by Scott Howard | Aug 15, 2018 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, Really? The Personal ScLoHo, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, Uncategorized, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
Time to introduce myself, again for some of you that I’ve known for awhile, and perhaps for the first time if you are unfamiliar with this website and podcast.
This is episode 75 of the weekly podcast titled, The Genuine ScLoHo Media & Marketing Podcast.
Launched in early 2017 as a request from a couple of the managers at Federated Media in Fort Wayne, Indiana, they were asked to create a sales and marketing oriented podcast and they asked me if I would consider doing it.
See this ScLoHo thing has been around for quite awhile. On the ScottHoward.me website are over 13 hundred articles I have written, edited and published since 2011 and the Genuine ScLoHo Media & Marketing Podcast is simply an audio version of most of the articles I have created since March, 2017.
The history of ScLoHo however is much longer that that.
And before we dig into that history, I want to clear something up about what ScLoHo is.
ScLoHo began as an email address and grew into an online moniker, identity and nickname. I even registered a marketing company with the ScLoHo name. ScLoHo is a made up word that takes the first two letters of my first name, middle and last names and mashes them together. Scott Louis Howard becomes ScLoHo. Look for me on Twitter, Instagram and nearly any other social media site that I am on as ScLoHo. Before launching the ScottHoward.me website, I published over 10,000 articles on ScLoHo branded blogs starting around 2005.
So ScLoHo and Scott Howard, that’s me, are synonymous.
I began working in the media world as a teenager when my high school launched a radio station. After school, I landed my first full time job on the air in Marion, Indiana at WBAT, followed by WIOU in Kokomo, WMEE in Fort Wayne, WKSY in Columbia City, WZWZ in Kokomo, and WXIR in Indianapolis. At all of these stations, I worked on the air as a disc jockey and radio personality.
Life changed when I turned 26. I crossed over to the advertising side of the radio business. I was impressed by the philosophy that the Crawford Broadcasting Company had regarding the relationship between the listeners, the radio station and the advertisers. I moved my young family to work for WMUZ in Detroit, one of a dozen Crawford stations at the time. My job was to write and produce advertising campaigns.
I loved the challenge and learning that occurred during my 8 years at WMUZ. I also did fill-in work in the afternoon and spent about a year hosting WMUZ’s morning show in Detroit. My first venture as an advertising salesperson was also at WMUZ.
The philosophy that I learned related to the trust factor we as people have. WMUZ was and is a commercial Christian radio station that has a special bond with their thousands of weekly listeners. Listeners trust the WMUZ radio personalities. Those personalities often talk about their advertising partners and so that trust factor is passed along to the businesses that advertise. WMUZ listeners trust that the businesses that advertise on their station are trustworthy.
My job was not just to create effective advertising campaigns, but to screen out the bad businesses from the good. I carry this philosophy today as I consider which businesses I want to work with at WOWO radio in Fort Wayne.
In the mid 1990’s, we decided to leave Detroit and return to Indiana. I worked on the radio again in Fort Wayne at WBTU, WFWI, WGL and WAJI. Between 1995 and 2003, along with some part-time radio work and voice over production I was doing, I took a few blue collar jobs too in the printing business, the plastics industry and even automotive.
2003 was the year that I returned to media and marketing full-time in Fort Wayne when I joined a group of radio stations in the advertising sales side of the business. I spent 8 years rising as high as one could advance at that company before I was lured away to work for a website development company and later manage the social media for a $50 million dollar internet sales company.
Kevin, Ric and me. Picture snapped by my friend Ryan Recker.
I also served on the Board of Directors for the American Advertising Federation/Fort Wayne Chapter for 7 years. I taught personal branding seminars, guest lectured at a local university, was featured in some national publications including the Wall Street Journal, won a few awards and have had a lot of fun. I have consulted and coached businesses doing newspaper and magazine ads, billboard advertising, social media and all kinds of internet marketing, along with television and event marketing. More recently I was featured on an international podcast for broadcasters to share what it takes to be successful in broadcasting.
