Thanks to BBC manager Stuart Thomas for sharing this. It’s a 20″ spot informing tv viewers of the snow reports available on BBC Local Radio stations.

It’s short, to the point and with obvious public service benefit.

It’s also very clearly an extremely low budget production: stock footage, a short animation probably done in half a day on After Effects, and only versioned by region in text, not in the graphics or audio.

No everything has to be lavish.

How would you like to share your wedding ceremony with a bunch of total strangers?

I can’t say it appeals much to me but in many places around the world, often for economic reasons, mass weddings in a shared venue are commonplace.

And if you have to muck-in with scores of other couples then you might at least like to know they listen to the same radio station as you.

That’s the marriage proposal from Ghana’s Happy 98.9 FM.

Happy FM’s Mass Wedding promotion is in its sixth year. The station tied the knot for a record 50 couples in 2011 and it’s set to match that this coming Valentine’s Day.

The radio station and its sponsors meet the cost of everything except shoes and rings: the ceremony, clothes, grooming, beauty treatments, honeymoon, counselling and cooking lessons. Never forget cooking lessons – the secret of a good marriage.

Happy FM’s general manager, Charles Asibey told Earshot Creative that the mass wedding started as a public service initiative but has now become a major event:

Happy FM gains talkability, point of difference and brand recognition in a particularly competitive market from this venture so it counts as a promotion in my book.

I also like the alignment between the Happy name and the innocence of this initiative.

If this was done in the UK there’d have to be some jeopardy involved. Listeners would choose who marries whom or, worse still, only one couple would get the cooking lessons.

Don’t ask me how the “number 1 sports station” positioning fits but feel free to add your own “marriage is like sport because…” joke below.

Our good friend and supporter Francis Currie from Francis Currie Consulting is after some fantastic promotional audio to showcase some of the UK’s best on air promotions designed to boost audiences and hours.

He’s looking for some audio to really help bring the reason to run ratings-boosting promotion on their stations to life – with the power of audio!

There is nothing like a bit of audio for really bringing things to life. Can you help? Do you have any audio – promos / competition rounds etc – for any of the following:

• Mystery Voices
• Secret Sound
• Three Songs (in the right order in full)
• Cash Tracks/Dream Ticket
• The Fugitive
• Rock Shop & Recover
• The Birthday Game

Here’s the team that flew the flag for Earshot in last night’s Radio Academy Christmas Quiz.

We came fourth out of seventeen and were beaten only by, er, better teams.

Left to right, we are Nik Goodman, Steve Martin, Helen Quigley, Jacob Rickard and James Stodd.

Photograph by Jonathan Jacob

Yes, we’ve rebranded a normal day of the week. It’s Invitation Tuesday, when your Earshot needs you. Here’s why:

Invitation 1

At 4pm on Tuesday 13 December we’re recording an edition of the Earshot Creative Review podcast and you’re welcome to come along and take part.

James Stodd of the BBC will be with us together with the Radio Academy’s John Myers. John recently wrote on his blog about some of the radio promos he hates. Now he’ll hear the good stuff.

You’ll need to be in Central London for 4pm on Tuesday armed with your favourite piece of promotional audio of the year.

Can you manage that? Please email steve@earshotcreative.com so I can be in touch with venue details.

Invitation 2

Than, from 6.30pm on Tuesday, James and I propose an Earshot team in the Radio Academy Christmas Quiz, in Highbury.

Jonathan Jacob can’t play because he’s helping to organise the event so there will be a couple of places open in our team. Anoraks only. Clever anoraks, actually.

Update: 0745, 9 December: we have now completed the selection process for our team which will comprise:

Nik Goodman, Helen Quigley, Jacob Rickard, Steve Martin and James Stodd.