The dog and I were out in the field this weekend. She's a Flat-coated Retriever, and she just lives to get out there and hunt. Not go hunting with me, mind you; no, she loves nothing better than hunting on her own. That old dog has great hunter's instincts, doing her best work off in the brambles, where she knows the hunting is best. While she loves to hunt alone, she also loves to bring back what she's caught, to show it off and get her reward. She's really good at what she does, and when it comes to hunting, I'm probably more of a distraction than an asset to her work. Kinda like a lot of sales managers I've seen lately.
Read More...
Online radio continues to grow as a viable category for audiences and advertisers alike.
As we plug along in our efforts to fully monetize this medium we need to recognize something critically important:
Online radio is not simply radio online.
In other words, we need to take advantage of the novel capabilities of the digital medium as we build our online radio strategies and not think of the medium simply as the over-the-air signal repurposed.
Read More...
The son of Radio parents, my first NAB convention was in Chicago, sometime around 1957; I can remember holding my father's hand as we walked the halls of the Conrad Hilton Hotel, visiting hospitality suites. This proves nothing except that I sure am old! In the years that followed, I attended many more NAB conventions (following as the Big Show moved from Chicago to Las Vegas), and participated as the National Radio Broadcasters Association convention morphed into the NAB Fall Radio Show. I've attended nearly every RAB conference, beginning with those wild events at the AMFAC Hotel and Resort in the middle of the Dallas-Fort Worth Airport; I'm certainly not the only one who never found the resort!
I've been a presenter at dozens of these meetings, served on their planning committees and, when I succeeded Radio Wayne Cornils as EVP/Meetings of the RAB, was actually in charge of both the RAB conference and RAB's sales and management programs that it supplies to the NAB conventions. I have great respect for those who plan and operate our industry's meetings. It is a tough job.
Read More...
Honesty is the best policy. I am sure everyone has heard this statement delivered by a parent, school teacher or even a minister. It is a simplistic statement that is difficult to adhere too 100% of the time because we all have fell short by exaggerating a fact or blurring fact from fiction. The ad industry has been called out on a few occasions for not being honest, with some brands even being ordered to stop advertising a particular message. Is it possible for honesty to be the best policy in an industry that is built on convincing consumers by any means necessary? Are advertisers and their ad agencies capable of being honest in everything that they do? I know I am being naïve because the advertising industry is a microcosm of America.
Read More...
In 17 years of media sales consulting, I have observed three issues that seem to rear their ugly heads repeatedly. As radio retools toward The New Radio Model with a focus on generating higher revenue, these three obstacles must be overcome:
1. Too many rookie salespeople don’t succeed.
2. Managers want their people to make more face-to-face calls.
3. Veteran salespeople are not always good at getting quality appointments with prospects.
Read More...
It is no secret that I have long been a proponent of having enough "Feet on the Street," the simple concept that a station or a cluster has to have the critical mass of sellers necessary to make enough calls to generate enough business to hit top line revenue budgets.
Recently, some of Radio's most visible groups, large and small, have chosen to plant their flags firmly in a different place, settling on the idea of reducing the overall size (and cost) of their sales teams by using senior sellers exclusively, ridding themselves of newer, less senior, lower-performing sellers and/or not hiring inexperienced sellers in the first place. Most visible among these is Clear Channel, whose Bain and Company investor/advisors have made it clear that they think newer, lower performing sellers have a bad Return On Investment (ROI.) Another group going this way is a well respected, big grossing, small market Wisconsin/Michigan operator who says, flat out, that he doesn't have the time necessary to train newbies, so he just doesn't hire any. Hey, at least he's honest about it!
Read More...
“The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer.”- Peter Drucker
Yes, radio is moving (or being pushed) towards a new business model. But, when it comes to generating revenue for The New Radio Model, the fundamentals don’t change.
Read More...
There's no doubt about it: There has NEVER been a better time to upgrade your sales staff. Previously, I've written here in Radio-Info.com that the talent pool has never been wider and never been deeper. There are MORE experienced sellers available AND more EXPERIENCED sellers available.
Read More...
When I first mentioned that phrase to a friend he looked at me like I was standing on my head. But the Internet has turned every communication medium on its ear and more than a decade after “the Web” entered our homes and daily conversations we still struggle to figure out the new business model. The process of reinvention is made more frustrating because new technologies and communication channels seem to pop up every day making yesterday’s Cinderella today’s Ugly Stepsister.
Read More...
As you may or may not know, there has been a controversy regarding this year's Mercury Awards. Tom Taylor of "Taylor on Radio" asked a thought provoking question of his readers. He asked, "Should the Radio Mercurys be about ROI, and not just creativity?" I sent the following reply to his request:
Read More...
Radio's institutions are all reacting differently to the triple-whammy of Time, Technology and Tight money. The responses that these institutions choose will obviously weigh heavily on the reactions that come from Radio. One institution that I wrote about a few weeks ago, NAB, has chosen to seek new leadership. In the meantime another, Radio and Records, decided to go ahead and jump off the Tallahatchie Bridge. Here's another, very different, example:
Read More...
In September 1994, Lowry Mays, Chairman/CEO of Clear Channel, had just completed a market visit to New Orleans. It was his tradition to gather staff together and journey around the corner to Nick’s Bar. There, he would spend time with everyone from the janitor to the jocks on the air. As I stood outside the bar, Lowry approached me in his very deliberate manner.
“Sherman, what would you think if Clear Channel would expand not only its ownership stake in Urban Radio, but at the same time, utilize the resources of the company to develop African American ownership?”
