by Scott Howard | Aug 2, 2017 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
Today, I’m going to talk to you from my generational perspective and I have one question for you:
Do You Want Our Money?
I am a young Baby Boomer. I am also a WOWO Radio Listener.
And I work for WOWO in the advertising sales department. That means I am the dude you can talk to about buying advertising for your company on WOWO. You can email me directly at my work email. It’s Scott@WOWO.com
But the rest of this piece is about me and my generation, the Baby Boomers. I just read an article from Mediapost that says that too many businesses are losing out because they are ignoring the Baby Boomer Generation with their advertising.
As a member of that age group and one that also deals with requests from advertising agencies, I totally agree.
First of all, let me set the stage with some facts from the Mediapost article and elsewhere. 
The Boomer markets (those between 53 and 71 years of age) are comprised of approximately 78 million customers.
That is the biggest demographic group (age wise) in this country. It’s also the group that is spending the big bucks that younger generations wish they had to spend.
According to a Pew survey, Boomers are outspending every other affluent category by $1 trillion per year. It was predicted that annual spending would exceed $4.6 trillion per year by 2015, and it has. The aging Boomer customer is today’s target population and, even more so, tomorrow’s.
The Mediapost article talks about the digital disconnect:
Seventy percent of all Baby Boomers surf online. It’s estimated that those 50 and up spend more than $7 billion every year in online purchases. Several media surveys discovered that approximately 17% of all those surveyed in the 45 and over age groups believe that online advertising is intended for them.
Look at those numbers for a second. 70% of all of us Baby Boomers surf online. That includes the retired ones, by the way. But less than 20%, the number I quoted is only 17% of Boomers believe online advertising is intended for them. 
This is a wake up call to anyone under the age of 50 who is responsible for advertising and marketing. I don’t care if you run your own business, your parents business or work for an advertising agency… you need to pay attention and understand there are a whole helluva lot of people over 50 that can make you successful if you simply invite them to spend money with you instead of ignoring us.
A few more quotes from the Mediapost article:
Be willing to change your frame of reference (paradigm shift). Don’t let “Boomer customer myopia” interfere with an intelligent approach to improving Boomer customer satisfaction.
In other words, the first step is recognizing the opportunity that I’m talking about and be willing to adjust your marketing tactics to invite Baby Boomers to spend their money with you. 
Avoid using the age of target markets as the determining factor… Use your knowledge of life stage changes to determine your approach to service and marketing communications improvement.
I’m going to share with you what they mean regarding Life Stages in a second. But first a couple of words on how I can help you.
In the digital world, I have been advising companies for the past dozen years on how to improve their ability to be found with some basic Search Engine Optimization practices that remain relevant. I even stepped away from the radio world a couple of times to work full time in the web and social media worlds.
Today, along with connecting you with Baby Boomers via WOWO radio, I also have some proven digital marketing solutions that I can offer through the Federated Digital Solutions division of Federated Media. I saw proven because I have the data to show the results and we can talk about how to create a custom digital solution for your company if that is appropriate.
And then there is the mighty 1190 WOWO radio. Now over 90 years old as an AM radio station with one of the biggest audiences in Northeast Indiana including Fort Wayne, Allen County and surrounding counties for miles and miles, stretching into Ohio and Michigan.
Listeners can also listen to WOWO locally on 107.5 FM and online via their favorite apps or the WOWO.com website.
But here’s what you need to know about connecting your business with Baby Boomers via WOWO radio.
It’s a no-brainer. Ever since I started with WOWO in 2013, the weekly total local audience according to the ratings service has been over 100,000 listeners.
There are a couple other stations in town that have over 100,000 weekly listeners but they have a significant number of kids that make that total add up to 100,000.
WOWO’s listenership according to the ratings is 99% grown-ups. Adults age 25 and older who buy stuff.
Half of those adults are Baby Boomers like me. 
By comparison, 2nd most listened to radio station by Baby Boomers less than half the number of listeners. If you want to know why this is important, take a look or listen to last week’s advertising nugget about reach and frequency. WOWO actually reaches more Baby Boomers than any other Fort Wayne radio station, by an over 2 to 1 margin.
