Up and To the Right

Up and To the Right

by | Jan 10, 2023 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

My friend Ben uses the term Up and To The Right to describe the direction business should be going when you chart it out.

I’ve worked for Ben since 2013 and we worked together nearly 15 years ago too and Ben is a numbers guy.

Me, not so much, but it’s part of my work and it really doesn’t matter if you are a numbers person or not, if you are running a business, you need to know your numbers.

The Up and To The Right visual should be your growth, your income, your profits.  It might also be your expenses but as long as the income is ahead of the expenses, you are probably on the right track.

It’s become more challenging the past 3 years for a lot of folks, there is no denying everyone has been impacted directly or indirectly due to rising costs, supply shortages and staffing issues.

However, we are still here.

The world hasn’t collapse into total chaos, a black hole, or the return of the Messiah, at least not today.

So each of us move forward with the desire to have our numbers in the black and not the red.

Up and To The Right.

I’ve consulted with numerous companies over the past few decades and learned enough to be able to have an intelligent conversation on nearly any business topic or business operation issue.

However my area of expertise is in the marketing and advertising side, not the manufacturing side.  I am also really good at asking questions to help draw out answers and possibilities on those areas that I’m not an expert.

Advertising and marketing’s purpose is to sell stuff.  Create a demand, invite people to become your customers and take them thru the consumer journey or buying funnel, what ever you want to call that process that results in people giving you money for your stuff.

Most business people are amateurs at advertising and marketing.  That’s okay because they are professionals with their area of expertise.

Except when they are spending money and don’t know what they are doing.  If this describes you, try not to be offended.

Just in the past two decades, I’ve worked in both traditional and internet mediums.  Radio of course, but also print, websites, social media and a host of related methodologies to generate customers for clients.  Most of you reading this or listening to this podcast, are relatively clueless about all of this.

Your son-in-law knows how to “Facebook”.  Your buddy “has a guy” that once built websites and he’s really cheap.

The media salesperson tells you all the reasons why their audience is a “perfect match” and they offer you a boat load of free ads along with a few paid ads and you sign up and hope it works.

Please stop this insane method of spending money to get customers and talk to people who truly know what they are doing.

Also stop chasing the next big thing and fall into the trap of tossing all your money at the big shiny new digital platform.

The people you want to spend money with you are human beings, not machines.  Most advertising is annoying.

You need to buy the least annoying ads that are targeted to your potential customers using a platform that is trusted and respected.

For years, we’ve witnessed the growth of digital ad opportunities.  Many had double digit (in percentages) growth in users and so you may have flocked to those platforms.  I’m referring to:

Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, Twitter, Google+, FourSquare, and the latest darling TikTok.  Those are just off the top of my head, there have been over a hundred others that were trying to become a social media giant to attract a big crowd of users that you could then advertise your business to.

But it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.

TikTok is being banned by numerous governments and government agencies over security concerns because of links to the Chinese government.  Twitter is in a state of disarray as Elon Musk continues to make changes.  Facebook had been getting heat from the government for years over their behaviors and algorithms.  Having worked full time in Social, I know how you are at their mercy when they make changes.

If you are using social media as your primary advertising vehicle, it’s time to add another method that has stability and potential customers so you can continue going Up and To The Right in 2023.

I’ve shared a couple of disasters that nearly wiped out some companies that I’ve worked with because they used Social Media as their primary lead source and then the rules changes.

The other method of inviting people to spend money with you is the place that I work.  Which may or may not be a good option for you. Since 2013, I have chosen to work for WOWO Radio in Fort Wayne.  It’s a News Talk radio station that is turning 99 year old this year.

I’ve worked for other stations but nowhere as long as I have WOWO.  There is something special about the attentiveness of a talk radio listener that can be beneficial to the businesses that advertise.  It’s different than a music station. I also have a Sports Talk radio station and music stations available that we can use to invite their listeners to become your customers if you are in the Fort Wayne Indiana area.

