Radio media buying case study: twice the spots on nearly the same budget

What was wrong with the station-sold radio schedule?

Nothing looked wrong on the surface. A station representative sold the client 290 spots across two FM stations for $28,000. But that schedule reached 124,400 women 35–54 only 8.5 times on average, at $234.31 per rating point, because the spots were bought at an average rate of $96.55 each.

What the station-sold schedule delivered

The bank's schedule had been planned by a station representative going direct to the client. A station representative is paid to sell that station's inventory, so the schedule they build is a proposal from the seller, not an independent evaluation of what the budget could buy. The bank brought the same budget, the same two stations and the same target audience to Creative Options.

How did radio media buying change the results on nearly the same budget?

Creative Options' radio media buying rebuilt the buy on the same two stations, KSCS-FM and KTYS-FM, for $28,175, just $175 more. Our re-planned schedule cut the average spot cost from $96.55 to $46.57, which more than doubled the spots and gross rating points and lifted both reach and frequency.

What the re-bought schedule delivered

A note on the original PDF: in the station-sold table, some station rows repeat the Creative Options values (GRPs, effective reach, cume). The station-sold totals are correct, and each station's cost per point ($232.26 and $238.10) implies 77.5 and 42.0 GRPs. This page uses only the totals and the per-spot rates, which reconcile.

How price per point produced the result

Frequency Is King is Creative Options' proprietary radio buying method. Its goal is simple: set the frequency floor first, then buy as much reach as the budget carries. The lever that reached that goal here was price per point. Every dollar saved per rating point becomes more spots, more frequency and more reach, without adding budget. The chain in this case: the average rate per spot fell from $96.55 to $46.57, which bought 605 spots instead of 290, which lifted gross rating points from 119.5 to 285.5, which delivered 18.0 frequency and 140,600 net reach instead of 8.5 and 124,400.

Where the savings came from

The biggest lever was price per spot, on both stations (see the rate rows in the table). Same stations, same audience, nearly the same budget: the difference was who planned and bought the schedule.

Same two stations. Same audience. Nearly the same budget. More than twice the airtime.

This result was produced using the same documented system.

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What do radio cost per point and frequency mean for a schedule?

Cost per point is what it costs to reach one percent of your target audience one time; lower means each dollar reaches more of them. Frequency is the average number of times each person hears your ad. They are the two numbers radio media buying is judged on: whether a schedule is priced well, and whether it is heard enough to work. In this case both moved together. Both come from the same audience ratings, as the SRDS cost-per-point calculator and the Museum of Broadcast Communications explain.

Why did the station-sold schedule cost more per point?

In this case the stations, the audience and the budget were all fixed, so the whole gap came from the price and mix of the spots: $28,000 bought 290 spots from the station representative, and $28,175 bought 605 from Creative Options. A station representative sells that station's inventory; an independent buyer works for the advertiser and is judged on the audience the budget buys.

The rates came from Frequency Is King, Creative Options Marketing's proprietary media buying methodology, and the specific levers behind each rate aren't published. The original comparison records the result of that buy. What it does show is the size of the gap: on identical stations, the same audience cost less than half as much per rating point. See how we approach media planning and buying, and our guide to increasing ROI with radio advertising.

Is the price you pay per spot more important than the ad itself?

For most local radio buyers, yes, at first. Industry guidance focuses on creative and frequency, and research on radio recall supports that. But frequency is bought, not written: this schedule more than doubled frequency without changing a single word of copy, because the price per spot fell by more than half.

The common view is that the ad matters more than how often it airs. A 2025 peer-reviewed study in Cogent Business & Management (DOI 10.1080/23311975.2025.2480474) supports part of that: across four experiments, how ads were varied and repeated changed what people remembered, and familiar brands gained more from varied ads than from one ad repeated. That's true for a schedule that already meets a minimum frequency. Most local schedules don't: a 2026 Cumulus Media | Westwood One and RAB study found agencies and radio sellers estimate 33 weekly ads to reach two-thirds of a station's audience when about 51 are needed. The strongest counter-argument to our view is that a station rep knows their own inventory best and can protect key placements. Both hold. But average frequency hides the spread: on the station schedule only 11.3% of women 35–54 reached effective frequency, versus 14.3% on ours, at less than half the cost per point. Fix the buy first, then judge the ad.

Limits: when does this result apply?

• It measures audience delivery, not sales. The comparison uses ratings-based estimates (reach, frequency, gross rating points), not calls, visits or revenue.
• One market, one audience, one period. Two Dallas–Fort Worth FM stations (KSCS and KTYS, now KTCK-FM), women 35–54, and a flight between 2003 and 2008. The dollar amounts are that era's rates, not today's; the ratio between the two schedules is the finding that transfers.
• The constraints we worked within: the budget was held essentially flat, the station list could not change (KSCS-FM and KTYS-FM), and the target audience stayed women 35–54. All the improvement had to come from how the same airtime was bought.
• The tradeoff: the bank spent $175 more ($28,175 versus $28,000, about 0.6%). For a bank that wanted more frequency, that small increase bought 315 more spots.
• Who this does not predict success for: advertisers buying a single spot or a one-week flight (too little volume to negotiate), advertisers who need a fixed position such as a sponsored traffic report (fixed positions trade price for placement), and brands whose radio problem is the ad itself rather than the buy. For those, fix the creative or buy streaming audio with precise targeting first.

The transferable lesson

Price per point sets how much frequency your budget can buy, and frequency is what gives the ad a chance to work. Before you sign a radio or TV schedule, ask for four numbers: total gross rating points, net reach, average frequency and cost per point for your target audience. If the seller can't provide them, you can't compare the buy, and you probably aren't getting the best one. That comparison is where better radio media buying starts. For TV pricing, see what TV advertising costs in Denver.

Radio media buying FAQ