Awareness. Performance. But What About What Happens in the Middle?
Brand and Performance. Different channels. Different goals. But that’s where most plans fall short — they miss what happens in between.
Kerre Woodham Mornings. 9AM – 12PM Weekdays on NewstalkZB with Pinnacle Life. A trusted voice. A credible platform. A clear, consistent presence. It’s not just about awareness. When brand shows up like this, performance follows.
Most marketers treat radio like it’s background noise. Something nice to have. A brand box ticked. An awareness exercise.
But we’ve seen something very different play out.
Over the last 2 years, we’ve had a front-row seat to what happens when you combine smart media buying with well-placed sponsorship. In one case, a long-standing radio campaign suddenly started punching above its weight.
Radio is supposed to build awareness.
Search is supposed to drive action.
But when you treat those channels like they’re on separate planets, you miss what happens in between.
From Airtime to Action: The Radio + Search Connection
We analysed the timing of radio spot placements and compared it with real-time Google Search activity.
The result? A clear, consistent correlation.
Whenever the radio ads ran, we saw a lift in brand-related search — more people looking, more people curious, more people taking action. This alone is good. But when we added in the sponsorship layer — specifically weekday integration with a trusted host and credible platform — things changed again.
The lift wasn’t just linear. It was amplified.
This wasn’t a case of “more impressions, more exposure.” It was about association. When a brand is given the mic by a host that listeners trust — especially in a mid-morning slot when attention is high and distractions are low — it does something to perception. It legitimises. It familiarises. It builds momentum.
Sponsorship Isn’t a Nice-to-Have. It’s a Force Multiplier.
The media plan hadn’t changed dramatically. The budget hadn’t ballooned. But the sponsorship shifted gears. It turned a solid media channel into a performance catalyst.
It’s not that sponsorships magically make people buy. But they do make people care. They make them remember. And when you pair that with a performance engine like Search, you start to see the kind of compounding effect most marketers only dream about.
Don’t Just Buy Media.
Own it.
Radio can be great. But radio with context, consistency, and credibility — that’s when things get interesting.
If you’re already spending in the channel, ask yourself this:
Are you just filling space… or are you creating meaning?
Because the moment you stop treating sponsorship like a logo placement and start treating it like a strategic lever, you’ll see what we’ve seen:
It stops being just airtime — and starts driving real action.
Want help finding your own multiplier effect?
Let’s talk. We know what to look for — and what to layer on.
