Lessons from the NCAA Basketball Finals

Lessons from the NCAA Basketball Finals

by | Apr 22, 2024 | ScLoHo Sales Tips, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

It’s been a few weeks and hopefully the sting of your broken bracket has faded enough to apply some lessons from college basketball to our businesses.

Living in Indiana, I was rooting for the Purdue Boilermakers to win it all.  In my family we even have a Purdue grad, my step-daughter.

April 7th and 8th, the top teams played in the Womens and Mens championship games and as I was listening to some of the commentary during and after the games, there was a common theme that the champions had that was different from the runner-ups.

In the Women’s championship game, Iowa had Catlin Clark who was their superstar and has been a media favorite.  She scored 30 points and was the leading scorer of the title game.  Catlin Clark is a college basketball superstar.

The next night, Purdue’s Zach Edey racked up 37 points and outscored everyone of the players from both teams.

Both Catlin Clark and Zach Edey finished their season on the losing team.  Purdue lost by 15 points to UConn and Iowa got beat by a dozen points to South Carolina.

Why is it that Iowa and Purdue, both teams with nationally known superstars lost the most important games of the season?

It’s because Basketball is a team sport.

As I glanced at the scoring stats, this years college champions, both the Men’s and Women’s side, the schools that took home the top trophies had a balanced team that didn’t rely on just one superstar.

The Iowa Hawkeyes had just 5 players that scored while the Women’s champs had 9 players adding to the South Carolina Gamecocks final score.

The UConn Huskies had 7 players contributing points in their win, while Purdue’s Zach Edey, only had 4 teammates sinking the ball.

The day after the Men’s Championship game I was talking with my boss about all of this and applied it to our situation at Federated Media.

My station, WOWO is one of 10 in our company.  5 are in South Bend, Indiana and the other 5, including WOWO are in Fort Wayne, Indiana.  During the 11 years I have been with WOWO, either on the sales team or as the General Sales Manager, WOWO has grown to be the highest scoring revenue station out of all 10.  It’s not the one with the largest audience, and it’s not the one with the most popular music.  They don’t play music, WOWO is a news/talk station.

WOWO’s sales team has depth and balance.  When I was hired in 2013, I was the 5th person on a 5 person team and typically that position is a revolving door.  However in a few years I became 2nd in longevity and when I was promoted to General Sales Manager in 2020.  The year before, in 2019, I was named the top Account Executive in our entire company so my priority was to hire someone to replace myself.  Nearly 4 years later, I hired myself back to the sales team for WOWO and left most of the management duties.

Then and now the WOWO Advertising Sales Team of Account Executives has been filled with strong players.  Tracy has been with us 23 years.  Rob joined 11 years ago and we just added another Federated Media veteran, Brad who spent two decades with our sister station WMEE and returned 6 months ago, this to on the WOWO team.  Having a strong team has helped us nearly triple the revenue results and it doesn’t rest on one person.  Everyone has a slump every once in a while and if you don’t have the others to carry your team through, it can be very challenging.

What about your organization?  How much of the success relies on one person?  Are you vulnerable if something were to happen to that person?  I understand that most companies in the past few decades have become lean and reduced redundancies and back in 2020 with the Covid pandemic, our company did too.   However, we should also create backups for people, not just systems.

Need help on any of this?  Ask me and if it’s not in my portfolio of services, I have connections to people who can assist.

 

 

 

Pitfalls of Pinpoint Targeting

Pitfalls of Pinpoint Targeting

by | Apr 15, 2024 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, Sound ADvice

A little of this and a little of that can work when making cookies in the kitchen.  But when it comes to marketing your business, having the correct “Media Mix” is crucial to capturing your immediate sales, and more importantly, your future sales and market share.

Digital media has made it possible to narrowly target, locate, and reach those precise prospects who are “ready to buy” today but many businesses have fallen victim to the pitfalls of micro-targeting.

People who only promote “micro-targeting” strategies suggest that advertising that reaches the broader market with mass media is a waste of time and money.  They claim that if you are not in the market to purchase today, you’re not worth talking to.