I can point to numerous antidotal stories and studies to reassure you that you should consider radio ads, like this one just release last year about furniture buyers.

But beyond the radio station, the key to your success is the person you talk to.  Are they an expert at selling advertising or at helping companies like yours keeping the numbers moving Up and To The Right?

Trust is the Glue

Trust is the Glue

by | Nov 1, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

Trust.

This five letter word is the glue that holds our world together.

Over the years I’ve been writing, publishing and podcasting, the theme I keep coming back to is Human Relationship Principles.  And the key to all human relationships is trust.

Before I dig into the marketing and advertising thoughts regarding Trust, let’s stand back at look around our world.

From the day we are born, we place our trust in an adult to feed us and take care of us.  As we grow older, we become more self-sufficient and those needs change but trust is placed in other things and people.  As simple as putting trust in the chair you are sitting in right now.  Trust that when you are driving down the road that the person driving towards you will stay on their side of the road while you stay on your side.  That’s trust.

Trust in relationships also pertains to agreements between countries.  A level of trust has to come with signing treaties. Agreements between companies always have a trust factor.

In the most personal relationships, we trust.  Trust that the person you lay down to sleep with is not going to harm you.

Trust can be broken and how we deal with broken trust will impact future relations.

Spending money on something involves trust too.  There is a reason some people buy chips from the dollar store and others buy them from the supermarket, but no matter where you buy them, you trust that what’s inside the bag is worth the money you paid.

When we don’t know who to trust, what do we do?

We look around for recommendations.

However not all recommendations are valued equally.

Research firm Ipsos released a survey that talks about who adults trust for recommendations.

The top couple of trusted groups are unchanged from surveys I’ve seen for decades.

7 out of 10 adults trust their family members and 2/3rds trust the recommendations of friends when deciding what or where to spend their money.

This has traditionally been called Word Of Mouth and I’ll get back to it in a second.

All the other sources for recommendations scored poorly,  Under 40% of adults trust casual acquaintances. Someone who works in the store or for the company were only trusted 37% of the time.

All the online resources including company websites, companies on social media, review sites, social media groups, even the social media influencers scored in the 30’s or 20’s out of 100 for being trusted enough to spend money.

Why is this you ask?

It’s all about the Human Connection.  We know our family, we choose our friends and we trust friends and family to have our back.  All those others, they’re just out for themselves, at least that’s our perception, deep down in our gut.

Marketers are looking to create advertising campaigns that will persuade us to buy what they are selling.

Smart marketers include the trust factor in their plans.

9 years ago, I joined Federated Media’s WOWO radio advertising sales team.  I had worked for other media companies and radio stations in Fort Wayne and I even worked for Federated Media earlier in my life on the air for sister station WMEE.

Why did I join WOWO in 2013?

Trust.

Ben Saurer was a young 20 something-year-old whose first real job was working in radio at a group of stations I was with and he left when he was hired by Federated Media to become their General Sales Manager for WOWO.  I knew Ben from our time together and I trusted Ben.

I trusted Ben enough to meet with him on the sly as I was working for an e-commerce company, as hour out of town, to discuss the possibility of us working together again.  Difference was, I would be working for him instead of the other way around like when we first met.

This trust factor along with trust in my own ability led to my taking an initial pay cut without a guarantee that I would earn it back; along with being the 5th person on a five person sales team.  A little background on what it means to be #5 on a 5 person team.  You’re not sitting in the superstar spot.  #5 on a 5 person sales team is a revolving door.

Nothing was promised to me, no established accounts to take over, none of that, just an opportunity that was mine to take advantage of.

All of the accounts from my past were handled by the other 4 members of the WOWO sales team.  Let’s be blunt about this.  #5 on a five person team has about a 10% chance of making it, and that’s optimistic.

During the first year, I ended up winning the Super Goal award for Federated Media’s Fort Wayne stations.  Out of about 20 sales people, I exceeded my budget goals more than anyone else when measuring percentages.  I was not the top salesperson, I was not in the top 5, I don’t know where I was actually in dollars, but I beat expectations.  That 10% chance of survival was overcome and then some.

