Making Radio: ProComm

Nobody likes to give away all their secrets, but I'm about to give one away: ProComm.

ProComm, which is located in North Carolina, is often my first choice among radio and voiceover production companies. (Yes, we might be based in Las Vegas, but we really, really like ProComm.) So do a lot of other people: Time Magazine, Disney, and MasterCard among them.

ProComm was one of the first production companies to pool its voice talent from other markets like Los Angeles, New York, Minneapolis, Miami, and Atlanta and then offer clients (people like me and my clients) an opportunity to screen them online. All the production participants (technicians, talent, and producers) are then patched in from various locations, allowing people like me to call in and effectively produce a national-caliber spot (whether it's local, regional, or national).

You never really appreciate such a tool until you have a very bad cold like I did about a month ago. We had a very busy production schedule with eight spots as part of a multi-market campaign for one of our favorite clients. At a walk-in studio, I would have had to reschedule the entire job or send someone else to produce the spots and hope for the best. Not so with ProComm. I climbed out of bed for a few hours each day and got to work — at home.

The quality is outstanding. Time after time, ProComm has demonstrated it keeps pace with our scripts. In fact, just last night (although I was teaching), the same client I was producing spots for about a month ago was recognized for its "Summer Gas Prices" spot that aired last summer. It received an IABC/Las Vegas Bronze Quill award for communication excellence in radio.

The client is Black Gaming, better known for its three resorts CasaBlanca, Oasis, and Virgin River located in Mesquite, Nevada, which is about 90 minutes north of Las Vegas. It's owned by Randy Black, one of the nicest and most authentic resort owners in the gaming industry (he also plays himself in the spots, which were recorded locally by Dave Martin).

The spot that won last night was the joint concept between myself and Scott DeAngelo, vice president of marketing for all three resorts. Scott noticed a trend last summer that people where reluctant to travel as far due to the perception that gas prices were just too high (prices were well over $3 per gallon in Las Vegas). So, based on that idea, he let us run loose to write, cast, and produce several spots that pitted Black, the "people's resort owner," against "greedy oil companies" who were, in effect, preventing people from taking a vacation. Add to this concept three great resorts for the right price, and you have everything you need to produce results.

While I won't share the entire case study here, I will offer up that the spot drove occupancy to record levels (about 10 percent higher) than previous years during the same tracking period and received some fine compliments from, believe it or not, other resort owners and marketing directors. Unlike many competitions, results are an important factor in the IABC/Las Vegas Bronze Quills.

So, kudos all around. A great product, a top marketing guru, creative scripts, great production, solid talent (including Randy Black and ProComm professionals), and a smart media buy (also DeAngelo's handiwork), and it's easy to win. No, I don't mean win awards: I mean win customers, which is really what it is all about.