The document proposes advertising campaigns to promote open evenings for Ringwood School's sixth form and lower school. For the lower school advert, it suggests using a voiceover to communicate information easily for busy parents. The sixth form advert will use a voxpop to engage year 11 students. Both adverts will air on local radio stations and include registration information. Print ads will use images to showcase sixth form and lower school experiences. Audiovisual ads will show typical student days to appeal to different audiences. Legal and ethical implications for the audio advert are considered around children, profanity and factual claims. Royalty-free music options are discussed. Regulatory bodies' rules must be followed to ensure the ads can be broadcast.
2. AIM
To increase footfall to open evenings for the Sixth Form and Lower
School.
In turn this will ensure a fully functioning year group in the new school
year with enough students to run as many courses as possible.
3. HOW?
For the lower school advert we were thinking of using a string voiceover in
order to communicate the necessary information so as to make it easy for
the parents to gage and remember within their busy schedules. We would
also include Ofsted titles and the range of activities available as part of the
Ringwood School experience as this will be appealing to the audience who
are scrutinising all of the schools nearby during their decision process.
For the Sixth Form the advert is going to be more heavily aimed at the
students as they are older and more able to make their own decision. We
will do this by using a voxpop to help the year 11s engage and imagine
themselves alongside current students. A voiceover will also be used to
present the key information to make sure that the attendance on the open
evening is as high as possible and measurable for the school before the
event.
4. TARGET AUDIENCE
Sixth Form: Majorly aimed at the students and what they would
envisage to be a good sixth form to attend (fun, student orientated,
social).
Lower School: Predominately parents as they will have more control
over the decision as their children are younger.
5. THE MESSAGE
To come to the open evenings and explore the facilities.
To register online before so the school can gage the quantity of people
attending on the two separate nights.
7. LAUNCH DATES
For sixth form – Mid October, after the lower school open evening. (so
that it doesn’t overlap), aired around 3pm-7pm, week days.
For lower school – the beginning of September, back to school, aired
around 7.15am-8.15am, weekdays.
We chose these dates after summer holidays because generally peoples
schedules would have changed (being off school/work) and also will
not be in the right mind-set to be informed about school events.
8. LOCAL EVENTS FOR ADVERTISING
Ringwood Carnival and fair – flyers and posters
Around September there several events around Ringwood town that attracts
locals and people nearby to visit. These visitors are the types of people that
we are aiming our campaign towards; they’ll most likely live in the catchment
area, familiar with the town and understand Ringwood Schools’ status.
The timing is also very appropriate as its just after the start of the academic
year.
During the carnival procession there are many opportunities to promote
Ringwood School as the audiences mostly consist of parents and younger
children. There are even several primary school floats that participate.
9. LOCATION OF RADIO STATION
Wave 105, largest station in the South.
It covers a range of audiences from children to adults. The 20 year old
station is very youthful, updated and interactive. It presents competitions,
where £10,000 is available to win and they sell tickets online for converts
such as The Rolling Stones, Ed Sheeran and the event, the Isle of the White
Festival. To get an advert on Wave 105, it would mean being next to these
huge names and hopefully be thought of as incredibly genuine and official
campaign.
Forest FM, appropriate for local listeners, the station doesn’t have huge
demand for adverts, so we would be more incline to be selected.
10. COSTS
Depending on the popularity of the station, as you are charge for how
ever many people listen. For example, it’ll usually cost around £2 per
thousand listener.
A 30 second advert can cost between £250 and £1000 a week. This can
change, subject to how often its aired a week and how many listeners
there are.
12. PRINT ADVERT
Sixth Form: By creating a collage of images displaying what life at Ringwood Sixth Form is like the audience will be able to gage the breadth of
experiences they will be likely to receive should they choose to attend. Some examples are the community life of the common room through an
image of a group of friends socialising in break and lunchtimes, extra curricular opportunities with images of events such as The Big London
Night Walk and the Senior Christmas Party as well as the interactivity of lessons across the wide range of subjects offered e.g science
experiments, discussions on literature, drama performances, teamwork in sport and freedom of creativity in artistic subjects.
This advert will be linkable to the rest of the campaign through the tagline “Enriching young minds” which will be visible on all prints and
spoken on both the audio and audio visual adverts. Furthermore we can make this advert specifically appealing to the students rather than their
parents by painting an overall picture of life at Sixth Form that the 15-16 year olds would like; aspects like the social life and independence of
being a Sixth Former becoming an evident theme throughout the collage.
Lower School: In order to display the variety of subjects and choices available at Ringwood (this idea being a valuable USP and comparison
point to other Secondary schools and previous Primary schools) we have decided to produce a series of differing images that demonstrate this
message. Each print advert will follow the same layout and theme to create synergy across the campaign, as well as the same tagline and logo
like the Sixth Form edition, yet they will be made from a selection of images showing the current students indulging themselves in their
education at Ringwood with subjects and activities that may not be offered in other places eg a Food and Nutrition course, due to the size of
the establishment.
