Where’s The Money in 2023?

Where’s The Money in 2023?

by | Feb 27, 2023 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard

Depending on where you get your news and information, you’ve probably heard a lot of Gloom and Doom stories about the economy.

Some say we’re in a recession, others say “no, not yet, don’t label it with the R word.”

Some blame the President, others blame the previous President, some say Covid, others say… well whatever, it doesn’t really matter.

For those of you who age 35 or younger, your adult lives were relatively stable until 3 years ago, economically speaking.

By 2010, a mere 13 years ago, the U.S. economy was in a growth mode that lasted 10 years. Inflation was down, unemployment was disappearing, stock prices were on the upswing and overall, except for the political bickering, we really didn’t that much to worry about.

Sure, there was and is talk about climate change, human rights, making sure everyone was being treated fairly without bias due to gender, skin color, race, or anything else that needs improvement.

But for today, I’m talking about money and the health of our economy in the United States.

Generally speaking, as a group, we were doing well.

But the impact of Covid related decisions has thrown us into a bit of turmoil and confusion.  Shutting down businesses, toilet paper shortages, overwhelmed health care operations.  Followed by disruptions in the supply chain for essentials besides toilet paper and eventually rising prices has had an impact on most people.

Those of you under the age of 35 haven’t seen this before and that can create fear of the unknown.

Those of us who are old enough to be your parents, have lived through challenges similar to this and I’m here to attempt to reassure you.

I turned 63 on my last birthday and am at the tail end of the baby boomer generation.  When I was a teenager, Jimmy Carter was the President.  We had just survived the Watergate years with the resignation of Richard Nixon.  Gasoline rationing was going on because we didn’t have enough.  Our country recovered and grew in the 1980’s.

The next big crisis I recall off the top of my head would have been September 11th, 2001.  The world stopped as all air flight was grounded and we had no idea what to expect.  We made adjustments and continued until the housing market took a tumble in 2008 and again, gloom and doom was the mood.

2008 was the year that a widely unknown candidate for the Presidency of the United States went all the way to the White House on a message of Hope & Change. It was during the Obama years that those of you that are 35 or younger first started becoming aware of money and what things cost.

On my team at Federated Media, the youngest is turning 26.  She is the first year of Gen Z.  I also have three Gen X and two Boomers. The life experiences color each of their perspectives and outlooks on life today and in the future.  But each is different too due to factors not related to age.

The original question of this piece is not about attitudes but reality.

The reality of who’s got the money to spend in 2023.

As a generation, the biggest chunk is still with the Baby Boomers, followed by Gen X and then Millennials.

In advertising, there used to be an ideal age demographic that was initially 18 to 34 year olds for a number of years and then shifted to 25-54 year olds.

Nearly all the advertising was targeted to people in this demographic and the question to ask is why?

Baby Boomers were the largest generation ever, spanning the years 1946 to 64 for their birthdays and by the 1980’s most of them were between ages 18-34.

As Boomers aged and started families, the desired demo shifted to the 25-54 year olds and sort of stuck there.

Problem is the youngest of the Boomers are turning 59 this year and have fallen out of favor due to their age for the advertising community.

The exception seems to be all the medical and retirement advertising.

But believe me, the people who have the money to support your business still are the Baby Boomers with over 50% of the wealth and Gen X with nearly 30% according to several studies including MarketingCharts.com.

Marketers like to focus on youth, whether that’s Millennials or Gen Z, but Baby Boomers are the big spenders. A MarketingCharts review of the latest data published by the Federal Reserve confirms that Baby Boomers hold the largest share of US household wealth. However, Gen Xers, and to some extent Millennials, are seeing their wealth climb.

As the General Sales Manager of 4 radio stations in Fort Wayne, Indiana that target our programming to reach people with money to spend, even now, I can help you by connecting our listeners to you and your business so you can convert them to become your customers in 2023.   Email me for information:  Scott@WOWO.com

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
You Have To Be Trust-Worthy

You Have To Be Trust-Worthy

by | Aug 2, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo's Collective Wisdom, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

Now I know that Trustworthy is one word, however I want to dig a little deeper into this idea and what it means to the success of your business.  That is why I hyphenated Trust-Worthy in the title of this article and podcast.

If you’ve been listening to the past few podcast episodes or reading these articles, you may have picked up on the importance of Trust.

The Trust Factor is a foundational Human Relationship Principle that needs to be included in your marketing.

