Advertising Expert Stew Redwine Shares Marketing Tips

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine Joins Us On The Join Up Dots Podcast

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Introducing Advertising Expert Stew Redwine

Advertising expert Stew Redwine joins us on todays Steve Jobs inspired Join Up Dots business podcast.

Do you listen to ads on the radio and podcasts and instantly get drawn to them?

Is it the atmosphere, the words, or simply the persuasive nature of the voice over that makes you jot down those details and check into it more?

Well todays guest knows what works and what doesn’t, as he is the VP of creative Services at Oxford Road

They are the leading privately owned audio ad agency. Pairing disruptive brands with powerful media outlets, Oxford Road develops and places ads for leading B2B and B2C companies across multiple channels including podcast, radio, and television, reaching millions of people each day.

Since its founding, Oxford Road has served thousands of top brands and helped more than a dozen direct to consumer brands to scale their customer acquisition efforts and to evolve from start-up leaders into leaders with $1 Billion+ valuations.

So what builds trust in a product which then translates into a persuasive ad?

How can we make them an offer they can’t refuse: leading to someone taking action now?

Well lets find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only Mr. Stew Redwine

Show Highlights 

During the show we discussed such weighty subjects with Stew such as:

We discuss the world renowned adverts across the world which changed the way that the world saw how advertising should be done

Stew shares the marketing strategies that took Coco-Cola to the top of the mountain and kept them there forever

Why everybody needs to get out of their own way, when building a business and stop asking for permission from people who don’t need to give it.

And lastly…..

We break down the nine key components of audio litics which you can take into your own advertising strategies. 

How To Connect With Stew

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Full Transcription Of Advertising Expert Stew Redwine Interview

Intro [0:00]
Life shouldn’t be hard life should be a fun filled adventure every day. So now start joining up dots tap into your talents, your skills, your God given gifts and tell your boss, you don’t deserve me. I’m out of here. It’s time for you to smash that alarm clock. And start getting the dream business and wife you will, of course, are dreaming of. Let’s join your host, David route from the back of his garden in the UK, or wherever he might be today with another JAM PACKED episode of the number one hit podcast. Join Up Dots.

David Ralph [0:39]
Yeah, good morning, gentlemen. Welcome to Join Up Dots. It’s gonna be a different type of show today, because we’re going to, we’re going to detail a a subject that perhaps you hadn’t even thought about the effectiveness of the ad set you hear on the radio? So do you listen to ads on the radio and podcasts and sort of instantly get drawn to them? And is it the atmosphere the words or simply the persuasive nature of the voiceover that makes you jot down those details, and then check into it more? Well, today’s guest knows what works and what doesn’t, as he is the VP of creative services at Oxford road. Now, they’re the leading privately owned audio ad agency pairing disruptive brands with powerful media outlets. And they develop and place ads for leading b2b and b2c companies across multiple channels, including podcast, radio and television, reaching millions of people each day. Now since its founding, Oxford road has served 1000s of top brands and helped more than a dozen direct to consumer brands to scale their customer acquisition efforts and to evolve from startup leaders into leaders with 1 billion plus valuation. So what builds trust in a product which then translates into a persuasive ad? And how can we make them an offer they can’t refuse, leading to someone taking action? As soon as they hear it? Well, let’s find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots with the one and only miss this juice red wine. Hello, Stewart.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [2:12]
Great, thank you for that incredible intro. Thanks for having me on the show.

David Ralph [2:16]
It’s lovely to have you here. Okay, so let’s get straight into it. Because there aren’t ads. But I listened to there’s ads, but I blanked out on, there’s ads, certainly on YouTube, but I just click a button to try to get past them as soon as possible. I’m just not interested in in at all. So what makes a good ad?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [2:37]
Whoa, what makes a good ad? That is a big question. I think. First question, I will answer your question with a question. How are we measuring success? And how long do we have to get there?

David Ralph [2:50]
Okay. I want to watch it. I want to watch him. So based your entire entire idea. You want to

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [2:57]
watch? You want to watch him? Okay, you want to watch the ad, then it’s you know, okay, so is advertising entertainment? Did you just hear or listen to an ad? That was very entertaining, but can you recall who the advertisement was for? You know, it’s a big question on, on what makes an ad work and what makes a good ad, I think that for us at Oxford road. And I’m like, we need to tighten up that intro a little bit. It needs to be at Oxford road, we just want the ads to work. It’s, uh, have listeners or viewers taken action, immediately based on hearing or seeing the ad that is how we are judged, most often as a performance agency, is how do we compel people to take action right away. And sometimes that coincides with what you’re talking about that they enjoyed watching it, or they or it was entertaining to them. But I think that those can be slightly different things.

David Ralph [3:56]
So Can an ad be too entertaining, and just becomes like a little thing to zip onto every now and again. You know, in the United Kingdom. I don’t know if we you have it in America. But we used to have these really long adverts at Christmas, where you’d get all these celebrities and you’d go oh, it’s that person is that person. And at the end, you never bought anything. It was just something that sort of made Christmas. Do you can so can a sort of a advert be too entertaining.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [4:27]
You know, I don’t I’m thinking of John Lewis in the United Kingdom. Yeah, and yeah, exactly. And Byron sharp and lesbian, a lesbian and Peter field, I mean, excuse me, have done work in the United Kingdom measuring the effectiveness of those advertisements of John Lewis where they do the the well renowned Christmas advertisement at the end of every year. That is a big long story, a heartfelt story. We’re going to reach in and just you know, stimulate your emotions. And they’ve seen over time that those are effective at growing, not only John Lewis’s Share of Voice, but also their share of market. So over a long enough timeline, it’s successful. But that’s why I’m being a little bit dodgy, I guess on answering is just that it’s like, entertain, it can be too entertaining. If we’re trying to get them to take action in like the next eight weeks, then yeah, you’re gonna be trading entertainment and some sort of long term associations, and mental availability, for a brand that may not exist in, you know, in nine weeks, because we didn’t have a successful test in eight weeks, while John Lewis, who’s over a century old, I don’t know, possibly two centuries old. They know that they’re in for the long game. So they can build up this moment, make you feel really good during the holidays. And if and when you’re passing a John Lewis, and you need something you think of them you think of them for finally, they’ve taken up this mental availability. But they’re playing the long game, for talking the short game, we got to use some different tactics.