Just recently I was negotiating with a media buyer that wants to buy advertising that will reach 25 to 54 year olds. That is a popular sweet spot in a lot of advertising agency mindsets. And sure that may have been the correct sweet spot to target a couple decades ago when Baby Boomers were that age, it’s very limiting thinking now as I have just demonstrated.
Before I wrap this up, I want to expand on why companies need to consider Lifestyles not just age demographics.
I’m 57. 
A good friend of mine, Kelly is also 57. His daughter is heading off to her 1st year of college right this very moment.
My wife and I have 5 kids from our previous marriages and 9 grandkids. While Kelly’s daughter is starting her college days at Indiana University, our oldest grandkid is starting his college days at Purdue University. Our youngest kid is 29 with three boys.
Yes, Kelley and his wife and me and my wife are all Baby Boomers but with very different lifestyles going on.
I also tend to have a wide spread of ages in my friendship circle. The oldest is 18 years older than me. I also hang out with those that are 30 years younger than me.
It’s not just the age, but the lifestyle that you need to pay attention to when planning your advertising.
I’ve done enough talking, I want to hear from you as I ask once again on behalf of myself and the other 78 million Baby Boomers, “Do you want our money?”
by Scott Howard | Jul 26, 2017 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
Reach & Frequency Matter.
There is an age old advertising nugget that has been lost over the years.
Or perhaps (and I shudder to think this is the real reason), it simply isn’t taught anymore.
What is this advertising nugget?
Reach and Frequency Matter.
Before I go any further, I should explain what those two terms mean.
Reach is how many different people your message will reach.
Frequency is how often an individual person will see/hear/read your message.
Let’s talk about this reach and frequency concept in an every day scenario first:
You order a large Pizza. How many pieces of pizza do you have and how many people can you serve?
If the pizza is sliced into 16 pieces, then the maximum number of people you can serve is 16. Everyone will get some, but no one is going to be full.
Eight people could each have two slices, or 4 people could have 4. You can do the math and come up with possibilities.
Reach is the total number of people who get at least one piece of pizza.
Frequency is how many slices of pizza each person gets.
For someone with a small appetite, they may only want 2 slices. But we all know someone that will always want that last piece because it takes a little more for them to feel full and satisfied.
Now, let’s take this reach and frequency discussion into the media and marketing world. And I’ll use the Pat Miller Program on WOWO radio as my first example.
We recently received information that there are over 50,000 adults that listen to the Pat Miller Program every week on WOWO between 3 and 6pm, weekdays. That number is the total potential reach of a commercial during his program who live in and near Fort Wayne, Indiana.
By the way, the Pat Miller Program is the most listened to radio program weekday afternoons for grown ups.
All of this is great news and important for businesses that want to invite Pat Miller Program listeners to become their customers. Why? Because there are a whole heck of a lot of them! That’s the reach factor in action.
The other part of the equation is Frequency. If you want to run just one commercial per week, the maximum frequency is always going to be one, no matter how many total people hear your commercial, if it only plays one time, then there is no way the frequency number can be greater than one.
In our pizza scenario, when you have 16 slices of pizza and share with 16 people, the frequency is also just one.
Just as one slice of pizza usually isn’t enough to feed a hungry pizza lover, one commercial per week isn’t enough in most cases to make a strong impact and convince Pat Miller Program listeners to spend money with you.
That’s why buying one commercial per week on the Pat Miller Program on WOWO Radio is not an option I offer.
Studies over the past 50 years have said we need an average frequency of 3 to 9 times exposure to an advertising message before we act. In the past decade each of us are exposed to more and more marketing messages than ever before. Some say that each of us see or hear over 10,000 marketing messages per day. Before the internet, that number was just a fraction, maybe 3,000 marketing messages per day.
Thankfully, our brains have a filtering mechanism that prevents us from being overwhelmed by all of this on the conscious level, but depending on the impact of certain marketing messages, many are stored in our subconscious where they are forgotten until we need to remember them.
An example in my life was a few years ago when I needed to call a garage door repair person and an old business card that I had not paid attention to for years came to mind and that company was the one I called to fix a broken spring at our new home.