I only share all this with you because I want you to have confidence in the Scott Howard dude a.k.a. ScLoHo, that I’m not just hear to sell you stuff. I am here to help. I’m here to teach, to consult, to advise, to coach and even guide you through the process of marketing you and your business.
Human Relationship Principles are the heart of most successful marketing and advertising efforts and I can help you employ them with your business, organization, or event.
I have learned a lot from a lot of people and continue to learn more and more every week. If you have any marketing or advertising questions or answers, I’d love to talk with you.
by Scott Howard | Jul 25, 2018 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
A study released this summer of over 500 consumers in the United States points out a reason why most advertising campaigns under perform.
There are over a million advertising and marketing messages that we are exposed to each year and most of them are missing something.
What is that something that is missing?
Trust is the Missing Link.
According to the ExpertVoice Consumer Trust Panel, only 4% of consumers trust celebrity endorsements, while over 80% trust the recommendations from friends and family. In today’s overcrowded marketplace, consumers are searching for trusted recommendations before making a purchase, says the report. Those so called social media influencers, they only earn the trust of 6% of consumers. Yet the influencer marketing industry expected to reach $10 billion by the year 2020.
Those are huge numbers. I’m going to bring it down to earth and tell you what I discovered a few years ago when I joined the advertising sales team at WOWO radio in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
WOWO is a news talk radio station with live, local newscasts starting at 5 in the morning, all the way up to 6 at night. Two local newscast every hour, except the first four hours, when the news team does 4 local newscasts in the morning. As a local news and talk radio station, WOWO also has two local radio personalities, Charly Butcher and Pat Miller who host mornings and afternoons. They are our version of celebrity, but not really.
Let me explain.
Because of the nature of our talk format at WOWO, Charly and Pat share their personalities with listeners. People don’t tune in to WOWO in the afternoon to hear the latest news, they tune in to hear what their friend Pat Miller is talking about with regards to what’s going on in the news. Pat and Charly become friends to their listeners. This is critically important to know, because remember the trust factor of family and friends tops 80% compared to anyone else when you are looking for advice on what to buy or whom to buy it from? Pat and Charly have credibility with their listeners.
There’s another statistic from this national trust survey I want to address. A significant reason why celebrity endorsements aren’t trusted by us everyday consumers is because we know that those movie, music and TV stars are paid big bucks to slap their name on those celebrity endorsed products. Here’s the quote from the report:
…the greatest concern for consumers regarding celebrity, athlete and influencer recommendations is the monetary compensation given to the individual from the brands they’re promoting. Additionally…many consumers expressed concern over what knowledge a celebrity possesses regarding the product they’re being paid to endorse.
Here’s how the live endorsements work with Charly and Pat at WOWO. When they do a full blown, live 60 second endorsement for an advertising partner, Pat or Charly do get paid a fee. The radio station gets paid for the 60 seconds of advertising time and Pat or Charly are paid an additional endorsement fee. These are the highest priced ads you will hear on WOWO. I call them the Platinum Option.
If you and your business wanted this live endorsement 60 second advertisement program from Charly or Pat, you have to qualify. You must be a person of your word. We understand that mistakes can happen but we want to make sure you are honest. When Charly Butcher was promoting Collins Flags as an Indiana company selling American Made Flags, you bet he checked them out before he agreed to endorse them. Same thing with Pat Miller’s endorsement of Doc Dancer heating and cooling. Pat has gotten to know the owners and has used them for his own home. Pat and Charly have veto power too. If they are asked to do live ads for a business that has a questionable reputation, they can and will say no. They have their trusted reputation to protect.
And speaking of protection, when you hire Pat to be your spokesperson for your business with these live 60 second endorsement ads, you are protected from Pat also endorsing your competition. Same thing with Charly. Ask me about this if you want to know more.
by Scott Howard | Jul 11, 2018 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Fort Wayne, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
As a member of the WOWO radio advertising sales team, I have some insider information to share with you.