David Ralph [6:13]
So for a entrepreneur, but somebody out there listening, and they’ve just started building their platform, and they’re, they’re trying to nail their branding and their positioning, obviously, that’s a short game, they need clients as soon as possible. For many people, they haven’t got huge budgets, like John Lewis, and all those other sort of corporations. So with your expertise do you want to do let’s let’s sort of spin this whole podcast episode around normally, I do this at the end. But let’s get to it at the beginning, what the spins that people can do, but doesn’t cost the earth doesn’t mean that they’ve got to become experts at voice overs and video techniques, but can actually make a difference to their bottom line?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [7:01]
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, first of all, it doesn’t matter how you say it until you have something to say. So kind of a roundabout way to answer this, but you know, you look at Coca Cola. And if you’ve been to the Coca Cola Museum, which I recommend, it’s in Atlanta. Okay, there you go. Awesome. So in the early days, they were doing the six pack, right, they came up with a six pack, you can buy five and get one free special offers, you get special Coca Cola, notepads and pencils, if you buy Coca Cola for your shop, lots of special offers and discounts at the very beginning. Now, Coca Cola has open happiness, branded spot, people smile and drink and Coke, right? Because it’s everywhere. It’s ubiquitous. And in the early early days, what you need to do is give people a very compelling interests, very compelling reason to pay attention to keep paying attention, and then give them like you said at the beginning, an offer they can’t refuse. And at Oxford Road, what we’ve developed over the years, and I’ve been at Oxford since before the beginning and full time for the past seven years, is we have a specific formula that we use, it’s a checklist based on a lot of other persuasive work that’s, that’s out out there. That are the nine key components of a persuasive message. And we call it audio lyrics. It was born in audio, and you can just Google audio lyrics. How to Write a podcast ad that sells is an article that I wrote, it’s out there, you can see the nine key components that you need, and essentially break down your message into these nine pieces. There’s other models out there, but this is the one that we have arrived at that we think works, that we know that we’ve seen works. And just maximum, it’s like you’ve got to break down your message into the key pieces, make sure they’re in the right order, and then push yourself as hard as you can to make them as potent as possible. That’s where I’ve seen people probably get jammed up is that they? They’re resistant to how do I break this thing down into pieces? How do I really look at it and how do I push it as far as possible? And then the big areas I’ve seen just jumping right in I mean, you’re asking for practical advice is people, advertisers, even new people, the space will omit positioning. So the the nine key components of audio lyrics are setup value prop positioning demonstration substantiation offers scarcity path execution, like I said, you can just Google that it’s out there. So it’s easy to find, or you can link it in the show notes. But areas that people omit very commonly are positioning, why and how specifically, are you better than the status quo and competitors come out and just say it I’ve seen resistance over the years where folks are like, I don’t want to be mean, I don’t want to be critical. It’s like okay, Yeah, and it’s like you are trying to get someone to break up with their spouse. Like they’re already using this brand. And they’ve used it for years, like you better come with some compelling rationale. And again, if you’re John Lewis of Ford Motor Company, Coca Cola, you’re in the privileged position of getting to entertain people with cinema for 60 seconds or six seconds, wherever, you know, choose the venue, because everybody know you’ve taken up all the space in their mind, when you’re the new person on the block. Nobody knows who you are, and nobody cares. So you’ve got to give them a reason to care.

David Ralph [10:35]
Yeah, absolutely right base and just spin it from advertising. Because I know, when I launched my podcast, 10 years ago, I kind of didn’t want anyone to listen to it. I didn’t mind it. Nobody knew me. But it was the people that used to know me. It was like, I’ve kind of set a new pattern, and I hadn’t sort of redefined myself. And I see that a lot with people that they say to me, yeah, I don’t want to cause a problem for that person. I go, but it’s it’s business. It’s competition. You know, back, they can do it back to you. As long as it’s got morals. As long as it’s not mean. It’s just competition, isn’t it?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [11:15]
100% I mean, just get back out there, get, you know, go out and do some physical, you’d ask those folks. Any of those folks is like, did you play sports in school? Do you currently play sports, like we just did a company soccer game a few months back, because there’s a couple few months ago now, but we’re playing on again, tonight, we’re playing another company soccer game, you know, if I don’t hustle and try to get that ball, or I might have to get push someone else off of the ball, like they will get the ball? Like, absolutely, it is competition. And that means you have to exert yourself, and you’re physically going to run into other people. And it’s going to be bumpy. But you know, it’s to your point moral, there are rules, leave it on the field, don’t get petty, but you know, business and whatever your aspirations are, whatever you’re trying to achieve. You know, it’s like Post Malone says, you know, it’s all a game to me. It’s all a game. Yeah, it’s just a game.