Let’s review. Reach is the total number of individuals that can be reached by a particular marketing message. There are limits and you should understand this when you are deciding what advertising programs to invest in.
Frequency is the number of times an individual person will see or hear your marketing message and it corresponds with the number of ads you run for a particular audience.
It’s the combination of these two numbers that are key factors in the success of your advertising expenditures. If you don’t know what these numbers are for the advertising you are currently doing or are considering doing, stop. Make this a priority to find out. Once you find out these numbers and understand then you can make smart decisions about how to invest your marketing and advertising money.
I’ll be glad to help you figure this out too. I know you are busy and it can get confusing.
One side note about frequency and the success of advertisers on WOWO Radio. I spent nearly a decade in Detroit working with local businesses on their radio advertising and twice as much time doing the same in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Most of the stations I worked for before WOWO were music based stations. WOWO is a news talk radio station with not just a huge audience but a very devoted audience. The number of ads I would need to air for a company on a music based radio station is higher than the number of ads per week I need to air on WOWO because of the loyalty of WOWO’s audience.
Also factoring into the success of WOWO Advertising is the nature of the news and talk format. Pat Miller Program listeners (as well as listeners to all of our programs) are active listeners tuning into the spoken words of Pat and others. This helps them also pay attention to the spoken words in the advertising. I’ll share more on this in the future.
by Scott Howard | Jul 19, 2017 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
I am looking to form a few more advertising partnerships in connection with WOWO Radio and Federated Media including our online Federated Digital Services marketing options.
Let’s see if you qualify and what this entails.
1st of all, I only want to work with people and businesses that operate from a foundation of Integrity. The Cambridge dictionary defines Integrity, “the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles“.
In practical terms, this doesn’t mean perfection, it simply means you are not going to lie, cheat or deceive because that is against your operating principles. When mistakes happen, you will take care of them appropriately.
Next, you need to have a Key Marketing Challenge that you want to overcome. This could be as simple as needing more customers. It could be related to expanding your business. It could be to overcome a misconception about your industry.
Most business people I know are pretty smart. They know the ins and outs of their area of expertise and they have a product or service worthy of buying if people knew about it. Most of those same business people don’t know jack about marketing or advertising. That’s okay because that’s where I can help.
I don’t know how to tune up my HVAC system, but I have experts who do that I trust. (HVAC is the industry term for the Heating and Air Conditioning companies). Those HVAC experts don’t know all that much about advertising and marketing but they trust me and that’s how we work together.
The advertising partners that I am looking for with WOWO also need to have the willingness to spend money as an investment to solve their Key Marketing Challenge.
How much money?
It all depends on the solution that is needed to solve the Key Marketing Challenge.
I’ve worked with companies that spent $10,000 per month and others that spent $3,000 per month. That’s a big difference, but it really depends on the goals, needs and other critical elements of the Key Marketing Challenge for each business.
So far I’ve listed 3 factors that might qualify you to be one of my Advertising Partners with WOWO:
- Integrity as your foundation.
- A Key Marketing Challenge that needs solved
- Willingness to Invest in Your Success
Depending on your business needs, our partnership may actually go much deeper than advertising. A couple of my favorite advertising partnerships right now have me functioning as their Marketing Coach or Marketing Consultant. These companies actually use me to help them with their overall marketing plan, developing a marketing strategy and even help them evaluate offers from other marketing and advertising firms.
I make recommendations outside of what I can sell them directly with my Federated Media solutions. And no, I’m not getting kick backs on those kinds of recommendations. I simply am doing my best to look out for the best interests of my advertising partners.
Not everyone that buys advertising from me on WOWO is at the level of advertising partner that I just mentioned.
Some don’t need the level of involvement that I offer.
Some are not ready for that level of financial investment yet, so they are taking baby steps and I’m helping them grow.
Some have their own advertising game plan and they don’t want to tap into my expertise.
Like I said at the beginning however, I am looking to form a few more advertising partnerships in connection with WOWO Radio and Federated Media including our online Federated Digital Services marketing options.
