And here comes radvertising

"Welcome back listeners, if you are planning big for an upcoming holiday , you can travel by Singapore Airlines to Hong Kong to have the time of your life...or even to Sydney, as Singapore Airlines is offering the best deal in town for its valued customers"... OR.."welcome back you all music lovers, I hope you all are aware that to enjoy the music to the fullest, you need a Sony Ericsson Walkman phone, which plays your favorite music so well that you will enjoy the time..."...Just a few of the glimpses of the new phenomena which is redefining our advertising scopes...thanks to the increased popularity of the radio channels in Bangladesh and the radio listening culture, a whole new dimension of advertisements have popped up...giving plenty of rooms for the Bangladeshi corporates to think about new ways of advertising their products and services.

The best thing about radio is that the target consumers/listener can actually be mobile and can still be connected to the radio through the mobile-phone enabled radios while walking, driving, studying whatever. The power of broadcasting that radio possesses enables to deliver targeted promotional campaigns right through the ears of the listeners to grab more and more of the mind share. And who else can do it better than Radio Foorti? The ever-getting-smarter RJs of the channel have gone a long way in contextualizing particular advertisements...so specific adverts of Singapore Airlines or Nokia or Sony Ericsson are not aired in isolation, rather it has become part of the RJ scripts...so that when the RJ is establishing a conversational ambience with the listeners, advertising snippets are intertwined in the script to entice the potential consumers....and they make it look like as if its very natural....natural radio advertising...or 'radvertising' I suppose.

And keeping in view the expansion of the radio coverage across the whole country, I sense more and more opportunities for new avenue to advertise...not only to advertise traditionally..but innovatively....that is when the RJs not only play songs and chit chat...they become the ambassadors of certain brands....so that the credibility and acceptance gets closer to the audience. Radvertising is here and it is here to stay....those companies who realized it early enough are perhaps reaping the benefits already.

Meanwhile....keep on listening to your favorite radio channel...and welcome to radvertisement.

No Chinta Do Foorti Today

Not much foorti on radio today is what Mr. Chintito wants to say in the Star Magazine. Read the whole story in the linked page to know why. I would just say what I have to say here.


Only if we could put a hold on our insatiable wants and needs and desire and expectation and complaints. Even yesterday, we didn't have any popular radio in place, now we have a few, and we have already started complaining. Neither do I work for these radio channels nor I am married to any of them, I think its a superb initiative to be the least. I also assume there is plenty of room for growth for these radio channels in terms of their content, quality and standard. But for all these, we need to nurture their efforts and encourage them.

I also sometimes make fun of the Benglish accent of few of the RJs and the way they speak in their intoxicated voice. But it is not fair to generalize the lot. After all, they have just started, they need to adjust to what the market demands and likes. Mr. Chintito also talks about the invasion of Hindi songs in the radio channels. Cultural invasion is inevitable in today's world of globalization, its better to compete head on rather than eliminating competitors. Now if you ask why does not Indian radio channels play Bangla songs, we say its because of the inefficiency of your generation. The 'old is gold' generation could not even penetrate into the music/media industry of West Bengal and now they are lamenting the invasion of Hindi songs into Bangladeshi radio channels. We should also keep in view the immense exposure these channels are giving to 'previously unknown' or 'little known' music talents from Bangladesh who sing in Bangla ofcourse. I am sure these critics would fall short from criticizing even the Band music of Bangladesh, terming it as 'noise'. So if you are in a position not to be satisfied with any dish, why cook for you in the first place.


I assume we have enough bandwidth/frequency in the spectrum to accommodate more private radio channels. We have the lowest number of radio channels in the region. I hope somebody would soon take the initiative to launch 'radio oteet', 'radio gotokal', 'radio yesterday' etc. and play songs from 50s and 60s only so that those who are bothered with 'radio foorti' and 'radio todays' efforts can keep their 'chintas' at bay.