2014 was my first full year at WOWO.  2015, 2016, 2017 and 2018 were mostly growth years. And then 2019 something happened.

It was a year that exceeded expectations and budget goals again and I ended up winning the Super Goal award for Federated Media’s Fort Wayne stations again.  The difference in dollars was tremendous however. 2019 versus 2014 for me was a difference of around $500,000.

Besides winning the Super Goal award, I also won the Account Manager of the Year in 2019 for the entire Federated Media organization.  That was based on dollars.

Trust was the reason behind this success.  Business owners grew to trust me and the radio station, WOWO.  Now WOWO itself has earned respect and trust for it’s legacy that began in 1925 and in a couple of years will be celebrating a century on the air.  WOWO has had legendary radio personalities and our current line-up features two outstanding people who are trusted by their listeners.

Pat Miller hosts the Pat Miller Talk Show, weekday afternoons from 3pm to 6pm and Kayla Blakeslee is the host for Fort Wayne’s Morning News weekday mornings.

When Pat and Kayla talk, people listen.  But it’s more than listening, a relationship develops over time.  This is what happens what a radio personality is allowed to be real and share themselves on the air and as a news and talk formatted station, WOWO listeners have developed a Trust relationship with us.

The most successful campaigns on WOWO have Pat or Kayla as their spokesperson.  Their listeners Trust them,  it’s Word Of Mouth with a Bigger Mouth.

Recently I took over the sales departments at sister stations 1380, The Fan, our Sports Talk station; along with 98.9 The Bear, Federated Media’s Heritage Rock Music Station and BIG 92.3, our Classic Hits Music station.  The trust factor is there too on our music stations and here’s why…

No matter if you’re listening to Brett on the Sports Rush, Pat or Kayla talking about the news, or listening to your favorite tunes on BIG or the Bear, you are not just intellectually involved, you are emotionally involved too with your favorite stations.

Trust is an emotional connection and that is why I have seen so many businesses be successful when they invite listeners who have an emotional bond with their favorite station, also trust the advertisers, especially when the ads tie into that emotional side of us and nurture trust.

Sure, you can create some boring ads that just present the facts and hope they work.  You can create some gimmicky ads to promote what YOU want to sell, but if they leave out the human side and do nothing to build trust, your chances for success are limited.

Want to know more about how to integrate Trust in your marketing outreach?  Contact me.

https://omny.fm/shows/the-scott-howard-genuine-scloho-media-and-marketin/287-scloho-podcast-trust-is-the-glue
ScLoHo Changes

ScLoHo Changes

by | Oct 11, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, Really? The Personal ScLoHo, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard

UPDATE on 2/28/2023:

Despite what I wrote and my intentions a few months ago when I wrote this piece, I am going to be updating more than once a month.  Maybe weekly again.  We shall see.  There’s just too much on my mind not to share with you.  Last night I felt the urge and wrote and published this: https://www.scotthoward.me/wheres-the-money-in-2023/

Now here’s the original article:

This article and the audio version which is podcast episode # 286 is to announce some changes. The short version is I am going to reduce the number of articles I publish and podcasts I record.

This is due to a change in focus in my life and changes in the world around us.

Right now there are 1570 articles that I wrote and published on this website and most of them over the past 5 and half years have been captured in audio form as the Genuine ScLoHo Media and Marketing Podcast.  When I began writing and publishing the articles, over 15 years ago it was the beginning days of blogging and I actually had multiple blogs.  Some were updated weekly, others 3 or 4 times a day.  This was not a full-time gig, it was a side hustle, but not quite.

Side hustles are usually designed to make money.  Writing and blogging never had a direct connection to making money for me.  This was a passionate hobby.  If I was an artist, I would have been creating dozens and dozens of pieces each week, but as someone who has spent a considerable amount of my life in the media and marketing world, writing about it has been my creative outlet.