As a member of the Fort Wayne, Indiana community for the past 20 years, I have some insight to share with you.
As a marketing professional who has worked for other media companies, including those that competed with WOWO, I have some perspective to share with you.
As a Baby Boomer who grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana, where WOWO radio is located, I also have some history to share with you.
At the conclusion of this article, you will have a greater understanding of WOWO, Fort Wayne, and if we should talk about your business using WOWO to invite people to become your customers.
Twice a year, Fort Wayne radio stations receive the results of an independent ratings survey that tells us who listens and when they listen. Not in any scary, meta-data manner, but in demographic and geographic terms. June 29th, I received the results of the Spring 2018 rating survey.
I was not surprised by the data. I look for a couple of things such as the total number of listeners each week. When a business advertises with a radio station, there is a finite number of people that will hear their ads. Same is true with any advertising medium.
So I want to know how many total listeners WOWO has and once again, WOWO is listed as the radio station heard in Fort Wayne that has the largest number of listeners. Over 99,000 every week just in the 6 counties that include Allen County, where Fort Wayne is, and the 5 Indiana counties that are adjacent to Allen. That includes, Adams, Wells, Huntington, Whitley and Dekalb Counties in Indiana.
WOWO has listeners beyond those counties including the Indiana counties of Grant, Wabash, Kosciusko, Noble, Lagrange, Steuben, and several Ohio counties. The listeners in those counties are not included in the survey, but they are there. We know this because of the advertisers and listeners tell us.
The rating survey also tells me that 95% of WOWO’s radio listeners are grown-ups, age 25 and older.
Again WOWO leads the pack, we have nearly 30,000 more grown-ups listening every week compared to the next most popular station that has less than 70,000 listeners aged 25 and older.
Charly Butcher and the Fort Wayne Morning News Team have nearly 50,000 weekly grown-ups listening to WOWO.
So does Glenn Beck, whose 3 hour national talk show comes on at 9am.
Rush Limbaugh’s 3 hour national talk show has over 60,000 weekly listeners on WOWO between noon and 3pm and local WOWO Talk Show host Pat Miller has nearly 55,000 listeners every week between 3 and 6 in the afternoon.
There is no other radio station in Fort Wayne that has this massive number of listeners week after week, of grown-ups. Remember it’s the grown-ups that have the money, not the 13 year olds.
Why is WOWO so popular?
WOWO is a legacy radio station in Fort Wayne. When I was a kid, WOWO played music and the disc jockeys were allowed to be personalities. Bob Sievers, the legendary morning show host would tell me if school was delayed, but hundreds of farmers all across Indiana, Ohio and Michigan also listened to hear the farm reports.
In the evening, I listened to Ron Gregory when I was supposed to be doing my homework and enjoyed his wry sense of humor and puns.
But the WOWO of today is different. Now over 90 years on the air, mostly on 1190am, WOWO has been broadcasting a news and talk format for a couple of decades.
Politically, Northeast Indiana, or “WOWO-Land” as it is called to include the entire tri-state area leans conservative. With the line-up of conservative talk show hosts like our own Pat Miller along with national radio personalities, Glenn, Rush and Sean Hannity and Buck Sexton at night, WOWO has a strong format that attracts grown-up listeners.
We are not totally a conservative part of the country. Our mayor is serving his 3rd term as a member of the Democratic Party and his predecessor also from the Democratic Party served as mayor for two terms. The City and County Councils however lean Republican.
Our Fort Wayne Morning News with Charly Butcher, isn’t really a talk show, more of a news program with interview segments lasting 3 minutes or less, because it’s jam packed with 4 newscasts, 6 traffic and weather reports, 2 sports updates and 2 farm reports every hour! Interview segments with our Mayor and other city and county officials, state government leaders including the Governor and our Congressmen and Senators are featured live each week along with what ever else is timely and appropriate. And yes, just like when I was listening as a kid, WOWO still has school delays and closings in the morning when the weather is bad.