David Ralph [12:09]
I’ve just finished watching a three part programme on the BBC about Elon Musk. And Elon Musk. It was interesting, because I saw him on Joe Rogan as well. And Elon Musk seems to have a blind spot for having to ask for permission. And I’ll give you a bit of subtext on this. At the moment, he’s building a boring company to make tunnels under LA. And Joe Rogan say, Well, who do you have to ask to get permission? And he couldn’t answer the question. It was just like, it was so alien to him. It was just he’s so into action and making things happen. He didn’t even consider that actually have to ask anyone. It’s just, it’s just going. Now, when somebody is building a new business, a lot of the time, they’re not even willing to ask themselves, but it’s okay to do. And they just kind of secretly tiptoe around. Now Oxford road has gone from nowhere to where it is very, very quickly. And chicken and egg time. How would you get the clients if you haven’t actually done the advertising? Or had you done the advertising first? How did it start in the early days?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [13:17]
With Oxford road you’re asking? Yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Okay. So we had the, we were born out of a team at Clear Channel and one individual, our founder, Dan Granger, Clear Channel where he was growing companies, and at the time, like DTC companies, in radio, at Clear Channel now, I heart media. And it was essentially, it’s been a piece of Oxford Road, especially through our first nine years of advertisers looking for other worlds to conquer. So there was already folks advertising on the radio. And Dan and his team, Dan and his team have done a tremendous job of growing them. And it’s like, where else can we go? Where else can we go? And it’s like, well, there’s this new thing. You know, Adam Carolla is doing this deal where he, you know, records a podcast, and then people can, you know, it’s like so early on, it’s like, Hey, can we pay you to maybe read this copy for Dollar Shave Club and like, see what happens. And then it’s just been a rocket ship ever since essentially. So a whole lot of tenacity and hard work and figuring out how to make it work, how to make attribution work, and then a big piece of being in the right place at the right time.

David Ralph [14:37]
And do you think that is the key sort of element? You know, it’s not luck. You’ve actually had to position yourself to be in that right position at the right time. But do you think there’s a more than part of it a huge part?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [14:51]
Yeah, I think it was Seth Godin talks about it’s a really expensive lottery ticket. So it’s like you’ve got to work really, really, really, really hard and and be well timed to know that like out here in Ventura, you know, I can take the freeway and just be down in Ventura in less than an hour. And there’s a surfers point where like, Okay, I know I need to go there, if I’m going to catch a good wave, like I can’t go, you know, a mile down or half a mile, whatever, I also have to put in all the work to be a good surfer, which I’m not, I’m just saying using a metaphor. And then the waves have to come in and be a good set on a good day. And when it all comes together, that’s great. But like the work, the work the work, you’ve got to put in the work. And I don’t know, I don’t understand don’t pretend to know the luck component opponent of being in the right place at the right time. But if you are prepared, and you have been dedicated, and you’re trying to read the waves, then when a great set comes in, you’re, you’re well positioned.

David Ralph [15:50]
Now I’m interested in so obviously, we’re going to talk about podcast advertising. But I’m also interested in that reason why people start their own business. Because he is hard. It is hard. It’s easy. If you follow along, and you reach out to somebody who’s done it before in the environment you want to be in and they can help you through but so few people do. They just tried to make it up as I go along. Why do you think there is still this reluctance bow to give it a go? Fear? It’s gonna be more than just doing it. It’s got to be more than just fear. Because we’re frightened over everything. Aren’t we really?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [16:29]
Well, possibly. Yeah. I mean, I think that yeah, I take your point. I mean, I think underneath it is fear. Deep, you know, deep down that’s that’s the thing is uncertainty. Right? It’s like you turn the lights on a child can see once we can know something. Probably thoughts, like you’re saying I think like you’re saying I think if a person thinks they need permission, don’t the risk component have gone? I don’t want to put it all at risk, or, or even this idea of, you know, what do I do if it if it doesn’t work out, but the thing is, like, is being a part of Oxford road and some other things. It’s like, things have a way of working out. And even if it doesn’t, you know, it’s going to be okay, either way. So perhaps it’s more than fear. I guess I turn that back on you, I I am a little hung up on it. Because I go, it feels like to me underneath all of that’s just fear. But I would love to get to something more if you’ve, you’ve got ideas as well,

David Ralph [17:28]
I think you know, as you say that the dots join up. And I’m a great believer in that. And that’s the whole mantra of my show. But you don’t know you might be coming into a dead end and you think, oh my God, my life is rubbish and stuff. But then a little bit later you go oh, yeah, that’s why I went into that dead end. Because that person walked into there. I had a conversation with them. And suddenly I was up and running again. So I don’t think it’s fear. I think it’s training. I think we’ve been trained not to think for ourselves, and want to have the solutions given. And certainly when I was in corporate land, I used to spend more time saying to my staff members when I used to run teams, why do you think that? You know the answer, why are you asking me that? Because they just wanted to throw it over to somebody else.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [18:18]
At this point? I do I do. I do. Actually you’re making a great point because, you know, taking it from a fear position. It’s going like oh, they want to and the only reason they not doing it is because they’re afraid it’s almost like you’re taking a step back to go like they don’t even know that they want to or they can’t even conceptualise like they can’t get to that Elon Musk frame of mind where he’s like asked, permitted what like it’s so foreign. It’s another language to him. Where if you’re totally heavily institutionalised, which Western culture Hey, here we are. Yes, we all are, is sit down. We do this the test has this and there’s three possible answers and pop up up about and 20 some years of getting trained to do that. You make a great point you’re not even going to think that you could Hey, guys, instead of going to recess Why don’t we go do this? It’s like what No, you can’t do that.