A key aspect that we would like to focus on is the large amount of extra curricular opportunity available to the students, so after school clubs in
sport, creative subjects, drama etc, the annual production and school trips. This is because these prospects would not have been accessible in
Primary schools due to the size of the establishment and manageability with younger students, moreover in any smaller Secondary schools that
may advertise a more intimate level of education as a USP. We believe this colourful variety will entice a wide range of parents and children who
want to gain access to the broadest level of education they can.
13. AUDIO VISUAL
Sixth Form: For the audio visual section of the campaign we believe a montage of time-lapses displaying the typical day of a sixth
form student (from their point of view) would be the best way to show the audience of curious year 11s what life at Ringwood is
really like (and how good it is). This way of filming is interactive and engaging to watch and will appeal to the younger target
audience due to its modern and homemade feel that will be reminiscent of the filming styles used a lot on social media. Through
this form of cinematography we can communicate with the students in a language they know and understand, showing how the
Sixth Form is aimed at and partially ran by the young people who attend.
Moreover we can display how the students get treated like adults as they can study independently and socialise in their own
student base known as the common room (including the new café). On top of this a voiceover will be added to convey the
necessary information and link this advert to the audio and visual version as it will be the same voice, as well as the same tagline.
Lower School: In order to link both campaigns together in representing Ringwood School as a successful establishment, the same
idea will be followed for the lower school audio visual advert, however for a different reason. A montage of the students day from
their point of view will allow the parents to really see the quality of education and extra curricular activities and will give them
piece of mind as they will experience how the school really runs from the point of view of a child identifiable with their own.
Moreover there will be more of a push on fun and discovery in this version as this will appeal to the students who are scared of
‘big school’ being different to the warm environment in their primary schools, in addition to the parents who will want their
student to have access to a wide array of subjects so as to find their true interests and enjoy themselves in this new and exciting
time of growing up. Yet again a voiceover will be used to transfer the important information and link the audio-visual to the audio
and the visual (through the tagline) creating interdependence across the campaign that will be detectable for the audience as they
are exposed to the different platforms in their everyday lives.
15. LEGAL AND ETHICAL IMPLICATIONS
There are several issues that need to be considered when making our audio advert and what regulations
and restrictions there are regarding them. These topics include:
Children- Regulatory bodies such as OFCOM and ASA have strict rules regarding children and what
they can and can’t say in adverts. We plan to use students in a vox pop for our advert and as they are
under the age of 18 we will need to get their parents to fill in consent forms assuring us that they
understand the premise of the advert and where it will be shared.
Profanity- We won’t be able to use any music or voice overs that contain swearing or aggressive
language, otherwise our advert won’t be broadcast so we will need to ensure people in the vox pop
don’t swear and the music is either clean or perhaps doesn’t have any lyrics.
False claims- We need to make sure all the things said in the voice over are factual and not leading
statements or false claims. Things said in the vox pop will need to be checked but they can be more
lenient as they’re opinions and we will say so in the advert so people are aware. It is particularly
important that it is all factual as the ad (for sixth form) is being aimed at children and young people so
they may be more impressionable and take what is said more literally than an adult audience.
16. MUSIC
Music is a crucial element of the advert that will set the tone and possibly affect the
audiences’ perception of the advert. Because of this, we will need to ensure we pick pieces of
music that are appropriate for each advert. We cant use any music as almost every song is
copyrighted and we can’t afford to pay for the royalties so the options we have are:
Making our own music- the bedding track of the ad doesn’t need to be complex or have
lyrics as it is simply there to fill the empty space so we could easily make a simple tune. In
order to make this we would need to use software such as Cubase or Audition but it may
take some time to make a 2 tracks that we like and that fit our criteria.
Using Royalty Free Music- There are many websites online that have readily available,
copyright free music that we could use such as https://www.bensound.com or
http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/music.html. The downside of these sites is
that you have far less control and choice over what your end track sounds like so you are
more limited in that respect.
17. REGULATORY BODIES
In the UK, OFCOM and ASA are the two largest regulatory bodies who
ensure the safety of the general public via TV and radio broadcasting.
It’s because of these agencies that we can’t use offensive language and
children must be protected. Having looked at both websites, I found no
further restrictions beyond the ones already mentioned and if we are to
break these regulations then our ad may either be moved to after the
watershed which defeats the point of the sixth form advert as it is
aimed specifically at students so we won’t be able to access our main
target. If it isn’t moved past the watershed, then it will be removed
entirely so it is crucial that we follow these rules to ensure we reach as
many listeners as possible.