Just as the pharmaceutical industry’s ability to leverage broadcast advertising may soon face new federal constraints, recent data shows over-the-counter brands achieving stronger results from AM/FM radio than from television.
The findings come from a Cumulus Media/Westwood One Audio Active Group analysis that tracked an OTC campaign’s impact using data from The Harris Poll and Nielsen Media Impact.
According to Nielsen, adding AM/FM to the media mix increased the campaign’s monthly reach among adults 35–54 from 33% to 58% – an 80% lift. Over the same period, The Harris Poll found that brand awareness, trial, and likelihood to recommend rose significantly among frequent radio listeners, while declining among those most exposed to the television campaign.
Among heavy TV viewers, brand trial, usage, and recommendation all fell between February and July 2025, even as the brand maintained its largest-ever national television buy. By contrast, these metrics improved across all categories for radio listeners, with ad recall nearly matching television despite far smaller investment.
Early in the campaign, ad recall stood at 9.6% among heavy TV viewers versus 7.7% for radio listeners. By May and June, both audiences showed identical 14% recall; equal impact for radio at one-seventh the cost.
The study attributes radio’s effectiveness to both its demographic reach and its connection with consumers already engaged in the OTC category. AM/FM radio advertising works because the brand is “fishing where the fish are,” the report concludes. The campaign reached the vast majority of the OTC brand’s 35–54 demographic, while TV missed most of it.
According to Miller Kaplan, pharmaceutical spending on network radio is up 9.3% year-to-date through August 2025 compared to the prior year. Major pharmaceutical marketers using the medium include Pfizer, AbbVie, Bayer, Astellas, Quincy Bioscience, Novo Nordisk, and Johnson & Johnson.
The Audio Active Group has now produced nearly a dozen pharmaceutical case studies demonstrating similar outcomes.
President Donald Trump’s recent memorandum orders agencies to require fuller disclosure of risks in all drug advertising, closing a 1997 loophole that allowed marketers to direct consumers to websites for side-effect information. The directive has already triggered a wave of FDA warning letters targeting online pharmacies, influencer campaigns, and traditional broadcast spots.