For awhile, there were just a few of us in Fort Wayne, Indiana that were blogging consistently and then I realized I was the only one of those that started out around 15+ years ago.  Long time acquittance and friend Anthony Juliano started shortly after he joined the Asher Advertising Agency where he’s been for 18 years and his focus has changed and sharpened over the years.  Most everyone I know with a few exceptions have stopped.

First off, I’m not stopping.  I am however going to change the frequency.  My intention is to do a monthly article and podcast update instead of weekly.

Two reasons:

Time is primary for me.  In 2020, my position with Federated Media changed from being a member of the WOWO radio advertising sales team, to becoming the General Sales Manager of that team.  It has taken close to three years for me to minimize my selling role on our team. In 2020, despite my being in management, I was still the number 2 salesperson for WOWO.  In 2021, I was either #2 or #3 every month.  My goal for 2022 was to reduce my selling time even more, to next to none, and with some staffing changes the past few weeks, that looks very possible.

The beginning of October however saw some additional organizational changes start to occur and for at least an interim basis,  I am also managing 3 more stations along with WOWO for the rest on this year.  The time I need to devote to the sales teams and the individuals that make up these teams is more important than ever.

Years ago, when I was with another group of radio stations and was promoted to a General Sales Manager position, I asked my boss, which was more important, my own sales or the sales of the people on my team.  He took the easy answer and said both.  I decided that it was more important to be able to multiple my time than add.  8 plus 2 = 10.  8 x 2 = 16.

What that meant to me is instead of adding two more hours to my day, it was a better investment of time to teach, train, coach and mentor others to be their best.  That’s the multiplying principle.

Something else I’ve learned from a guy I just heard of this year, Mike Weinberg, is that that Sales Managers and Sales People should employ different skills and talents.  Sometimes they are opposites in those two positions.  Our companies outside sales consultancy has different online talent assessments that potential candidates take for different positions.  Some do well in Sales but are not so great in Sales Management.  Honestly, less than half the people we have taking any of our online talent assessments score high enough to be considered for employment.

Here’s why we put so much value in those talent assessments…

Talent is like your height, skill is like your weight.  Once we become adults, we stop growing taller.  Our core talents are what they are.  What we do have control over, all of our life, is our weight. Like skills, we can grow and develop over time with the right development.

So I said Time is one reason for my changing the frequency to monthly instead of weekly updates.

Reason number 2 is accessibility of information. You and I have access to more information that ever before.  You don’t know the answer to something?  Ask your phone!

If you want to know what I think about something, there are two ways to find out.  My website has a search feature powered by Google.  Having published so many articles on the subject of media and marketing over the years, you’ll likely discover I already answered your question.   Also you can reach out to me directly.  I don’t hide.  My personal email is Scott@ScLoHo.net and you can also find my phone number for phone calls and texts at my website too.  You can direct message me on the socials too.  I’ve been on Twitter since October 2008 and am on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn too.

Thanks for your time today, my next update will be in November

 

3 Fundamental Questions To Ask Before You Advertise

3 Fundamental Questions To Ask Before You Advertise

by | Oct 4, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard

There are 3 Fundamental Questions You Need To Ask Before You Advertise.

I’ll tell you what they are and also go a little deeper.

Question 1:

Who Do You Want to Invite to Spend Money with You?

Question 2:

Why Should Those People Spend Money with You?

Question 3:

What is the Math Needed to be Profitable?

Now, let’s dig in starting with the first question, Who Do You Want to Invite to Spend Money with You?

I want you to think about basic demographics such as age and gender but also deeper than that. Income, lifestyle, values.  Once you develop what we call a persona or two or three of your ideal customers, you will be able to decide where to advertise.  Most advertising choices have a particular audience and you want to find the audience that matches your ideal customer.

As I tell my advertising sales team at WOWO Radio where I am the General Sales Manager, it’s our job to find business that want our radio audience to become their customers.  It’s that simple on our end, and reverse it for you as a business owner and you’ll be able to decide where to advertise, or at least where NOT to advertise.

