Would you think of telephone media as "America's Largest Listening Audience (News - Alert)?" It might not be the first thing that comes to mind, but that’s the claim of Advertel (News - Alert), who say that “larger than radio, television, print, outdoor -- and the Internet, telephones provide the largest, most perfectly targeted listening audience.”
In fact, company officials are so jazzed, they claim “there has never been a time in history when any media form has been as prevalent and universal as the phone. The numbers have grown exponentially, and they continue to rise.”
Advertel has been compiling business telephone listening audience estimates for more than 20 years. “There is no database like it on the planet,” they say, and some of the numbers are “absolutely staggering -- One client has an on-hold audience larger than that of the radio audiences of Rush Limbaugh and Howard Stern, combined! One client's chain of auto parts stores has an on-hold audience larger than the entire U.S. Internet usage estimates for 2005.”
And, they say, “one small retail outlet in New Jersey has an annual audience larger than the attendance at the Kentucky Derby.” Right, and they’re probably considering betting about as much money, too.
These callers, Advertel officials say, “are all primed to do business with the company they called, right at that very moment, and they're literally under their nose.”
Advertel sells it services to help improve the way clients present themselves over the telephone, “redesigning and refitting the pre-recorded portions of business telephone calls with broadcast quality, caller-friendly greetings... phone systems deserve more attention than they get.”
In a recent interview with TMC’s (News - Alert) Juliana Kenny, Paul Beran, CEO of Advertel, noted that “Callers immediately recognize the difference between royalty-free music, and songs published by name artists. When they hear something of quality that they recognize, they usually respond to it -- and often, with their checkbook. To kick this effect up a notch even further, ADS-ON (News - Alert)-HOLD typically arranges for up-close and personal interviews with the artist. This demonstrates the extent with which we’re willing to go to make the on-hold experience interesting and entertaining.”
David Sims is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of David’s articles, please visit his columnist page. He also blogs for TMCnet here.Edited by Juliana Kenny