[RADIO

When it comes to advertising innovations in radio, all roads lead to Kaye Bentley. Her radio tune-in campaigns for the Fox TV network are consistently among the most creative in the business and the most talked about. Always looking for new ways to use radio, Bentley is not afraid to take risks and try something new. She was the first to use the shortest-length commercials (two seconds) and the longest (90 seconds). She's turned ads into hourly dramatic episodes and sponsored 24 hours of commercial-free radio. Bentley, who has served as senior vp of national media, affiliate marketing, on-air planning and Fox All Access for the Fox Broadcasting Co. since 1995, is also one of the few Mediaweek All-Stars from an advertiser's in-house agency. In 21 years and 350 All-Stars—and as 2006's Mediaweek All-Star for Radio—she is one of only six to hold that distinction.Fox relies on Bentley to use radio to create buzz for the TV network and drive tune-ins to its program lineup. Fox turned to radio to help build its network brand 20 years ago and has been using radio as its primary off-air medium ever since. "It's the first [TV] network to use radio as the primary medium to get the word out. That helped turn broadcasting tune-ins into a huge revenue category for radio," Bentley says. "[News Corp. chariman and CEO] Rupert Murdoch and [News Corp. president] Peter Chernin are big believers in radio. They know how it launched this network. Every year they ask me, 'Do you have enough for radio?'" Fox spends $90 million annually on radio, making the TV network one of the top three spenders in the medium and making Bentley Fox's secret weapon. Bentley's own radio revelation came in 1980 when Lee Iacocca moved the Chrysler account to Kenyon & Eckhardt in Detroit, where she had begun her career as an executive assistant in 1972. While there, Bentley worked on a Chrysler campaign that flooded the airwaves with spots voiced by Joe Garagiola, who urged listeners to buy a Dodge, get a check. "The light bulb went off," says Bentley. "To see something working so quickly and so effectively—that was the beginning." To understand Bentley's love of the medium, go back to 1999, when radio consolidation combined with flush dot-com companies willing to outspend traditional radio advertisers made operators greedy. It was easy for stations to bump the long-standing clients for the quick dollar. At a meeting of the Radio Advertising Bureau's board of directors, Bentley called the industry on the carpet, reminding them of the advertisers that had stood by the medium in softer times. "She's a straight shooter. You better have your stuff together and know your product. You have to sell her with strong information or she'll pin you," says Rhonda Scheidel, executive vp and director of sales for Premiere Radio Networks. Adds Chris Carlisle, executive vp of marketing for Fox Broadcasting: "I call her 'Hurricane Kaye.' She's a whirlwind. Don't ever stand in her way."To Bentley, buying radio is a lot more than a nice cost per point. "I love to think about the creative ways we can use radio to cut through," says Bentley, who meets with radio groups and their creative people once a year. "With us, it's about the relationship. A lot of people spend a lot of money in radio, but a lot of them aren't getting the benefit that Fox is getting."Radio clients agree, praising Bentley for her ingenuity and marketing acumen. "Kaye has continually and without question used radio in the most creative, compelling and engaging ways. More than any other, she understands that 'predictable' soon becomes invisible," says Bob McCurdy, regional president for Katz Media's Clear Channel Radio Sales.Take Bentley's groundbreaking 2005 radio campaign for 24, the first time anyone scheduled a 13-hour countdown of radio spots and the first time anyone used 30-second ads in spot radio. The idea was to create 14 30-second "serialized" spots teasing the next spot an hour later, and leading up to the broadcast of 24 Monday evening. The countdown spots aired in addition to Fox's 60-second ads, giving Fox two spots an hour across 980 Clear Channel radio stations. Then, when many advertisers began to go with shorter spots, Bentley reversed direction and went longer with Fox's Animation Domination 90-second spot to promote the network's Sunday night comedies, King of the Hill, Malcolm in the Middle, The Simpsons, Family Guy and the premiere of American Dad. The ads were created to sound more like programming than advertising. Just this August, Bentley became the first to use 2-second spots, called "blinks," the shortest length ever to promote three of the network's returning shows, Prison Break, House and The Simpsons. Bentley compared the blinks to "pop-ups," which were paired with 60-second spots in the same hour."We believe you can't give people enough reasons to talk about you," says Bentley, a philosophy that also led to the development of the American Idol secure Web site for radio stations. Created two years ago, the Web site provides stations with sound bites from Idol, entertainment news and interviews, and other content from Fox's theatrical releases. She also created a DJ Fanatics show panel of radio personalities that love certain shows on Fox. Bentley's group sends them previews and episodes of the shows. The hosts of Kevin & Bean, CBS Radio's top-rated morning show on KROQ-FM in Los Angeles, for example, are nuts about Family Guy, The OC and 24, and talk about the shows on the air."She has the ability to predict trends. She jumps on new, innovative opportunities way before the rest of the advertising community does," says longtime friend, Rachel Elster, an account executive at KRTH-FM, a CBS Radio station in Los Angeles. "When it works, it works big."Bentley has come far from her first job as a secretary at K&E, thanks to Dave Gillespie, the CEO who himself started in the mailroom. "One day he said to me, 'I see how you work and I think you should go into media.' I took his advice and I've been on that side ever since. In my heart and soul, I'm a marketer," Bentley says. Katy Bachman is a senior editor at Mediaweek.

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