Let’s move on to the second question and dig in. Why Should Those People Spend Money with You?

This should be an easy question to answer and on the surface it is.  You can say, because we make really good  ___________. That is just the start.  Because, you are not the only one offering what you are selling.  Before Apple introduced iPhones, we had cellphones.  Many were what we now call dumb-phones, with the ability to text and talk and take a low quality picture.  Some people, those who were more advanced had a Blackberry phone, which were nicknamed Crackberries because it seemed like people were addicted to those phones.

I’ve never owned a Blackberry or an iPhone.  I went from slider and flip phones to a Samsung Android Smartphone when I joined a tech company back in 2011.  Now, it seems like everyone has either an iPhone or Android, and my old Nokia 6170 and Motorola Razr sit in the back of my desk drawer just waiting to be tossed out a dozen years later.

The Why You Question is so important, yet so overlooked.  It is the reason that people will switch from what they have been doing or using and try you instead.

The reality is that not everyone that knows about you will abandon their current provider right now, if they don’t have a reason.  The reason for someone to switch is a combination of what makes you appealing and a dissatisfaction with the status quo.  This is a topic I can do a whole series on in the future, but for today, let’s keep moving.

Question 3 is about Math.  Math involving money and customers.  How much do you need to sell to break even?  Take a step back… How much should you price your goods and services so you will break even?  You need to know these numbers because you need to know how to make money.  Yes I mentioned break even, but that’s because you need a baseline number.  You can then increase your prices on paper to set up a decent profit margin.  Then you need to also come up with alternative formulas to get to the end result.

Here’s an example using small numbers.  If you need $100 to break even, there are a few ways to do that.  You could sell 50 items at 2 dollars each.  Or you could sell 2 items at $50 each.  Or you could sell 10 items at $10 each.  All of these options add up to $100.

In retail, it is common to double the wholesale price to get a retail price and make money.  Take those formula’s we just talked about and and double the dollars so now you’re bringing in $200 instead of $100.  You have to know your numbers.  This gives you a foundation for when inflation hits and your costs climb, you can raise your prices appropriately.

It’s also important to know your numbers for advertising.  Many advertising and marketing sales people are afraid to talk about Return On Investment but my team isn’t.  We want to know that they money you invest with an ad campaign with us has reasonable goals and we can use those goals along with your tracking the results to decide the success rate and make appropriate moves in the future.

One more time, here are 3 Fundamental Questions To Ask Before You Advertise:

Question 1:

Who Do You Want to Invite to Spend Money with You?

Question 2:

Why Should Those People Spend Money with You?

Questions 3:

What is the Math Needed to be Profitable?

Reach out to me for help and guidance.

 

How to Deal with Inflation Realities

How to Deal with Inflation Realities

by | Sep 27, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

In sales, there is a visual description that we use that describes our on-going goals, Up and to the Right.

If you visualize goals over time, that is how most companies want to see their growth.

Inflation however can be a real kick in the pants.

When the costs of things are following that image of Up and to the Right, it affects nearly everyone.

I was talking with a friend last week who had a new home built and he was explaining how he was fortunate that they locked in prices before prices started climbing.  He still had to deal with some of the challenges his builder was facing including inventory issues that included not having materials available due to supply chain issues and what was available was now priced much higher.  Staffing shortages also contributed to the issues that created a delay in the completion of his family’s home.

In this case the builder had to eat the increased costs and his profit margins shrunk.

I’ve watched other businesses that have had to decide how to handle inflation and many of them resisted raising their prices and it hurt their business.  I understand the reluctance, however over my career I’ve urged many business owners to raise their prices as the cost of doing business increased and they were losing operating profit.

That’s kind of a made up term, Operating Profit.  One time I was working with an HVAC company and wanted to create an R.O.I. or Return On Investment formula so we could calculate how many new customers we needed to bring them to pay for the ad campaign and the owner was very insistent in pointing out that in his eyes, there was no “operating profit”.  To paraphrase what he said, “Every dollar we bring in goes somewhere, we don’t just toss it in a bank account as profit.”