David Ralph [19:11]
Yeah, and as the little rules in life, I think you know, don’t stand on the grass. Don’t do this. Don’t do that. And my my kids are obsessed with these little rules. And I always say to them, Well, I’m going to the grass police gonna get me Come on Let’s just walk across there. It’s not gonna hurt grass is it you know, but they’re so programmed, they won’t do it and they will walk 10 minutes down the road to save cutting across a little bit of grass, you know? And I think it’s the little rules in life that you are willing to break but actually build up the confidence that it’s going to be all a you know, as we talked about Elon Musk again, I don’t want to make this a need on my show. But he’s he’s kind of he’s he’s mental. He’s beyond mental because there’s nothing in his brain but says you can’t, you know. And once you get to that point, I think success is kind of almost a given. Because you’ve got no obstacles, you’ve got no fences, you’ve got no signs saying don’t step on the grass, you can just go any direction you want.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [20:19]
Yeah, and I think that one way of looking at it, you know, I’ve got kids as well as that, like, whatever the sign is the only 12 People in the hot tuber. Don’t text and drive, don’t take

David Ralph [20:33]
maced. You

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [20:37]
know, I just remember in when my daughter was was little, she was like, asking me to, can you read all the rules on this site? It’s very much to, you know, relate it to what you’re saying. But even like, don’t text or drive or $250? Fine. It’s like, Look, these are all maybe you see that as a ticket in the sense, they call it a ticket, you’re buying that ticket to do that behaviour to do that activity. That’s the trade. So fine, whatever. If that happens to me, fine. Me, that’s fine. I bought the ticket to do it. It’s okay. Like so as opposed to, there’s this parental thing that you’re still a child, and that’s the parent and you’ve got to act permission. If they don’t give you permission, you can’t do it. It’s like, Elon is a person among people. And he wants to do this, okay, well, what happens if I do that there’s these things in place, whatever, I guess we deal with the don’t bore underneath West Hollywood committee, like whatever get the drill. You know, which is just to your point of going. The it’s not that there’s this authoritarian that one day is gonna come down and give you permission, you’re the only one that can give yourself permission

David Ralph [21:47]
is fascinating. Let’s hear from Oprah, we’d be back wish to

Oprah Winfrey [21:51]
the way through the challenge is to get still and ask yourself, what is the next right move? not think about, oh, I got all of this. What is the next right move? And then from that space, make the next right move, and the next right move, and not to be overwhelmed by it. Because you know, your life is bigger than that one moment, you know, you’re not defined by what somebody says, is a failure for you. Because failure is just there to point you in a different direction.

David Ralph [22:23]
Now, let’s take the conversation away from Oprah, but sort of embedded as well. At the beginning, Oh, just a moment ago, we were talking about people wanting to have permission before they do anything. So for a successful ad that we already know, builds on nine components. Yeah, is one of the biggest components actually getting them to believe it’s okay to do it is a kind of a permission element in that as well.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [22:52]
Yeah, I mean, social proof substantiation. It’s one of the major ways to substantiate it’s that so in this venue and audio, particularly in podcast and in radio before, there, people are intentional in listening to you, as a host, right? They seek you out, they like you, they feel like they know you, they do know you and it’s intimate, right, it’s intentional, and it’s intimate. So you’re you’re you are proving it out to them. If you’re saying hey, I use this and you should too, or man, I wish I would have had something like this when I was dealing with XYZ. Short of that it’s social proof of going, you know, as much as it might feel tired or trite. Nevertheless, it is persuasive. You buying something on Amazon or wherever it is, oh, how many reviews to that? Does that have how many people have used it? That would be the way to go. Okay, now I can it’s okay if I can use it because all the other animals in the savanna went over and drink out of that waterhole and they didn’t fall over and die from poison. So now I can go over and I can drink from that waterhole.

David Ralph [24:02]
I hate reviews. I rarely read reviews. And if I have read reviews, they generally come back and bite me in the bum. But and you see that my wife’s goes, Oh, no, we can’t go to that hotel. Somebody said they had dry flannels or something and you go, who cares? Who cares? He is just a moaner. Let’s go and make up our own mind. So how do we sort of get this review then to flood through? So people get that social proof but it doesn’t sound like we’re just listing Amazon reviews. Well, storytelling isn’t storytelling.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [24:40]
I think that storytelling can but this is where we got to be careful in is the story tied directly to what’s on offer and how much how directly is it tied to what you’re doing and the either benefits or the feature of what’s on offer but to just tell the story in and of itself that’s disconnected from the brand or the product I, I question that

David Ralph [25:09]
I have so many people do want to come on the show. And they say I’m a storytelling expert. I help people tell stories and convert and make sounds and stuff. And most of the time I say no to them, because I just think, I think there’s more to it than just storytelling.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [25:28]
Well, I mean, I think, you know, Steven Spielberg is a storyteller, and he’s in the right place to be doing that. I think, the theatre books, the cinema. That’s great. Be an expert story. Stephen King is a storyteller. That’s fantastic. I think that advertising is a piece of marketing, right? So it is a sales component of your business. It is a functional thing. It is a mechanism. Yes, those emotional components relate. Yes, we can pull out the one or two examples where, wow, the impact of that often I have found the most go to examples are from century old companies that have a tonne of mental availability from grandma and grandpa to mom and dad to child where it’s like AT and T any question in anyone’s mind what that is? Why they’ve been advertising for 100 years with booleans of dollars. So now, they

David Ralph [26:31]
won’t say that again? You’ve practised that before? No, that

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [26:35]
was just right off the cuff. They, but I can do it again. Okay, here we go. Reset. No, but they might my point in saying that is I’m imagining most of the folks. Well, anyway, I’ll talk about my me is like, great, great, great. Okay, Coca Cola, att blah, blah, blah. Let’s put that over here. Alright, let’s talk about you, your business goals, your 10 to $15 million business 50 to $300 million business, you know, $302 billion business, whatever that is. Okay, how are we getting to the next level? All right, let’s get serious about how we’re going to win the next game, okay, and really get focused on what we need to see these ads do.