95% of WOWO listener tune in weekdays between 5 in the morning and 6 at night. I call in WOWO Primetime. 70% listen on the weekends.
There are other stations in Fort Wayne that are targeting the same age demographic as WOWO, but they have half as many or even a third as many weekly listeners.
There are also other stations that have a news or talk format, but again their total number of listeners is a tiny fraction of the weekly listeners that WOWO has according to the latest radio survey I’m looking at.
By the way, this dominance of WOWO is not new, it’s been consistent during the 15 plus years I have worked for WOWO and before when I worked for the other radio station companies in Fort Wayne.
All this information is good and great and wonderful, but how does WOWO perform for business that advertise with us?
I’m impressed and that’s not a bunch of hype. Because of all that I have already mentioned, there are certain characteristics and options that I have with WOWO that are not available anywhere else in Fort Wayne that have created phenomenal results for advertisers that partner with us. Nothing is 100%, but compared to other stations I have worked for since 1986, I don’t have to cross my fingers and hope for the best when I have a true advertising partner who takes my guidance, coaching and follows that plan we create together.
Not every business that I talk to however qualifies to work with me. Want to know if you qualify? Hit me up, and let’s connect.
by Scott Howard | May 9, 2018 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, Really? The Personal ScLoHo, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, Uncategorized, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
This week, we are going to talk about a subject that goes beyond media and marketing, it’s about being Authentic and Appropriate.
The backstory on this subject is that being Authentic and Appropriate is how I strive to live my life. However I was recently talking to a new friend who works in the radio and podcasting industry and he mentioned those words and I felt a new podcast and blog post article was in order.
I’m in my 50’s and I recall half a lifetime ago (in my mid 20’s) working in Detroit. I went from being a t-shirt and jeans wearing radio disc jockey to wearing a sports coat and tie everyday because I was switching over to the advertising side of radio and would be meeting with business owners every week.
Two versions of the early Scott Howard aka ScLoHo
With help from my family, I spiffed up my wardrobe and became an equal to the business people I would meet with. At least that was the impression I was trying to convey. I probably carried it off pretty well, or is it pretty good? See, I really don’t care which is grammatically appropriate, that’s my authentic self talking.
But back to the subject of being Authentic and Appropriate. We want to trust people and trust the businesses run by people. Being Authentic is key. However, you need to temper your authenticity with being appropriate. In my personal example, if I decided I never wanted to wear a tie and sports coat when I took the job in Detroit, because I wanted to be the authentic Scott Howard radio guy who only wore jeans, I wouldn’t have lasted. Instead, I decided to grow my wardrobe and who I was. I didn’t toss all my jeans and t-shirts, I just wore them in my casual settings.
Now let’s see how this can apply to your business. What are some characteristics of you and your business that are important and needed to inspire trust and confidence?
Two examples come to mind of people I’ve met with recently. There’s the pharmacist that wears a white lab coat with his name on it. In his off hours, he can be seen in shorts, and barefoot wearing a t-shirt. If he dressed like that during business hours, he would lose the trust and confidence of his customers in many cases.
The other example is my favorite heating and cooling company. All of their techs wear clothing with brand logos and their trucks are also branded so when they pull up in your driveway, you know who it is. Imagine someone pulling up in a rusted out van wearing tattered jeans and an old sweatshirt coming over to check out the furnace. My wife wouldn’t open the door to someone like that. Not that she is a snob, she wants to feel secure that the person is trustworthy and appearances count.
You can apply this authentic and appropriate principle to all you do and to all your employees too. Be yourself, let others get to know you, but don’t share questionable stuff unless you are prepared to face the consequences.