But here’s the thing…What if your competitor has been using mass media effectively to establish a brand and create a pre-need preference for their business over yours before the consumer is ready to buy? Waiting to reach your prospects until they are ready to buy can be too little too late.

The world’s largest advertiser Proctor and Gamble discovered this the hard way.  They learned that by targeting, or niche marketing, via digital and social platforms, they were not reaching their potential future customers.  Therefore, they were actually losing brand identity and ultimately market share.  They quickly re-adjusted their media mix to include even more traditional media (Radio/TV) which turned the tide and grew their sales. (No pun intended as Tide Detergent is a P&G product!)

Last year I was part of a radio masters sales summit conference in Cincinnati, Ohio and one of the presenters was the man who worked for Proctor and Gamble who saw the error of their ways and saved the company by returning to radio and TV.  He has since retired but he is a huge advocate for radio to build and sustain your brand image.

Human beings are stubborn animals. Reaching them when they are ready to buy is of little use, especially when they are biased towards your competitor or unfamiliar with you.

Conversely, if you have created a strong pre-need preference for your business, your competitors’ online and search efforts will be in vain.

Like cookies with added preservatives, the good ole’ traditional advertising (Radio/TV) is what makes your advertising investment last longer.  Of course, it’s not wrong to reach consumers when they are ready to buy, particularly if they are already familiar with you, trust you, and prefer you.

 

To see what the Advertising Research Foundation (a media-neutral organization) says about the right media ingredients, click here. If you would like to visit about your media mix, give me a call and we can visit.  I’ll bring the mixing bowl!

What you just read was sent to subscribers of my weekly Sound ADvice newsletter.  Contact me if you would like a free, no-obligation subscription too.

No Quick Fix

No Quick Fix

by | Apr 8, 2024 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, Really? The Personal ScLoHo, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

One of the concerns that I sometimes hear when talking to a business owner about investing in an advertising campaign is how long it will take to get results.

Or a variation is the opposite…

Can we handle all the business we get if we start advertising with your radio station?

My friends, there is usually no quick fix.

Advertising is usually not like a faucet that you turn on and customers come rushing out to buy what you have right away.

It takes time.

How much time?

Depends on how many ads you place and how often they air and a few other important factors.

However to the untrained, it might seem like things are closer than they really are.

Last month my wife and I took a trip to Washington DC to see the Cherry Blossoms and sightsee and along with a memorable trip, I’ve also got material for a few blogposts and podcast episodes.

The first day of our arrival, after checking in to our hotel and enjoying dinner at a local Irish pub, we decided to walk over to the Capitol Building which I knew was about 3 or 4 blocks away.  We could see it from the Irish pub.

Then we glanced over towards the Washington Monument and decided to hike thru the National Mall to the Monument where there were more Cherry Trees and it was my intention to continue to the Jefferson Memorial.

However as we started the first part of our journey it was getting dusk and our perception of distance and the time it would take was off.  We did make it to the Washington Monument, but there was no way we were going to continue that night all the way to the Thomas Jefferson Memorial on foot on Friday night.

A couple days later, with some pre-planning, I made arrangements for us to get a tour of the major sites of Washington DC that included transportation and from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in the daylight that Sunday, we could see much more clearly the big picture of how far we were from the Washington Monument and the Capitol Building.

The lessons we learned about quick fixes:

  1. Plan ahead
  2. Understand the journey
  3. Know when to regroup and find a different method
  4. Dress appropriate for the journey

Those same lessons apply to marketing your business, even the last one about dressing appropriately.

Want help? Contact me.

Older and Wiser

Older and Wiser

by | Apr 1, 2024 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

Facts are facts, right?

Yes and no.

When you look at numbers or other facts, it’s often not enough to just look at the raw data.  We can learn so much more by digging deeper and being curious.

Curiosity is a term that came up in a recent conversation with a friend this year and we both agreed that it’s essential to understanding something and avoiding assumptions and dispelling certain biases.

