Leadership Lessons

Leadership Lessons

by | Nov 6, 2023 | Sound ADvice, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

What does it take to be a leader?

That question was asked of myself and a couple dozen others this summer at a half day retreat our company held in August.

The answers were plentiful and good, as most of us were in a leadership position.  Some of us had a leadership title with people that reported to them, while others were leaders due to the work they did or how they performed.

One topic on the subject of leadership was sent out to subscribers to my Sound ADvice newsletter and it goes like this:

Are you a boss, or are you a manager?

When you approach the definition of the word boss or manager as a noun, they basically mean the same thing. However, when approached as a verb, they have drastically different meanings.

 

As a verb, Webster’s dictionary defines “boss” this way, “to order about in a domineering way”.  A “manager” is defined as, “to handle or direct with a degree of skill”. It even adds in, “to treat with care”.

Poor customer service is often the result of interaction with people working for a boss who is not happy with their situation. Strong, professional, and polite customer service comes from employees working for and with someone who is a manager.

The most successful managers today hire people who have a passion to do their jobs to the best of their ability…these people don’t need a boss. These people need a manager who will give them access to the tools, training, people, resources, and environment that allows them to perform to the best of their ability.

So, if you’re a manager, here’s an idea. Instead of giving your people a “to-do” list, try asking them to give you a “to-do” list. What do they need you to do to help them be more productive or deliver better customer service?

In our Twelve Ways to Create Happy Employees, number seven is “360-degree feedback”…asking your employees how YOU are doing.

 

Zig Ziglar said, “You can get whatever you want as long as you are willing to help others get what they want.”  It’s also been said that “You can be as successful as you want if you are willing to let others take the credit.” 

If you look honestly into a mirror and ask yourself, “Am I a boss or a manager?“, what would you answer?

If you’re a boss, are you ready to quit being the boss and become the facilitator or manager of your team’s success? A culture where the “boss” works for the staff and the staff works for the customer can create a successful company without anyone working for the company!

Happy employees will deliver happy customers.

If you would like to see the Twelve Ways to Create Happy Employees, click here now and start making happier employees, more satisfied customers, and more money!

For close to 10 years, I have worked for Federated Media and most of those years I got to work as a member of the advertising sales team for radio station WOWO. Then for close to 4 years, I got to lead the WOWO sales team and then took on the General Sales Manager position for 3 more stations.

Now again I am back to my first love of marketing consulting and advertising sales.  During those management years, I learned how challenging it is to be a boss, a manager, a leader with the title and consistently do a good job for your team and your bosses.

For those of you who are in that role and doing everything you should be doing I salute you.  If you need any help, or guidance, I have some recommended books and podcasts, just reach out to Scott@ScLoHo.net

If you would like to receive my Sound ADvice weekly newsletter, send me an email to Scott@ScLoHo.net.

It’s Not Just The Facts Ma’am

It’s Not Just The Facts Ma’am

by | Oct 30, 2023 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, Sound ADvice

First a few facts…

We’ve gone thru a challenging number of years in the political world as divisions between Republicans and Democrats have become more prominent, at least at the national level in our country.

Those on the left accuse those on the right of not telling the truth and those on the political right accuse those on the left of not telling the truth.

Both sides accuse the news organizations they don’t like as Fake News.

As someone who knows how media works and who observes all of this on radio, TV and online, I can not only see the biases, but I also understand the why’s behind them.

But I’m not going to go all political on you right now, I’m just going to use that as an example of Facts versus Emotion.

We may think we operate and make decisions based on logical facts but most of us are actually ruled by emotion and then we find the facts to support what we believe.

There’s another part of this that relates to how customers decide what to buy that subscribers to my Sound ADvice newsletter read about recently and I’ll share it right now.

Some consumers make purchase decisions based on relationships and some make them purely on price. They are referred to as either relational or transactional customers.

If your business sells on price alone, this information may not pertain as much to you. If you would like to sell more on relationships, pay close attention and heed this information.

Chris Lytle, author of The Accidental Salesperson, says “If you become known for what you know instead of what you sell, buyers will come to you for help and advice instead of the lowest price.” The good news is that they will pay you more for your knowledge than they will for just the product!

