Listeners of CBC and Radio Canada‘s Radio 2 and Espace Musique stations can expect to hear radio ads starting this fall – ad inventory that will be represented by Canadian Broadcast Sales and its Quebec-based partner Groupe Force Radio, respectively.
Jennifer Smith
Monday’s announcement also included news that Jennifer Smith was made national sales manager for Radio 2, adding to her existing role as director of sales and marketing for Western Canada.
Related
• CBC Radio 2, Espace Musique allowed to air ads
• The Stursberg Files
After the CRTC cleared the public broadcaster to begin selling ads on the stations (part of CBC’s somewhat contentious plan to offset budget cuts imposed by the federal government) Monday’s announcement confirms the timeline of the ad rollout on the two music stations.
“CBS is a large-scale prestigious firm with whom we share the same objectives,” said Jean Mongeau, general manager of the Radio-Canada Revenue Group, in a statement, “and it will ensure solid coordination of our dealings with our business clientele. This in turn will help us better align the CBC Radio 2 and Espace musique marketing strategies – a clear advantage on which we hope to fully capitalize.”
Patrick Grierson, president of Canadian Broadcast Sales, calls the soon-to-be-available inventory “unique” for being a “limited commercial environment” and for it’s audience.
“It’s a largely unduplicated audience,” Grierson told Marketing. “It happens to be demographically 25-plus, but more importantly, it has a very up-market profile – an audience largely not reached with other radio.”
While the CRTC has imposed strict limits on the volume of air time the stations can sell – four minutes every hour – Grierson said CBC and his organization want to “respect” the existing audience which, over the stations’ 40-year histories, has never heard a single ad on its airwaves.
“We’re in the very early stages of putting together this sales strategy, but clearly the intention is not to flood the station with commercials at the outset because much of the audience has not been exposed to commercials.”