Yes, that is true with most small and medium sized businesses, the ones that are not publicly traded on the stock market.  Those are the size of businesses I usually work with. But this is also the difference between Gross Profit and Net Profit.  The reality for the HVAC owner is that that were able to afford a decent personal living lifestyle due to the success that had operating their business.  Their staff was happy and their customers were happy too.

Profit is not a dirty word as some news media like to focus on the money being made by the really big publicly traded companies that are required to disclose money numbers.  We live in a country that likes to offer opportunities to anyone and most of us are employed by or work in the small business world.

How do you as a business owner deal with the inflation realities?

Make adjustments.  You have to continue to make a profit.  Before inflation and before Covid disrupted everything a few years ago, (if you were in business before 2020) you had a formula for setting your prices.  Customers were used to paying you for your products and services based on the prices you charged which you set at a level to make a gross profit.

One thing you need to do is raise your prices.

Another thing you can do is offer a lower price option that is simply a smaller portion or less than the more expensive option.  I’m thinking of the restaurant business.  Huge plates of food that were way too many calories for a single meal that you were offering in 2019, we don’t need that much.

If you are in a service industry you can do the same thing.  For your old price, offer something a little less and for those who want the same service, mark it up.  Give us, the consumers a choice of higher prices or same prices and we will adjust.

Inflation is a reality and instead of wishing it away or driving yourself out of business because you are afraid to adjust, do what needs to be done and be honest about it.  Your customers make not like it, but they still want what you sell and will figure out what works for them.

The Wait is Worth It

The Wait is Worth It

by | Sep 20, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom

Are you a patient person?

Or does waiting create anxiety?

For me, it all depends on the why I am waiting.

I’m sure it is that way with you too, to some degree.

At the end of 2019 I was cleaning up my email and found a series of newsletters from Roy H. Williams.  Roy goes by the moniker The Wizard of Ads, like my nick name is ScLoHo.  Every Monday for several years, Roy’s newsletter arrives in my inbox.  It’s called the Monday Morning Memo.

Now there’s nothing but predictability in what I just shared with you.  I can count on receiving the appropriately named Monday Morning Memo from Roy Williams on Monday Mornings.

Wouldn’t it be nice to know that all things were predictable?

The Monday Morning Memo dated September 16th, 2019 talks about something I talk about too.  I call it the buying cycle, Roy calls it the purchase cycle.  Both of us are referring to the same thing.  And it has to do with time.

Roy used the example of engagement rings. Roy says:

330 million Americans will purchase 2 million engagement rings this year. This means that 1 American in 165 will buy an engagement ring.

There has been a tendency for digital marketers to emphasize the zero moment of truth.  That’s the instant that a person is ready to go out and hand over their credit card for a few thousand to buy that ring. The digital marketers are looking at that as the time to be in your face with their ads for diamonds.  After all, for many of us, it’s now or never.  Actually in the wedding game, a significant number of us get married more than once, so those diamond ring digital marketers may get a second or third chance down the road.

However the buying cycle or purchase cycle as Roy refers to it, is not the same for everything we buy.  I bought gas the other day, something I do about once a week.  Filling up my gas tank is a much shorter buying cycle than buying an engagement ring.

Also it is important to recognize that most of us have habits that we follow with many purchases and unless there is a reason to change our habit, we aren’t going to change them.

Earlier this year, my office moved from the northwest side of Fort Wayne, Indiana to the southwest side.  I live northeast.

When my commute to the office changed, so did some of my buying habits.  Until this move, I never would have used the gas station or grocery store that I use now.  A few years ago the breakfast place I would visit stopped selling my favorite beverage so I changed.

Because you just can’t advertise a sale and it will convince everyone to stop what they are doing and go and buy from you right now… that is why you need to move from a self-centered marketing plan to one that is customer-centered.  Being there when they need what you can offer is critical.  Reminding them and inviting them, every week is what this is all about.