Chris goes on to explain “To become known for what you know, you have to actively market your knowledge instead of your product.”

A group of hugely successful auto parts stores created a strong market position in the DIY category by promoting and exploiting the knowledge of their employees. They had employees who loved Ford and others who knew Chevy, Chrysler, or Dodge inside and out. Even some who were more specifically knowledgeable about the older “muscle cars”. This knowledge took the focus off the price and put it squarely on the fact that they had people with the knowledge, and they had the parts!

As they say, knowledge is power, and the more knowledge you are perceived to have, the more people will look at you and your company as the “experts”.

In the 10 Ways to Market Your Knowledge, the author suggests, “Have an FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) page on your website. Monitor the questions your customers are asking and publish your answers clearly in layman’s terms. Allow your prospects and customers to ask questions online, and always be prompt in posting your answers. Most importantly, take credit for your answers and make sure the public recognizes that the answers came from you.” 

Click here if you would like to see the 10 Ways to Market Your Knowledge. 
If you would like to receive my Sound ADvice weekly newsletter, send me an email to Scott@ScLoHo.net.
A few more thoughts on Relational versus Transactional customers:
Transactional will usually only be loyal to you as long as you are the lowest price.  That’s a losing game because there is always someone else that can underprice you, even if they do it as a loss just to gain that customer.  It’s called a loss-leader.
Relationship based customers are going to be less sensitive to increases in price.  Just the other day when I was stopping to pick up my breakfast, I heard them tell a customer that the prices had gone up 20% and they said that’s fine and paid the new price.  Relationship based customers are also more forgiving when there is a problem and you explain to them the situation.
I urge all of my business owner friends to pursue the Relationship based customers, they’re the ones that will keep you growing in business.
One more fact to share with you and that is starting today, I am returning to a weekly schedule for publishing and podcasting due to changes in my schedule and the requests from readers and listeners.
Duty Calls

Duty Calls

by | Sep 25, 2023 | Really? The Personal ScLoHo, ScLoHo's Media, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard

When you are good at something and recognized as being good at it, but you’ve stepped away from it and now the challenge to return to it comes up, what’s your response?

That’s the position I found myself in earlier this month and it’s a position that I’ve been in before.

For nearly 10 years, I’ve worked for Federated Media in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  I began as the 5th person on a 5 person sales team for radio station WOWO.

That was going to be my final job, however at the tail end of 2019, our company underwent some changes in upper management and my boss, Ben Saurer who had served as the General Sales Manager for WOWO radio was promoted to Vice President/General Manager of all of the Fort Wayne Federated Media radio stations.  This created a very important opening, actually a couple of openings that needed to be filled as Ben had been the General Sales Manager for both of our talk radio stations; News Talk WOWO & Sports Talk WKJG AND he was filling in as the General Sales Manager for WBYR, our rock station.

Even though I didn’t have ambitions to return to a management role, after careful consideration, prayer and encouragement from my sales teammates, I applied.  After a nationwide search was conducted, Ben offered me the position which I accepted to lead WOWO.

WOWO has been the “big dog”.  We brought in more revenue than any of the dozen stations in our company and we knew that we were also the leader of all the 25 or so local radio stations.

Honestly, as I was interviewing with Ben for his old job, I told him it was going to be a tough decision for him to make.

See in 2019, I lead not just the WOWO Sales Team of 5, but I was selected as the Account Manager of the year for the entire company.  1 out of 40 or so sales people.  Not bad for starting out at zero when 2014 began.

The decision Ben had to make was to take his top salesperson out of sales and put me in management, or keep me where I was.

The skill sets are similar but the application is very different between sales person and sales manager.  If you are considering a sales management role, or are in that position right now, I recommend you buy a copy of my friend Mike Weinberg’s new book The First Time Manager: Sales.  I was on his launch team and got a preview copy and it’s excellent. I bought a copy too which I am giving to Ben.

So Ben makes the tough decision and I took over as the General Sales Manager 1 month before the pandemic shut down our country in early 2020.  We are working remotely for 3 months and scrambling to figure out what adjustments to make because it wasn’t what they originally promised… a two week shut-down to flatten the curve.

