Campaigns have wasted millions of dollars in failing to understand what it takes to guard against the preemption of spots -- that is, to guarantee that spots run.

Most stations utilize two classes of time: non-preemptible (or fixed) and preemptible.

Because of an increased awareness to the potential for saving money in the buying process (in part because of LUC Media's political success), many media buyers attempt to place the buy at the lower, preemptible rate.

Then, as demand increases, stations tell buyers that they should pay "fixed" (non-preemptible) rates in order to clear, or worse. To make their point, the stations simply preempt many of the spots in a buy.

At that point, many firms generally pay the higher (often much higher) fixed rates, believing that they are now "invulnerable" to preemption. They could not be more wrong.

Many buyers believe that they have to pay higher, non-preemptible rates in order to guarantee clearance. Further, they believe that once they pay non-preemptible rates, they cannot be preempted.

In both cases, quite the opposite is true.

It is generally not necessary to pay a non-preemptible rate to guarantee that spots run. Moreover, even where orders are placed at non-preemptible rates, preemptions still occur. Sometimes, if “oversold” a station will simply preempt a "non-preemptible" spot. More often, a station will simply not accept the order. Unfortunately, in the fast paced media environment we operate in, some buyers will not discover that spots did not run until well after the scheduled airdate or until after the ad campaign has completed.

LUC Media maintains constant, on-going communication with the sales and traffic departments of all stations. Oral and written confirmation of placements, monitoring public files and daily verification of actual spot placement times are just some of the tactics this company uses to make sure spots run- regardless of price.

As a result of a thorough understanding of the law, as well as knowledge of station practices regarding commercial and political advertisers, LUC places a buy well-armed. The result: get good rates, and spots that run.

Some stations that only have preemptible and non-preemptible time will try and drive advertisers to higher levels of rates to avoid paying political advertisers LUR rebates. What they fail to do is disclose is that there are "intermediate" rates which can be paid to decrease the chance of preemption and yet still qualify for the LUR rebate.

By law, stations are required to disclose extensive information about station policies, preemption priorities and alternative rotations to political advertisers. We use that information for all our clients and all our clients see a benefit.

LUC Media reads disclosure statements very carefully and asks for clarification or explanation of policies where necessary. It can be confusing (do not try this at home), so perhaps this concept can best be illustrated through an example of what we do for political clients:

For the early news, a station discloses its lowest preemptible rate as $1000, and its fixed rate as $1700. At the beginning of the 60-day window (early September), candidates begin placing buys. The first week, spots placed at $1000 clear. The second week, the station informs candidates that the market is really getting "tight" and that for future buys, it would be safer to pay the fixed rate of $1700. On Thursday of the second week, the station tells the candidates that the early news spots ordered for Monday and Tuesday were preempted. At that point, most candidates place all future orders at the fixed rate of $1700 for the early news, and probably buy at the fixed rate for other dayparts as well.

For LUC Media, however, the questions are just beginning:

• What is the lowest-priced spot placed for the early news next week?
• How many commercial spots are in at rates higher than $1000, but lower than $1700?
• What are our chances of clearing at, say $1200? $1300? $1400, etc.?

Some in our business respond to station sales schemes by saying, "well, the stations say that it will take fixed rates to clear; we need to place the buy and not be concerned about whether the spots will clear." A client should not have to worry about whether spots will clear.

This is the job of the media buyer.

Nor should the client have to pay a premium -- in some cases a 10-50% premium, costing hundreds of thousands of dollars -- in order to "not worry about whether spots will run."
By making sure that stations comply with the law, by closely monitoring clearance rates, traffic and other practices, LUC Media makes sure spots run while saving clients hundreds of thousands of dollars in the process.