren’t a marketing god to realise that performance channels drive performance.
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Yet he begs for airtime on any show that will let him on.
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I thought it was really refreshing to hear someone have a point of view at a conference like this!
He did make it clear that radio was effective in building the brand but is not relevant at this point in time.
Thanks for sharing Sam!
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Hmm, a fascinating insight from a business owner who unabashedly isn’t a marketing expert and whose own ‘brand’ was launched through traditional media…
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My usual response to someone who tells me that radio doesn’t work is, “you mustn’t be using it correctly.”
Radio works just fine for us.
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Spreadsheet Jockey
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This is a little rich coming from a guy who uses radio to his advantage when he has a book to promote or something he’s involved in.
Do a simple search on this joker, he’s been on every major radio station in Australia at one time or another to promote himself and what he does. This is the thanks we get for giving him airtime? Cut this guy off.
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Sam’s brand came very late to the piece and there were already a number of leading (more well known) celeb get-fit-fast programs – also advertising on radio. Probably not radio’s fault…
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Spent money having an agency on retainer? He even considered spending millions on radio advertising? Unlikely for a person who had people calling half of Australia trying to get anything for ‘free’ or ‘contra’ for him and his girlfriend.
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Sigh… Radio isnt effective, but that doesn’t stop him from begging to be on all the major breakfast shows..
Gotta love it when a B grade celeb thinks that because they can see a click or a “like” its a sale.
I bet TV, Newpapers, Mags, Outdoor, Cinema etc doent work either!
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I think the lesson here, is to take media strategy advice from an ex-Bachie with a grain of salt
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Sorry i missed this event. Sounds like there were some big insights.
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Is this a comical joke?
His core advice is to not change 40 things at once when marketing online but one thing at a time, to assess it’s impact.
We’re talking about the most BASIC strategy here that a high school student would already know.
[Edited under Mumbrella’s comment moderation policy]
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Bless.
This part is ironic – “Wood also warned against shady operators in the digital media and marketing space, who claim to be experts in business growth and transformation”
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I guess Mr Wood knows a lot about something, which is just as well, because he certainly appears to know nothing about radio advertising.
Radio is one traditional medium in this ever changing world, where you can still get value for money and spectacular advertising results. But it must be crafted specifically and placed right, or it is like burying your campaign in the bush.
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I have never heard of this clown but I can tell you at least 5 brands that I heard on the radio on the way into the city this morning. I wager his business will be extinct within 5 years, whilst radio will live on.
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Based on her previous articles, there will be numerous omissions, mistakes and twistings of fact to get clicks. The black dress #metoo article being a perfect case in point.
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One week of ‘branding’, 15 sec spots.
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@awkward
Maybe you should wait to read the paper and judge for yourself. And if you were an Effie judge you’ve kind of done the wrong thing commenting and prejudicing a fair an honest entry.
Sam Wood is a tool. You’re just vindictive.
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I had some jokers telling me I needed a website, some digital ads, some likes, some tweets, a social media presence and an influencer.
Tried it – didn’t work.
I then advertised on radio and things worked out just fine.
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Cool mate, So what’s the purpose of appearing on every breakfast show that will have you?
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All those with Adex, check out his spend for the last 3 years by media. Interesting……
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Good idea… My Adex says that since Jan 2016 he has only ever spent $58K on digital… no radio, no tv, no OOH, no press.
I wonder how he was able to form such a definitive view on how well radio works for his business? Comparing free PR he received from the on air teams to an actual branding campaign, that’d be like an apples v oranges comparison.
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