Low and behold, when 2020 was over, WOWO and our other stations survived, better than had been expected. As I continued my position as the General Sales Manager of WOWO in 2021 and 2022 we faced what a lot of companies faced.  Shortages, but ours was the people kind.

About a year ago, one of our other sales managers moved to a sales person position because their talents were better than any of the candidates we’d been interviewing.

That manager was overseeing three stations and about a month after they joined my WOWO Sales Team, I took over as the interim General Sales Manager for those stations too in addition to WOWO.

This summer I went on a hiring spree to add two more salespeople to the stations I was temporarily overseeing.  Last month and this month those two salespeople began and will be selling for our rock station.

In the meantime, we also hired a new General Sales Manager for those stations I was overseeing for the past year and he begins in October.  He’ll do fine, he spent most of his 25+ years working in management and with Federated Media.

Another change, and this is the reason for the title of this today, Duty Calls, I am switching gears and returning as a Senior Sales Person for WOWO.  Try as we might, we have been challenged with having a full team of sales people on WOWO the past 18 months and it’s time for me to step in and fill that role again.  As far as I know, Ben is going to be doing both jobs of V-P/General Manager for Federated Media Fort Wayne; AND overseeing the WOWO sales team.

As Duty Calls me to help in a sales role again, I look forward to helping more businesses invite our listeners to become their customers and you’re likely to see me out of the office a lot more than I’ve been since 2020 and I look forward to it.

No longer will I refer you to someone else on the WOWO sales team, I’ll get to work with you personally just like before.

300 Media and Marketing Tips… Maybe

300 Media and Marketing Tips… Maybe

by | Aug 20, 2023 | ScLoHo's Media, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

For those of you who are reading this and wondering what’s the deal with the number 300, I’ll tell you.  If you are listening to this podcast, you already have a clue from the introduction I gave.

Since 2017 I have written, created, produced and published the Scott Howard Genuine ScloHo Media and Marketing Podcast and the audio version of what you are reading or listening to is episode #300.  If you’ve never listened, that’s fine too.  This is article #1584 that I’ve published on my website ScottHoward.me.

When I started publishing stuff online, on my own webpage it was in 2004, before Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or any of the other social media platforms that are popular today were even launched.  Google offered a free blogging platform and I created a personal blog, and a separate media and marketing blog. both of these were being updated daily.  I created a couple other specialized blogs and by 2011, after 7 years I had created and published over 11,000 articles all under the online moniker of ScLoHo.

When my friend Kevin challenged me to create a name for myself online with a real website, I took a couple of months to plan and then purchase a domain and build out this website.  Scott Howard dot com was already taken and so I used the dot me domain.

I imported most of the blog articles to the new website and continued writing and publishing every day.

Eventually I decided to slow down and focus more on quality instead of just quantity of content.  None of this was for profit.  Never made a dime directly from anything I wrote, and kept the content and webpages ad-free.   The benefit I was getting was the creative outlet and I was able to get noticed online and offline, so it helped me build my reputation and community.

When I started blogging nearly 20 years ago I worked full time for a group of radio stations and stayed with that company for 8 years.  I left to join a website development company and left that to return to radio and left radio again to work full-time in social media for a multi-million dollar international eCommerce company.  That last job I got because of my 9 pervious years of doing this kind of thing on my own.  Self- taught? Perhaps, but it was more of a process of self-educated, reading and learning and experimenting and talking with others.

Nearly 10 years ago I decided to return to the radio world and this time it was with Federated Media and WOWO radio.

I continued to write and publish but sometime ago decided to go from 7 days a week, to 5 days a week and eventually once a week.

It was Fall of 2016 when two of the Federated Media Sales Managers approached me asking if I had time and interest in doing a podcast on advertising.  It was a new initiative at Federated Media and they were aware of my background behind the microphone as a broadcaster, my experience in sales and my current weekly writings on my own website.  I suggested doing an audio version of what I was already writing and that set the stage.

Looking back I created the first 6 podcasts in December of 2016 but we had a management change and it wasn’t until a few months later the podcast was launched as a weekly companion piece to what I was writing and publishing.

At the beginning of 2020, my position changed and I stepped into management with Federated Media and then nearly a year ago took over two more stations in our company and decided it was time to slow down a little more.  At the end of 2022, I announced that instead of weekly updates, I would publish monthly.   Sometimes more often like this month, but once a month was going to be the standard.