David Ralph [27:14]
Now, a lot of the time, ads are completely pointless. It’s been proven that Hollywood spend so much money on, you know, advertising, the New Jurassic Park film, but actually, people are gonna go and see it anyway. They almost don’t need to have it. But they’re frightened. I think somebody once said 50% of my ads work brilliantly, but I just don’t know what 50% is something along those lines? So how do you maintain VAT? When you’ve got a client that’s sitting in front of you, and they might be a bit daunted by all, but the eye is going to come back to them?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [27:52]
I mean, you got to be able to prove it. We’re in the age of evidence based marketing. That was John Wayne homemakers who that’s most often attributed to I know, half of my ads work. I just don’t know which half Yeah, look at the technology they had, right. I mean, they’re sending out newspapers, Almanack, almanacks, and you got to have people snip off coupons and send them back in. Now, we’re in a position where we can get increasing clarity and even in the audio space with pixels, to be able to see what does work and to understand what creative does work. And then it’s just, it’s the same I’d get you to do anything is like, I got to be able to substantiate my claims just the same as an advertiser going like, this is faster, this is better. Okay, how much faster? How much better? Like, what are you talking about? Why would I stop using what I’m using? Well, because this does X, Y, and Z. So the same with these advertising campaigns and at Oxford road using every possible input that we can, from a measurement standpoint, based on all of the performance data, we have been able to say to you with a straight face. This is how we see your campaign performing and therefore you need to invest more here less, potentially less like you’re saying, if we were to see that, oh, you know, we’ve noticed when we do these big tentpole promotions for your movies. Now that we’re able to really see that with some more clarity, these podcast reads pushing people to those films like they’re really not, that’s not really doing anything. You need to turn that off. Right? That can also be the answer is that some of this stuff like you’re saying is just not worth the investment.

David Ralph [29:38]
Jurassic Park wasn’t worth the investment. I went to that. And I actually wanted a dinosaur to finish me off halfway through it was just dreadful, but it still made a lot a lot of money and that’s my sort of point on these things. A lot of it doesn’t need the money thrown at it, but people are too scared not to be in the game some now.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [30:01]
Yeah, absolutely. I understand. I think there you go scared fear like whatever. Yeah, of course they are right, not making they’re not making their boss mad, doing what the herd does. You know, Martin Luther King Jr said nothing pain some people so much as to think, like really stop and think, like how, why and how does this make sense? And could could that trend be valid? What you’re you’re suggesting that like, hey for especially a really heavily nostalgia driven film, we really don’t need to promote it as much. I mean, I noticed the poster in the theatre when I went and saw it. I, which is funny, I mean, I was to your point, I was in the theatre with my ticket in hand, and then I saw the poster. But it had, you know, the picture of like, this circular architectural element in the trans Arthrex heads in it. And I was like, Oh, this is like every designer’s like dream design, because the name of the movie wasn’t on the design. And I feel like that’s what they’re always chasing is like, we could make an ad that doesn’t even have the brand name. And like, why go competing story to go to, like, go try to tell a movie, don’t be a failed storyteller, trying to bring your failed attempts at being a storyteller into this into sales we’re trying to sell over here. Right? And it’s like, okay, so you can’t make it doing that. So you’re going to try to bring that over here.

David Ralph [31:34]
So, because he can get too clever comment, it can get too close. Yeah, it can’t you can

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [31:39]
out you can out quite 100%. I mean, there have been television spots that we’ve worked on where even you know, audio lyrics is named audio lyrics, because was born out of audio. Nevertheless, it’s a persuasive persuasion formula nine key components 71 sub components, okay, you can apply it to any persuasive message. So we’ve taken other people’s creative, scanned it so to speak through audio lyrics, right? I mean, it’s a linear list of checkpoints. And gone, hey, take this change that change this and it most of the time what it is, to your point, is taking out the clever, taking out the entertainment going, let’s not spend 18 seconds, trying to entertain right? Is it even that funny? Let’s reduce that down to like six and like, let’s make the rest of the message harder hitting.

David Ralph [32:28]
Yeah. You’re You’re a young man. But have you ever seen a film? We’ve got to go back in time for this? Okay. Okay. It started Dudley Moore, the English comedian. Do you remember Lee Moore? And it was crazy people? Have you ever seen this film crazy people? I have not my just do, Stu, you’re gonna cancel the rest of your day. And just say this is research. And basically the story is Dudley Moore. He’s a marketing expert. And he has a breakdown, and his ads aren’t really converting any more. And so he gets put into a mental asylum. And he starts using the mental people in there to write his ads. And because they just do think so simply, as like, I remember one of them was toilet paper. It’s good for wiping your bandwidth. And it was nothing more more complicated than that. And it was the honesty that kind of changed the marketing and people were going this is what we want. We don’t want clever, we just want simple. And yeah, it’s a great film. But I look at adverts Now certainly in a cinema. And I say to my son, what was that? Especially sort of sort of beer adverts and alcohol, they just could totally confusing.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [33:45]
They can be sure. And I think that it’s a simple Matt, you know, there’s also this groupthink thing that happens, where it’s like, and we try to keep ourselves honest, that Oxford road it’s hard. There’s such gravitational pull to kind of be like, like, I’ve got kids, you got kids. It’s like, oh, hey, do you want to come to this, you know, recital, my daughter’s playing piano. And it’s like, Isn’t she so good? Oh, yeah, she’s really good. That’s like, Okay, where did she place on the national ranking of pianists? pianists? 11 year old female pianists or whatever. Like Is she that good? Really? Is she really that good? It’s like let’s be honest. Like is that really that clever? Like I really like Dave Chappelle let’s say or you name you know, whatever comedian whatever your top shelf entertainer is or show is like hold your ad message up to that level is it you know, Game of Thrones good? Is it Dave Chappelle? Good? Is it that good? Okay, if it’s not, then let’s not try to be entertainers. And let’s make sure that we’re clear to your point. I think then it gets so confused and you get a committee making it At the end, you’ve got a guy sitting in a theatre with his son for a beer ad, which you think would be appealing going, what? What is going on? I just want to know, you know, what is going on? And why am I at Jurassic Park?