Before I wrap this up, here’s what I share on paper with those that I offer this partnership relationship to and you’ll see it’s a two way street.
This advertising partnership is a commitment from me:
- To meet regularly, every 2 to 6 weeks, as needed
- To keep our advertising messages updated regularly
- To offer additional opportunities to use the services and marketing platforms offered by WOWO Radio, Federated Media, Opt-In and Federated Digital Solutions
- To be a creative resource and consultant for all your marketing efforts
- To offer suggestions and feedback as the relationship continues
This advertising partnership is also a commitment from you:
- To be available for regular meetings and communication
- To keep me updated when changes and/or new services are offered that we might include in your marketing
- To set up a tracking system to assist in identifying results from our campaign
- To stay current with monthly payments as outlined
- To inform me of both successes and concerns as we move forward
That’s it in black and white. And it works.
Back to my original question: Do You Have What It Takes to Be My Advertising Partner?
Let’s talk and find out.
by Scott Howard | Jun 1, 2017 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
How do you know if your advertising is successful?
Most business owners I know would prefer not to advertise if there was another way to get customers that was free.
But free isn’t really free. It’s just that we value some things more than others or perhaps we are used to measuring certain things with different expectations.
I titled this piece, Measure What Matters and it’s a peek into a Return On Investment or R.O.I.
Usually the R.O.I. discussions I have involve the Return On Investment of money spent on advertising.
If I was in the financial industries business, the Return On Investment would look pretty basic. A ten percent R.O.I. on a 100 dollars is 10 bucks. In other words that $100 becomes $110.
That is an easy money measurement.
So is this next one.
Hourly wage. If you work 40 hours and get paid $800 for those 40 hours, then your Return On Investment of your time is $20 per hour.
Running a business is a different animal to pin down the R.O.I. You don’t have a strict correlation between the hours you put in and the dollars you receive. It takes capital to get started. Real dollars that are not quickly translated into earnings.
There’s also time spent planning and organizing that business owners put in that go beyond typical business hours. 90% of entrepreneurs don’t have an accurate figure of how much time that have invested in their business or what the dollars are that are associated with that time.
Does that prevent them from doing the work? Usually not.
Let’s talk about Return On Investment relating to advertising and marketing. This is a very difficult calculation to figure out accurately, with the types of details that you see in your 401K portfolio.
I’m used to asking questions that create an R.O.I. formula, it was easier 30 years ago when I worked for a Christian radio station in Detroit and we had a very loyal audience that would often tell our advertising partners that Robin Sullivan of WMUZ told them to shop there. This was before the internet and social media.
See, Robin really did tell her listeners to mention her when they shopped for a mortgage or got their car repaired or any number of other things that were advertised on her radio program.
And we often get similar situations with WOWO radio, where our listeners will tell our advertising partners that Charly Butcher or Pat Miller or Rob Winters or Rick Wolf recommended them which is fantastic.
But it’s not accurate. That’s anecdotal information.
Some people who sell digital advertising products will tell you that it’s easy to track the results.
Bull.
It’s not and those that pitch things like, “We can track every visitor to your website and prove the Return On Investment,” either don’t know what they are talking about or are simply lying to you.
I offer digital advertising solutions along with the radio advertising solutions we have at WOWO radio. The one thing that some digital advertising can do is track SOME of the traffic to your website and tell you SOME of the ways that traffic got there, but this does not make it better than the anecdotal info you hear about your radio ads.
If I do a digital advertising campaign for your business, no one is going to tell you that they are buying from you because they saw your ad on their laptop. And they are not going to tell you that they clicked on your ad either. However the tracking I can see will show me that yes, people are clicking on that silly display ad and while that is nice, we still haven’t determined if you are getting a positive Return On Your Advertising Investment just from those numbers.
I’m going to point you to an article I read recently about this, click here or if you are listening to the podcast go to ScottHoward.me and this article Measure What Matters to find the link. The article is about Janet & the Cows.
So how do you Measure What Matters?
Depends. There is no one size fits all. One of my clients came up with a formula that we use to measure the success of or our digital advertising campaign that he came up with based on his success with other online marketing and it pertains to a cost per lead formula. He wanted to see anything at or below 50 bucks and we are beating that. Most weeks his cost per lead is in the 30’s.
