Tuning into TV

Southwest Florida is singing the tune of Goldstein, Buckley, Cechman, Rice & Purtz. The law firm’s TV commercial jingle has caught on with cheerleaders, marching bands and assorted other denizens of Southwest Florida.

"I go into meetings and I mention my name and they sing the jingle," says Jeff Rice, managing partner with the Fort Myers-based firm. "Same in courtrooms [and] when I run into somebody at the store. It’s great for name recognition, and that’s what advertising is all about."

New and cheaper technology is allowing more area restaurants, stores and other smaller companies to try their hand at TV advertising, a realm once reserved for only the largest and wealthiest businesses. Many of these ads are produced locally, with production houses and commercial-production departments at television stations using new, high-definition cameras.

"As technology evolves, you can do so much more," says David Grey, owner and president of Flame Productions in Fort Myers. For 20 years, his company has helped businesses get their messages out through television commercials. He’s created everything from the classic "screaming salesman in cowboy hat" to "classical music plus sweeping scenery." It all depends on the client’s aim.

"With a car dealer, their most important goal is to get people through the door. They want to hit you in the face [to] get you in," Grey says. "Your developers, they’re looking for you to spend between $500,000 to a million or more for a home, so they’re going after a different type of clientele. [They] need to let [clients] know about the beauty, uniqueness and amenities of the community."

Anyone thinking of making a commercial needs to fine-tune the message and know the target audience before production begins.

"A lot of times, if the message is not right and not reaching the target audience, they are wasting a lot of marketing money," says Diann Cimring, a partner and president of Firestone & Cimring Advertising, Fort Myers. "Sometimes the message can be so bad they are actually portraying a negative image of their company or business."

Business owners with deep pockets planning longer-term marketing strategies often turn to full-service advertising agencies, which can assist them with television ads as well as radio and print media. Other businesses approach TV stations directly.

"We’ll walk you through the production, from writing the script to coming out to your business and shooting [video], and then letting you give feedback. It’s your spot," says Brent Struense, the director of marketing at WFTX-TV, the local FOX affiliate. "We want to capture the essence of the business so that it makes the telephone ring and customers come through the door."

Many businesses go to local video production houses that also offer creative services, including image design, scriptwriting, music selection and more.

"If you are investing a lot of money, you need to portray yourself in the best possible light by producing the best possible commercial you can afford," says Cimring. She estimates it should cost a minimum of $3,000 for the production of a basic but polished television commercial, plus approximately $3,000 to $5,000 a month to air that commercial on broadcast stations across the five-county area.

If that sounds too steep, advertising on cable allows businesses to target their commercials to specific communities, such as Golden Gate, Cape Coral or Lehigh Acres. This can bring down airtime costs closer to $1,000 each month.

Some would-be advertisers try to cut costs by renting a camera, shooting their own commercial and then editing it themselves using desktop editing software. "It usually turns into a disaster and we have to salvage them anyway," Grey says.

Regardless of the production methods, few doubt the effectiveness of television advertising.

"It’s a very powerful medium," says Lou Hernandez, president and executive producer of Fiddler Productions in Naples. "You can kill the sound and watch just the pictures and you still understand it. You can kill the pictures and just listen to it and you still understand it."

Hernandez also is seeing more clients putting video from their TV commercials on their company Web sites, or paying to place the commercial on other Web sites. It’s a major new revenue stream for media outlets that are focusing on the Web.

Rice says his law firm will stick with TV commercials and its attention-grabbing jingle. With the 2008 Olympic Games coming up, Rice envisions future spots featuring area athletes. Perhaps he’ll persuade some of them to hum the tune themselves in those commercials.