David Ralph [35:12]
Now we podcast it’s gonna be even harder because it is an interruption to the conversation. Most podcasts are constructed to be either informative or educational. And, and you haven’t got this huge sort of budgets or you’re you’re trying to make the budget of the podcast. And so what can you do in about these nine key components? Let’s finish off the show with these because these are key. And I’ve been trying to Google these ever since you said it, and I can’t find them at all. So let’s let’s go through nine key components of audio analytics, was it?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [35:48]
Yeah, yeah. It’s the nine key components of audio lyrics. Yeah, it’s a setup value prop. Positioning demonstration substantiation offers scarcity path. execution, I’ll make sure I get you set up with that. So you can link it. But first of all, it’s your setup, it’s you’ve got to replace whatever the audience is thinking about with something that’s more engaging, right?

David Ralph [36:14]
So how do you do that? Because in the old days, it used to be sort of, Do you have trouble with your backside? It was always like a sort of question on these information. Yeah. Oh, commercial is and you kind of think, well, actually, I do. And then away you go.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [36:31]
And that might work. To your point about Dudley Moore, that might actually work clarity might be the best way in. It might be even though we’re, you know, kind of going between this idea of being clear and being clever, which I think are both important and might be a clever hook, it might be a question, oftentimes, a question is the best way in it, a lot of times, it’s, you know, using their I say their language, but you know, using inside language, like speaking to people in their language about something that is important to them, sometimes starting with a fact that’s interesting or curious. And it when we’re talking podcast and audio in particular, it’s the host making that direct personal connection. So however they do that them sounding authentic to themself, and not doing like this hard gear shift into the ad, even though that’s not I’ll say, that’s not the worst thing in the world.

David Ralph [37:30]
Because I kind of like Rose, because it’s kind of okay, I just have to listen to this. And when we’re back into it, I don’t like it when the coast is doing these. And then I think, Oh, actually, he’s selling to me here. I didn’t realise this. I thought he was just chatting.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [37:46]
Yeah, and that you bring up a good point. And I and I remember, this came up earlier this year in the United Kingdom where you are, I can’t remember the governing body again, we only do a little bit of international. But the host is required to identify that they are in a break, right? You can’t they can’t just try to be sneaky, Pete and slide it in. Because like you said, it kind of feels dirty, right? You’re like, Oh, you were doing that to sell me. You know, the reason you wanted to have dinner with me and my wife is you’re part of an insert. You want to sell me some new life insurance. Great. You know what I mean? It’s like, you don’t want the ad to feel slippery.

David Ralph [38:29]
So blunt, honest. And short. Is it Is that what do we say to the people who are starting out on this?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [38:39]
I would say yeah, and unless you can do clever, and when you do clever, make sure you’re clever.

David Ralph [38:45]
And not too clever.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [38:50]
I think too clever with the way we’re kind of defining it here means you’re not actually being clever.

David Ralph [38:56]
No, you just being the accusing.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [38:59]
Exactly.

David Ralph [39:00]
So So what give us an example of one that really, really brought in the bacon, as they say for for Oxford road, right, really worked had all the key components. And maybe you were surprised. You thought it was good, but actually when it ran, Wow, it really, really gave you the results.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [39:20]
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think most often because it was early days with us was a variety of different spots that we did with Bolin branch sheets. They were with the agency for a number of years, no longer with the agency but we are part of that. them growing in audio. And we were just really honest about you know, the ways that people you know, the lack of sleep and it was like, you know, some of our initial campaigns were like, Listen, you know, you tired of staying up, looking at your phone. Tired of taking a you know, a bunch of sleep bean pills, you know, to try to fall asleep, I just remember is very like biting and more honest. And in fact, another one I could think of was blinds.com. We actually talked about that one even more, because with blinds.com, and they’re still with us. And they’ve been with us for a number of years as well. We just went for it with, you know, it’s blinds.com. You’re like, why are you selling window treatments? Like, how can that be cool. And we went with this simple appeal that no one else is going to tell you. So we will write, because people’s friends, people lie to us all the time. They don’t really shoot straight with us, no one else is going to tell you so we will, your blinds are ugly. Your house looks like a crack house. That’s why it’s time for blinds.com. And it works so incredibly well. Just in calling people out it was variations like the campaign was it’s been a number of years, but the campaign was dynamite. And it was variations on this theme of no one else is going to tell you so we will you know your house is ugly, or, you know, people think that your place should be condemned just going really, really hard at it. And I think that cut through an audio because most of the time, people are just kind of getting lulled to sleep in the breaks. And here’s a here’s a spot that was slapping him.