I titled this article Older and Wiser because it’s often the experiences we go through that we learn from.  However there are exceptions to this concept of becoming Wiser as we get Older.

The thirst for knowledge that we have as kids can be squashed if too many grown-ups tell the kid to stop asking questions and just conform.  However conformity does not bring new and exciting ideas, it keeps us stuck in the past.

I know some people my age who are always wishing for the “good ole days” and while it’s fun and interesting to reminisce, it can hold you back if you’re not willing to also look at the future opportunities. I also have a bunch of grandkids and one in particular that I’m thinking about today has always had a thirst for knowledge.  This person has no limits to their learning and fortunately has grown-ups that support their curiosity.

As we age, some of our values change and today I’m specifically looking at relationships with brands and products and how we as consumers change.

Marketing Charts released this study that revealed generational differences in buying decisions. When asked, “which of the following are more important than price when making a purchasing decision, the options included:

  1. Quality
  2. Convenience
  3. Customer Service and Support
  4. Brand Reputation
  5. Brand’s Ethical Values
  6. Consistent Digital Experience

None of these 6 options scored higher than price for Gen Z and there is a sharp contrast between the older generations and Gen Z for Quality, Convenience, and Customer Service and Support.

The last option, Consistent Digital Experience is the only option that Gen Z outpaced the other generations.

It could be easy to assume that Gen Z only cares about buying cheap stuff on their phone, but let’s dig deeper.

From the study:

Perhaps price is more important to Gen Zers than other factors due to their financial situations: slightly more than half (53%) of Gen Z consumers say that the high cost of living is a barrier to their financial success, and fewer than half (48%) of Gen Zers would describe themselves as fully or mostly financially independent.

Gen Z is currently ages 18-26. and compared to older generations, they have the least amount of income, so it makes sense that the price of what they buy is going to be very important.  It’s not because they are Gen Z, it’s because of their life stage that they are more focused on prices than older people.  For the most part, as we get older, we eventually have more money to spend.  We also realize the value to buying good quality stuff instead of cheap disposable stuff.  As most of us become older and wiser, our priorities shift.

This leads me to a huge mistake too many businesses make in their advertising and marketing…  They put too much focus on cheap prices and not enough attention to what grown-ups really care about:

Quality.

Convenience.

Customer Service.

Brand Reputation.

If your advertising emphasis is all about price and deals, you are not communicating to me the real reason I want to buy in most cases.

Want help in creating a campaign that offers more than just cheap stuff?

Do you have the guts to do this?  (Most businesses don’t.)

Contact me and I’ll help.

 

Stop the Ad-Speak

Stop the Ad-Speak

by | Mar 25, 2024 | Sound ADvice, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard

The dictionary definition of cliché is, “a hackneyed or over-used expression which has literally become meaningless over time.”

Why would anyone invest their hard-earned advertising dollars in an expression that has literally become “meaningless?” In fact, clichés can literally kill any chance an ad has of creating a positive impact.

There’s an old saying in media, People don’t dislike ads, they dislike bad ads. Bad ads, typically, are filled with clichés. 

The average consumer today receives in excess of 3,600 advertising messages a day, including radio, TV, newspaper, packaging, signage, internet, and more.

Before today’s cluttered and competitive world, many advertisers succeeded with clichés and by simply keeping their name in front of the public. Today, it’s much more competitive, and simple name recognition and repetition are not enough to ensure a return on your advertising investment. You need to brand your business before the consumer is in the market for your products or services.

Branding, by definition, necessitates differentiating yourself from your competition. Being different cannot be accomplished by saying the same thing as your competitors or using the same tired clichés used by other marketers.

Whether in your advertising or when having conversations with customers, make sure the words you use aren’t the same words that all your competitors are using!

The bad news is that there are way too many ads both national and local that are filled with too many clichés. The good news is… they are easy to fix!

We have developed a list of clichés that should be avoided if your advertising is to stand out among the crowd and be remembered. To see the complete list of clichés, click here.