Which brings us to today and the 300th episode of the Scott Howard Genuine ScLoHo Media and Marketing Podcast.

So many others have started an online project like I did and simply quit or lost interest.  There are plenty of others who launched a podcast and then quit after a few episodes.  My friend Steve was amazed at the longevity of my continuing to do this month after month, year after year.

Those 300 Media and Marketing Tips that I mentioned in the title… review the podcasts and you’ll find them, or search the ScottHoward.me website and there are a few thousand tips. For now, I’m going to start planning next months update as we continue

Timely Marketing Principles That Are Timeless

Timely Marketing Principles That Are Timeless

by | Jul 30, 2023 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Media, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

It’s been two full decades that I’ve been in the advertising, media and marketing world in Fort Wayne, Indiana, non-stop.

During the past twenty years, there have been a lot of changes in technology and how the world operates.  However, no matter what the technological advances, there are certain principles that you can follow to be successful.  You just need to see how to apply them to whatever your marketing options are at the moment.

First a little backstory.  In was 25 years ago this month of August, that I moved back to my hometown after my Dad passed away and I thought it was going to be for a couple of months to help my Mom downsize and move to a smaller place.  But I neve left.  Instead I got married again, and my wife and I have moved a few times, all on the northeast side of town including our last move 9 summers ago that was half a mile from our old home.

My media and marketing background is much longer than 20 years.  I was a teenage radio disc-jockey and pursued that career path for 10 years before moving my family to Detroit and working in the advertising side of the radio business.  I left radio in the mid 90’s and know how to drive a fork truck, run a tool crib and operate a thermoformer.  At least I did until technology changed and improved processes with automation.

April 2003 was my return to radio advertising and I took a whole, big-picture consultive approach.  While I earned my money from the advertising I sold, I really wanted to help businesses succeed and that was more of a motivating factor than money for me.

The past two decades, I’ve worked in radio, also website development, a niche newspaper, and was the social media voice for a multi-million dollar e-commerce company.  I mention my background not because I’m bragging, but to give some substance and add some credentials to what I’m sharing.

The Timely Marketing Principles That Are Timeless transcend the limitations of technology and get to what is the most important.

What is the Most Important?

Human Relationship Marketing Principles.

  1. Your Reputation Matters.
  2. People Need to Know About You Before They Will Spend Money With You.
  3. It’s Best to Be Known BEFORE You Are Needed
  4. That last one, it’s all about Top Of Mind Awareness.
  5. Build Relationships With People, not machines.
  6. We Want To Trust, so Don’t Blow It.
  7. If You Do Blow the Trust Factor, Apologize and Make it Better.
  8. Everyone is either a potential Customer or person that can refer potential Customers to YOU.
  9. Value is the sibling of Trust.

Apply these 9 Principles to what ever you do to market your business and you’ve established a foundation for success.

Now here’s a few more Timeless Tips:

The environment of your message matters. Take the old-fashioned standby of roadside billboards. If you are a roofing company looking to sell metal roofs to homeowners, the wrong place for your message is probably the sign next to the 40 year-old apartment complex.  A better location could be the road that the exclusive golf course is on.

The content of your message matter.  Don’t yell and shout at your potential customers in a radio ad, instead talk to them as individuals, in a friendly trust worthy manner.

Be strategic and consistent with your message. A lot of business people are looking for instant results.  When they think that something isn’t working they stop it and move on to something else.  Or they are having an identity crisis and sending multiple messages out that don’t fit a strategic master plan.  Apply human relationship principles of dating to your business marketing.  Most of us are not going to commit to a long term marriage relationship on the first date.  Or on the first attempt to get a date.  You can date one person for 50 dates and get a better result than if you were to go on 50 dates with 50 different people.

And Finally…

Be where your current and future customers are so you can connect with them.  If they are radio listeners, pick the radio station that has listeners that are a good fit to become your customer.  If they are on social media, use the social media channels that are also a good fit.

Be prepared to try something new, but don’t stop doing what works, without a solid reason.

And if you need help learning how to apply any and all of this to your situation, reach out to me.