David Ralph [41:18]
Yeah, I have seen some weird changes recently on radio over here, that wouldn’t have occurred maybe two or three years ago. And it’s strange, because in many ways to weld is frightened of saying anything. You mentioned, one thing I read today, right? And I do apologise out there. If other people have opposing views, I’m only reading out what I saw. But I think it’s crazy. I don’t understand it. But this lady in Norway, is threatened with a three year jail service, the same sentence for saying that men can’t be lesbians. And she’s liking to go to jail for three years because she made this statement. And people have just come out of the woodwork and just gone for her. And is that kind of, you know, does that actually excite the advertising people now but people aren’t getting onto Twitter is is no. You know, is pep up publicity just as good as good publicity with these kinds of things. Can you be constructive in sending out ripples student just like that?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [42:28]
Well, you know, I think there’s something deeper behind that, too. And it’s like you’re saying? Yes, everyone is it does seem like we can’t say anything. And also there is a question of what is civil discourse? And what is where is a place that we can talk freely and, and openly and just allow space for people to have their viewpoints like you’re saying and not immediately go us good than bad? They’re out there done? You know, how can we incentivize them. And that’s part of the work we do at the Oxford row at Oxford road with the media roundtable is to and with tools like barometer is to provide in a sense, just very, very quickly nutrition labels for media. So instead of going, Hey, where’s the line? Exactly? And, and oh, you know, this person said something shocking. Most of the time, what I’ve seen is when somebody says something shocking, or is generally, you know, labelled as offensive, it isn’t good. That is not a fun couple of days when that occurs, right? advertisers don’t want to be associated with it. And it’s, it’s, it’s ugly, it’s not fun. It’s like when somebody’s at a dinner party, and they say something, you know, they get hot, they get loud, and they say something mean, or cruel to somebody else. You know, it makes everything really weird there for a few days, but there’s a way through that doesn’t necessarily have to end with Thou shalt not, it’s thou can, but if thou if you do, then, you know, this is how you’re labelled in like, for instance, in brahmer, to go, Hey, do you want to how high risk of shows do you want to be on and that’s okay, like, let’s still allow the dialogue. Let’s still allow everyone to believe what they believe. But But to get back to your question, you know, to the core of it, I think, is that no, it’s I think, gone are the days of all press is good press. You know, I mean, some of this stuff can can make things difficult. When you’ve got podcast guests, or podcast hosts saying things that, you know, are there’s a very strong reaction to

David Ralph [44:41]
Yeah, it’s certainly I’m so aware of saying things now, but I wouldn’t have been five years ago, you know, of course, and the emails I get, I read from and I respond back and I actually think I’m not actually sure what your point is here, but I have a point because it’s their point. And then they feel passionate enough to email me and tell me that I’m wrong.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [45:06]
They do. And I’ve heard, you know, yeah, I’ve heard from other hosts. It’s like some of the it’s like, where do we draw the line? And I think that that’s where, one off tweets, one off emails. I’ve been involved in campaigns where you know, a single tweet, and it got right, you know, gets run all the way up to the top, we need to pull everything right. And then you find out, okay, let’s just stop, just stop and think just stop for two seconds. Who is this person? That’s, yeah, that’s funny. That’s funny. That’s funny, but But essentially, kind of, you know, similar in the sense of like, just a little bit of digging, you go, Oh, we don’t care what this person’s like, look at what they believe, like, whose company they keep, like, let’s just slow our roll. So that’s where if in general, like with your show, on the broad spectrum of nutrition labels, it was like, oh, yeah, this, this is tame, this is safe, then if there’s a one off complaint or this or that, it’s like, okay, that now we’ve got relativity for how serious to take that comment.

David Ralph [46:08]
As as a as a strange old world. So I’m gonna waste who knows nine components again, but let’s go through slowly, because I think it is. It’s really key to this. So what’s the very first one? Yes, it is the setup. Okay. So you’ve got to have a reason why you’re actually saying it. You can’t just sort of steam into it. But you can steam into it, but it’s more effective. If he’s part of a strategy. Yeah.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [46:33]
Yeah. I mean, you want to capture attention and you want to tee up your value prop. That’s basically what you’re doing. Right? Okay. Number two, is your value prop? And that’s your answering, what is it? And hopefully, what is your brand promise?

David Ralph [46:46]
Right? Okay, I’ll get this. And number three,

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [46:49]
is your positioning. This is again, where I said, big blind spot. And it’s related to what we’re just talking about. Why is it better specifically, than the status quo or competitors?

David Ralph [47:00]
And this is when people get a bit achy? And they kind of think oh, yeah, yeah, okay. Right. So you’ve got basically got to know what your value point is, and stand firm behind it. And you can actually say, we are better than somebody else. And we’re happy to prove it. 100% Exactly. Right. Okay, for

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [47:24]
is your demonstration. Simply put, here’s how it works.

David Ralph [47:28]
Okay, okay. And this sounds like an advert will be really long, but you can whiz through this quite quick.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [47:34]
Doesn’t have to be 15 minutes to save you 15% or more on car insurance, right, that’s a GEICO one and it’s got almost all the pieces in there. Particularly if you look at the way it’s delivered, which I’m jumping ahead a little bit so let me slow my roll. demonstration is here’s how it works. And I love it in Aristotle’s rhetoric, you know, 300 BC he says, People are not fully persuaded until they consider a thing demonstrated. It is so critical that you explain to someone this is how this thing works or you show them or in you gauge in the theatre of the mind. I you know, this has a functional use in the world that will give you emotional benefits. Yes, but let me take away some of your apprehensions or doubts by showing you right here Hey See look at works just like this.

David Ralph [48:23]
Right so far. Do we do five we did five and we

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [48:29]
that would be 1234. No five is substantiation which my point kind of on the Geico example is, you know why? Why should anyone believe you? Why should anyone trust you? There’s a case to be made. And we included in audio lyrics that if you’re a national, if it is a national ad, and it’s delivered in a national medium and it’s delivered by a national host, there is transferred substantiation and trust right there.