Read More...
It is time for the Radio industry to prepare to leave the NAB. Scary, I realize, but it is absolutely time to get ready. That's not to say that we should pull out immediately. It is, however, time to recognize that this, the most important of our organizations, is failing us just when we need them the most. Without a clear change in the direction and leadership at the very top, we must be fully prepared to go it alone, with a new national organization dedicated exclusively to the needs of Radio.
Read More...
This weekend I was sitting around thinking about what is happening with our economy and our country. I was trying to get inside of a crystal ball and look out to see what was happening. It was harder than it seems. But here is what I have come away with:
1) There are business PEOPLE that are doing okay. Note I did not say businesses.
2) There are things people are still shopping for
3) People are going out to dinner and movies
4) People are complacent about the price of energy
5) Duty Free Shops are tanking
6) TV as a medium is under attack
7) Newspaper.... well it is soon to be no more
8) And this is the biggie..... the radio Industry, even in these times of massive unemployment and under employment cannot attract good people.
Read More...
One of the most overused and misunderstood business terms these days is "partnership". It seems like anyone who wants our station to do a promotion calls it a partnership, and we lose sleep when our “partner's” price demand means giving the store away. What's a radio sales professional to do?
Let's go back and take a look at the actual definition of a partnership:
part*ner*ship 1: the state of being a partner 2: a legal relation existing between two or more persons contractually associated as joint principals in a business 3: a relationship resembling a legal partnership and usually involving close cooperation between parties having specified and joint rights and responsibilities (Webster)
Read More...
More than 20 years ago, Steven Covey famously said, “Begin with the end in mind.” More than half a century ago, in the years after World War Two, two German sociologists came up with an equation that nearly perfectly describes the path to the “end” that all good managers should be seeking:
**Job Clarity = Job Satisfaction**
If you remember third-grade math, you know that an equation is true in both directions: 2+2 = 4 is also 4 = 2+2. Thus, Job Clarity = Job Satisfaction is just as true when presented as Job Satisfaction = Job Clarity.
Read More...
As I told you, Step Number One, Reestablish the Relationships with your Top Clients, is the most important of the Five Steps I'll be giving you in this Radio-Info series, "New Tricks from an Old Dog." However, to be quite honest, this one, Step Number Four: Settling Old Scores, is, for many of us, going to be the most fun! Serious, but fun. Serious fun.
As an industry we’ve taken a real drubbing from many quarters in the last few years. Frankly, quite a bit of the bad ink we’ve gotten has been deserved; we do have to get our house in order. Much of what we have done in the years of consolidation has been wrong-headed. However, virtually no one of consequence is predicting the death of local Radio; we have a strong future if we handle it correctly.
Read More...
Here’s a nasty truth that often doesn’t show itself until way too late in the game: You understand that you, as managers, through no fault of your own, have little experience dealing with really tough times. We’ve established that and I think most of you get it. Concurrently, you see that the same is true for lots of your staffers, especially sellers. But what about your systems, the account tracking, activity monitoring, personality profiling, yield and contact managing programs and devices that sometimes we get to use like management light sabers and other times get under your skin like a third grade tattle-tale?
Think about this: One of the measures that virtually all GMs, DOSs and SMs take into account when looking to balance their sales strategy, is sell-out level. Lots of inventory pressure means one set of tactics, while lower pressure on inventory requires other, different techniques. However, what if there is almost NO pressure on inventory? I assure you that in lots of markets across America, there IS almost no inventory pressure. I mean, have you ever in your life heard so many PSAs detailing the “Seven Deadly Signs of Hemorrhoids?”
Read More...
Let’s begin by asking two important questions:
• What SHOULD my customers buy?
• What WILL my customers buy?
We’re all big kids in here. We know that what our customers should buy is often at odds with what they will buy. This is, of course, sometimes directly related to the “Agencies Suck” discussion we just had in the first of these "New Tricks" columns. You bring a client a KILLER idea and the agency wants to break it down into little tiny analyzable pieces, proving that, “your cost per point is WAY outta line, Mister!” That’s one of the critical reasons that you need to be talking directly to the client. Not to convince them to buy something expensive, but to convince them to buy something that is RIGHT!
Read More...
Lindsay Wood Davis, a Radio Sales & Management consultant, has put together a five-part series for Radio-Info.com, on the how to manage more effectively and accomplish more, in difficult economic times. Read part one, here:
Read More...
It was only a few months ago when those who used the word “recession” were chastised. The critics would respond with “Negative talk is to blame” or “We’re not going to take part in the recession.” That may have worked in past recessions, but not this one. Today everyone is looking for any evidence that everything will be OK again and we can get back to normal.
Most clues indicate that’s not going to happen anytime soon. (1) The Recession will affect everyone to some extent and (2) When Radio “comes back,” it isn’t going to be the same. Just like the larger economy, growth wasn’t backed by cash in the bank but by borrowing. Radio groups are burdened with insane amounts of debt with market caps below the value of a company’s real estate alone. The cash flows are being halved and station multiples are at 5x.
Read More...
I have had the opportunity to work with radio stations in two markets where PPM is now the law of the land. The first in Houston and the other in Dallas. StarCall conducted telemarketing in those markets, specifically to try to gauge what impact outside marketing would have on the PPM. Would the impact show instantly? What type of specific benefit for listening would be most effective? Could the ratings really be impacted during a very short campaign? Could the ratings be impacted with a small budget? What effect might this have in the future with regard to spot prices, rating point estimates, cost per point and the overall success for the advertiser as well as the station?
Read More...