And that brings me back to the media and marketing of your business. In all of your ads, skip the hype and keep the fine print to a minimum. Yes, you may need to have some disclaimers for legal purposes, but please don’t be a shyster. We as consumers want to spend money with businesses that we believe are honest and trustworthy.
I started out telling you that what prompted me to write this piece was a conversation with a new friend. His name is Matt Cundill and for a couple of years he has been hosting a radio insider podcast from his home in Canada. Matt is an extremely talented voice talent and his podcast is targeted to people in the programming side of radio which is his background. Here’s a link to the podcast that I was on, or just search for the Sound Off Podcast, Matt posted his interview with me on May 1st, 2018.
Matt summed up our conversation with these words,
The more I spoke to Scott about what makes a successful sales person, the more I realized that it has more in common with being on the air. Be authentic, tell the truth, work with the long term in mind…
Good words of wisdom for all of us.
by Scott Howard | Apr 18, 2018 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard
One of the weirdest things I sometimes hear from business owners is, “we are busy enough, we don’t need to advertise to get new customers.” Sorry, but you ALWAYS need new customers, and today, I’ll tell you why.
I had a conversation recently with a new business owner about the reality of his customer retention. This young man is smart, has advanced degrees in the medical field and has been in his profession for awhile. However he is also a new business owner who just celebrated his one year anniversary.
From all indications, he has made some good choices during the past few years. He knows about his competition since he used to work for them. He bought an existing business that had 4 decades of history in the neighborhood.
He even advertises, mostly continuing what the previous owner was doing, but I uncovered a couple of items that he was unaware of, that as a business owner, you should know.
While he had some understanding of what areas of his business were more profitable than the others, he hadn’t taken the time to figure out a Return On Investment formula that is important if you are going to spend any time or money on advertising. As we talked about some of those figures, they were eye opening to him.
But when I told him that he is likely losing 20% of his customers each year, his jaw dropped.
This was something that had never occurred to him.
(By the way, he’s not the one that I quoted at the beginning of this piece, that was another business owner that I visited last month that I don’t want to work with. That guy will likely be out of business in the next 5 years or sooner.)
Back to the bright young business owner. I shared with him some simple facts of doing business that I wrote about a few years ago. Here’s what happened to the customers you no longer have:
Some have moved out of town.
Some have died.
Some simply don’t need what you are selling.
Some have found an alternative.
It’s the last one that should concern you the most.
You need to find out what that alternative is and why it became an alternative for your customers.
You also need to find out why you are losing customers.
No matter how many new customers you have coming in your front door, if you can keep them from going out the back door, you should see your profits increase.
This is true of nearly any business that is at least a year old, and something you should plan for.
There are ways to attempt to decrease the percent of customers you lose each year and that involves taking a strategic look at your marketing plan, not just advertising. This is one of the fun things that I really enjoy doing and I am good at.
When I help you develop a Marketing Strategy Model, I will ask you questions that you may have never thought of. I may also tell you to do somethings that you might find go against the flow of what you think needs to be done.
Some of the things I have told others is they need to raise their prices and stop using discounts. That is not applicable to everyone, or all the time, but that kind of advice made sense to the advertising partners I work with that followed my direction and have made positive changes in their operations. They actually did lose a portion of the customers, but it was the ones that were the most difficult to work with and they replaced them with customers they enjoy working with.
This 20% rule also applies to what I do in my business. Since I joined WOWO radio in 2013, I have worked with over 100 companies. Each year most of them continue but some don’t and for various reasons.
Last year a long time advertising partner that I worked with for 10 years had health issues and decided to slow down. Actually losing 20% of their customers for the next few years was a good thing.
This year, another advertising partner is being affected by regulation changes in their industry, so we are on hold for now.
What this means for you is that I always have time to consider adding new customers. Depending on your needs, you could be what I call an advertising partner, which is the highest level of my involvement with you, or, at the other end of the spectrum, we don’t work together to help your business grow.
It all starts with a conversation, usually face to face and if you want to see how this works, contact me.
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