Another client of mine simply has annual sales goals. They continue to increase each year and we help her hit those numbers. We don’t have a true R.O.I. formula but we do have anecdotal information from her radio and digital campaigns that are reassuring.
The most important take away today is: You need to determine what success looks like and pick some ways to measure the results from your advertising and marketing efforts that fits you and your business. Period.
Want help? Ask me.
by Scott Howard | May 25, 2017 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
I was reading an article from Mediapost that mentioned that baby boomers who are becoming senior citizens are not what you might expect. To illustrate their point they pointed out that at age 63, Christie Brinkley could be considered a “senior”.
She is a Baby Boomer and she was featured along with her two daughters in the 2017 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue.
Since a big chunk of the WOWO radio listening audience is the Baby Boomer generation, I ask this question:
Does Christie Brinkley Listen to WOWO Radio?
My answer is defiantly not. Well maybe, but not likely.
Since she doesn’t hang out in the midwest and I’ve never heard her call the Pat Miller Program to express her views on, well anything, if she listens, we are not aware that Christie Brinkley is a WOWO Radio listener.
However, over the years I have found many women who will confess to me that they are a WOWO Radio listener and they think that they are a out-numbered.
On one hand, yes, there are more guys than gals that listen to WOWO’s news talk radio format, but not by much. If you were to take 10 typical WOWO listeners and put them in a room, and these 10 represented the WOWO audience, you would have 6 men and 4 women.
I was doing some research recently and from the data I have access to, more women age 40 and older in the Fort Wayne area listen to WOWO than any other radio station. When I look at Baby Boomer women, WOWO has twice as many Christie Brinkley types compared to the other Fort Wayne radio stations.
Let’s circle back to that Mediapost article that mentioned Christie Brinkley.
Quoting here:
Christie Brinkley, who at 63 appeared in this year’s 2017 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue rocking a bikini alongside her daughters—all the proof you need that 60 can be confident, sexy and in the spotlight.
Brinkley said, “In a country that’s very ageist, people love to put you in little boxes. Women feel very limited by their numbers. On a personal level, I thought, if I can pull this off, I think it will help redefine those numbers and remove some of the fear of aging.”
At 60 and beyond, Boomers continue to be a dynamic and powerful consumer segment. They may not be considered young, but their youthful energy has them constantly on the lookout for new and improved products and services that help them achieve the active, full lives after 60 that previous generations could only have imagined.
Here’s a couple of take-aways from the Mediapost article that you can apply to the women and perhaps men who listen to WOWO radio:
1. They represent a large and growing consumer market
At 37 million and growing, Americans in their 60’s have been the fastest-growing age group since the turn of the century.
2. They have big spending power
The average net worth for 60-somethings is significantly greater than it is for Americans in their 20s (by 99%), 30s (+67%), 40s (+27%), and 50s (+13%).
Nearly half (40%) of today’s 60-somethings are still working.
On top of that, many 60-somethings are choosing to forego leaving a large inheritance and instead are opting to spend on experiences they can share with their children and grandchildren in the moment.
3. They’re not slowing down
Today’s 60-somethings know they’ve still got it. Their mindset is characterized by a steadfast belief in their abilities, a desire to learn and try new things, and wanting to raise the bar on what’s possible at this life stage.
They understand the need to care for their health differently than when they were younger, so they pay more attention to their diets, stay informed about advances in healthcare, use supplements and prescription drugs when needed, and take fitness seriously.
4. They embrace technology that matters
80% of 60 – 69 year olds are online, and nearly 8 in 10 of those online use smartphones.
They are leading the charge for devices and services that make their homes more secure and efficient. Next up is technology that will help them monitor and manage their health.
5. They’re a big influence on their adult children.
More than previous generations, Boomers and their adult children like, trust, and go to each other for advice.
When I listen to WOWO radio, I hear ads for home improvement, luxury automobiles, financial products and other big buck items that Baby Boomers are spending their money on.
Want to know more about how to invite WOWO listeners to spend money with you? Contact me.
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