David Ralph [48:55]
Okay. So on something like Heineken, for example, that will say yes, Heineken, probably the best lager in the world isn’t Heineken or Carlsberg? Well, one of them I can’t remember. I’m a little bit confused. But one of them says, probably the greatest writer in the world, is that does that actually substantiate anything?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [49:16]
Well, I think that actually is being clever. And if anything, that’s a positioning statement, and I feel like a bit of a dare. And so it’s being cute. And I also think it’s appealing to people for on an emotional state of like, oh, wow, these guys are being honest. They’re not trying to make this big, bold claim. They’re just standing behind the fact that they make a good lager, but I can trust them more. And so in that case, yeah, I think there’s a substantial substantiation element there, in that you’re using facts and figures. I you know, in the same way as Avis right, we’re number two and that means we try harder, so well. A roundabout way you beat me to it. Yeah, that’s substantiation.

David Ralph [50:04]
Right. So over here, we have a thing called Ronseal, which is a wood Preserve. And it just does fence panels, you make your fence better. And it’s basically the advertising slogan. It does exactly what he says on the tin. And that’s it. But it’s actually become slightly, but we say over here in the UK, we can say, yeah, it does exactly what it says in the tin is become part of our sort of vocabulary. Because I don’t have to say anything about what’s in it. It just does what it says.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [50:36]
And you know what, a lot of times, I remember looking at Audience Insights data on a research on an advertiser. Just recently, well, I guess it wasn’t that recently. But whatever time is so weird now, post pandemic, and all this stuff doesn’t really matter. Like that. That was one of the big things people are looking for. Right? So shocker, it does exactly what it says on the tin. That’s what, that’s what we want. We just want to know that it does. And sometimes that’s all they want. And if you could entertain them, too, and make them feel something, I think that’s good. But you know, we just need things to do what we need them to do. And we’ll keep buying them.

David Ralph [51:13]
Yeah, right. Number six, offer.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [51:16]
So I’ll do six, seven and eight together, which is offer scarcity and path. We break them out very specifically, because an offer can be a little bit nuanced. But just real quickly, it’s, you know, well, for all three of those offers scarcity and path. It’s like why should the listener take action and by when and for offer, it can be more than a discount? It can be that it’s guaranteed it can be that it’s free. It’s not just offer isn’t inherently $1 amount off, or a percentage off, right? For scarcity. It can be it’s running for a limited amount of time, we’ve only got so many left in inventory, some sort of compelling reason to act now it can be Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, a holiday and for the path. So offer scarcity path. So offer, what am I getting? Why should I do it? Why is it special? Scarcity? How long is it available, hopefully, there’s a limitation to that if some kind of kills would be like compounding pain, or lost opportunity. And then my path and the key on the path to is even with like something huge, unless you just know that you know that like over here we have Walmart, that something like 300 million Americans, which is there’s like 350 million Americans in the country are in Walmart every week, it’s like 250, or something like that. But a massive number of Americans are in Walmart every week. And if you’ve got in cap space, you know, they’re going to see you in Walmart. And that’s where you prefer they buy other than that, make sure you’re telling them exactly where to go and make it really, really clear and simple. So offer scarcity path at six, seven and eight.

David Ralph [53:04]
And the big one, put in a nice bow on the top number nine,

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [53:09]
yes execution. And we intentionally put it at the end, because it does not matter how you say it, until you’ve got something to say execution is for the way that we do it with scripts is does every word count. But I think it’s does every image count? Does every word count does every second count does every beat count that again, is getting back to this kind of approach you’re sensing as I’m talking about it of going? Isn’t that clever? Is it just right? Is every word punching as hard as it possibly can to maximise my point and make it as clearly as possible. But let’s come up with that. After we figured out very clearly what it is we’re going to say,

David Ralph [53:48]
Well, I love this, you can go back and you can listen to this time and time again. Now, what’s what’s the kind of audience that you actually work with? Stu? Is the only you know, is it solopreneurs? Is it entrepreneurs? Is it just big companies?

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [54:05]
You know, it started out with entrepreneurs and solopreneurs. And we still do a few of those. We’ve we’ve had the privilege. We’re grateful to continue to work with larger and larger brands that want to advertise an audio both domestically and internationally. So like Shopify, indeed, NetSuite then we’ve also got advertisers like Tommy John, where we’ve been with them from very early on and blinds.com. And Moin, Koike box.com That’s when we’re working directly with the founder. And that’s like what it was all about at the beginning. So it’s a little bit of all of those, but increasingly more larger and larger brands that are wanting to go okay, how can I really make audio work? both domestically and internationally.

David Ralph [54:56]
Okay, so what’s the best way that people can connect We view

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [55:01]
Oxford road.com. And there’s a offer special offer, they can sign up for our newsletter for free.

David Ralph [55:08]
Go over there go over there. Yes. There’s a scarcity. It’s going to be taken down by the end of the day. Yeah, I know. Exactly. Gonna get in there. Well, thank you so much for spending time with us today, joining up those dots. And please come back in when you’ve got more dots and more adverts and whatever, because I believe that by joining up the dots and connecting our paths is always the best way to build our futures. Stu, thank you so much.

Advertising Expert Stew Redwine [55:34]
You’re most welcome.

David Ralph [55:37]
Stew red wine from Oxford road looking at how to structure advertising to sell more and boost your return on income. If you want more information. The link is now on the show notes that Stu was talking about the nine components of copywriting ads that sell we’re going to be linking to that. And I found that fascinating to see that there is actually a path that you can walk that takes the listener from interest piqued their interest all the way through to taking action in as short as possible time raced up. Okay, so thank you very much for listening to this episode of Join Up Dots. If you’ve got any suggestions for future episodes, just come across the join up dots@gmail.com, email us or you can come across and leave a voicemail whatever way you want to communicate with us. Just do it and we’re flying guests back and bring the information that you want to build your dream life into the show. Okay, so thank you very much. You look after yourselves. And I’ll see you again. Cheers. Bye bye.

Outro [56:42]
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