Amy Walker

Radio Conventions

There are a number of conventions used in radio advertising which help persuade the listener to either do something, buy a product or make them aware of an event or organisation. Many radio adverts are only around 30 – 40 seconds long such as the Strepsils advert which was released in August 2011 and played on national radio stations such as Kiss FM and Capital FM.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGBOYOhZkr4&feature=related

The advert’s intentions are to promote their new sugar free lozenges by mentioning that they provide ‘up to 2 hour soothing effective relief’. As mentioned, it only lasts around 35 seconds long and is relatively persuasive for the listener and audience. It provides details of the product and promotes its ability to cure a sore throat and cold. The use of alliteration when the narrator says, ‘new Strepsils strawberry sugar free lozenges’ helps the advert stick in the listeners head as it’s highly catchy and it’s something that the radio listener would be able to remember. It’s short and simple which most radio adverts try to convey. It has a female voiceover which makes the advert appear more light hearted and applies a generally happy tone to the promotion. Unlike the previous advert, the ‘Don’t Run the Risk’ radio advert made by National Rail has a much more serious and important message to convey.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0HJ1C5IWFg&feature=related

They portray this idea by using a males voice with no other non-synchronous sound is present which

Amy Walker

relates to the initial content of the advert. By using direct addressing to the audience such as; ‘You’ and ‘you’ve’ it immediately grabs the audience’s attention as their attention in now focused on the male voiceover. Like most radio adverts, it uses a number of rhetorical questions which make the audience think and relate it to themselves if they were in the position in which they male is implying. He addresses the situation by suggesting 3 options to the listener by asking them, ‘Do you A? … B? ...or….” It puts the listener in the scenario which the narrator has just created, making them feel fear as though they were actually stuck in the middle of a level crossing. The most powerful aspect of the radio is the crash of the train hitting the car just after the male voiceover says ‘or C’. It establishes the lack of time in which the listener, if in that position, would have to make a decision before the train would be near. Overall, the radio advert is a simple, yet powerful. It makes the audience think about the situation which the male has suddenly placed them in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1CRJAySsqA&feature=related