There’s a good chance you are not familiar with the name Cliff Freeman. But, you should be. Why? He was a branding master. “Pizza, Pizza?” He’s responsible for it. “Where’s The Beef?” Yup, that, too.
Freeman passed away of pneumonia at the age of 80, and news of his passing started to trickle out in early October — first on a Sunday TODAY “A Life Well Lived” segment and on October 25 in the Tampa Bay Times, his hometown newspaper.
Broadcast media owes a debt of gratitude to Freeman.
Why? Because radio, and to a limited extent television, have largely forgotten about the art of great creative with respect to self-promotion.
Across the 1980s and 1990s, Freeman’s work became famous across the U.S. The “Where’s The Beef?” commercials for Wendy’s made a star out of the woman who uttered the line, Clara Peller — so much so that a Where’s The Beef? board game was licensed and a media tour included a visit to Scott Shannon on the WHTZ/New York Z Morning Zoo.
The Wendy’s campaign is perhaps Freeman’s most known effort — although his other work is not exactly unheard of.
Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don’t.
Almond Joy and Mounds commercials are the work of Freeman.
Freeman also wrote — and voiced — those Little Caesars “Pizza, Pizza” spots, which are famously muted in Canada to avoid confusion with the nation’s own Pizza Pizza chain.
More recently, Freeman put his stamp on silly Staples commercials.
Freeman was raised from age 6 in St. Petersburg, and is a Florida State University alumni.
In a New York magazine interview, he once compared his clients to “Davids going up against Goliaths.” As such, “You have to win with wit.”
While radio stations often aired audio versions of Freeman’s TV work, radio stations themselves rarely used such advice to market and promote themselves — aside from the goofy “Birthday Game” spots seen 35 years ago when Shannon co-hosted the WHTZ Zoo, perhaps.
Freeman ran his own New York agency from 1987 until 2009, specializing in comedic advertising.
Looking back, it’s a shame radio companies didn’t take notes, and fully understood the power of memorable or even unforgettable create. Years later, Freeman’s work is recalled not only for tag lines, but for the brands they are associated with. Wouldn’t it be great if radio, with brands as old as those “Where’s The Beef?” spots, had similarly memorable campaigns?
In a 1996 St. Petersburg Times interview (prior to the newspaper’s merger with the Tampa Tribune), Freeman was asked how his creative juices were sparked. “Who knows how this process works?” he said. “There is a discipline in that you ask yourself what is the main thing about this product that you’re selling. But I guess you’re either born with it or not.”
The Radio industry, in particular, is clearly not born with it. The No. 1 Hit Music Station doesn’t really cut it, folks.
A radio station is no different than Wendy’s or Little Caesars or Staples. It’s not about 10 songs in a row, or being the home of Ed Sheeran and Halsey in a Spotify and YouTube world. It’s about defining what the station’s biggest attract point is, and marketing it in a way that makes consumers want to come.
Scott Shannon understood this. Z100 and WPLJ shared many songs in the 1980s. But, Z100 was the home of Mr. Leonard, the place Eddie Murphy came to visit when in New York, and the station with television commercials offering a big cash payout in a free money birthday contest. Supersticker patrols during summer months saw future record industry executive Ken Lane out at the beaches, looking for cars sporting the unique Z100 logo. WPLJ may have had more variety in its music and a great morning host in Jim Kerr, but it wasn’t The Hot Rockin’ Flame-Throwin’ Z100. Marketing made Z100 shine across the 1980s moreso than its music or air personalities. Few recall that retired KCBS-AM news anchor Susan Leigh Taylor once hosted middays on Z100. But, they remember the “Free Money Tookie Tookie Bird.”
Radio must master its own marketing prowess before it can truly have a meaningful conversation with marketers about why they should invest more money in the medium if they are not doing so today.
Once this task is accomplished, we can move on from rote discussions about Reach.
If one radio group alone were to develop spots like the ones the late Cliff Freeman dreamed up, there’ll be nothing to beef about for an industry that needs a bit of an ad dollar injection.
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