Well, last month I saw a story from MarketingCharts.com:

For Many Americans, Trust in Businesses Must Be Earned

Before my time, I’m talking 50 or 60 years ago, I think we were a more trusting country. At least that is my perception. In the past couple of decades, since 9/11/2001, Americans attitudes have become further clouded as a country regarding Trust.

That overall skepticism is an attitude that has spread to business, especially big business.  Also the past two years we have been through a tremendous number of events that have made us less trusting.

Even those of us who are generally optimistic have struggles trusting in things like, “Will the restaurant I want to go to be open today?”  I had that challenge last week when I discovered that my usual Monday lunch spot was now closed on Monday’s as a way to cope with staffing issues.

Here’s a few numbers from the article:

In its survey of 2,200 US adults, Morning Consult found that 42% agreed with the statement: “I tend to trust companies. They must do something bad to lose my trust.” By comparison, an almost equal share (39%) agreed more with the statement: “I tend to not trust companies. They must earn my trust.” The remaining fifth (20% share) said they either didn’t know or did not have an opinion.

And:

In the US, businesses that are trusted will be rewarded… Some 39% share of respondents in the US agreed that when they trust a company, they go out of their way to purchase from them.

Here’s a couple more stats from this survey:

There are penalties from consumers’ loss of trust in brands. Slightly more than half (54%) in the US said they have lost trust in a company or brand, and among those 42% stopped using them and started using their competitors’ products, while 39% stopped using them and claimed they will never use them again.

About a year ago, I was on a lunch break at a restaurant that was busy but they didn’t indicate their would be an extraordinary wait time. Turns out that was a big mistake.  We sat for over 20 minutes before anyone took our order and finally when our food arrived we had them pack it to go because we were there over an hour and had to get to our next meeting.

Multiple times we attempted to flag down a host or waiter and were told they would be “right back”.  After placing our order, we were still not given any warning that they were slammed and understaffed.

We left hungry, with a bad attitude and have not returned since.

One more quote from the story:

Factors That Build Trust

Within the US, two factors stand out as being the most important in building trust: good value for price; and high-quality products and services.

This survey was about brands, not individual businesses but the same principles apply:

  1. Over communicate if things are not what is typical for your business.
  2. Don’t ignore problems, there are long term ramifications to the health and success of your business if you do.
  3. You need to do everything possible to earn the trust of your customers and clients, all the time.
  4. We don’t expect perfection, but please own up to mistakes and problems.

That is how you become worthy of trust.

Are you Trust-Worthy?  Next time, I’ll share a way to let others know.

 

You Can’t Whine & Win at the Same Time

You Can’t Whine & Win at the Same Time

by | Jul 5, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, ScLoHo Sales Tips, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo

Congratulations, you have successfully completed 6 months of 2022.

How do you feel about that?

Well first off, for making it this far this year, you and everyone else gets a participation trophy.

However the real trophies in life come from more than just showing up.

If this sounds like a little rant, it is, so buckle up.

We often hear news stories and articles talking about “the average” this and that.

You know what an average is right?

You take it all, the good, the bad and the stuff in-between; add it up and then divide by the number of figures you averaged.

There’s an old joke about three guys at a shooting range.  The first one misses his target by 6 inches to the left.  The next one also misses his target by 6 inches to the right.  The third guy happens to be a statistician and says, “Well I don’t even need to shoot, ’cause if you average out your two shots we got us a bulls-eye.”

No matter what you are doing, there is going to probably someone better than you and worse than you.

You certainly don’t want to be in the worst group, right?  In business those who are doing the worst are failing.

The next group, the one in the middle. These are the ones who are doing average work.  Their business is not quite failing or not making boat loads of money either.  They are just surviving, for now.  Or maybe they were surviving and then something happened and now they aren’t doing so well.

The last group, those are the winners.  Above Average.  Top Performers.  They get more than a participation trophy, they get the prize money for coming in 1st, 2nd or 3rd.

You can tell alot by observing and listening to the people in these three groups.

At the bottom, there is often a lot of grumbling and blaming someone else or something else for their troubles.  Rarely do these people and their businesses succeed.  They are too busy whining and You Can’t Whine And Win At The Same Time..

In the middle you’ve got those that wish things were better but don’t commit to the changes needed.  Their businesses are built on Hope and Hope Alone.  “If the stars align…” Right.  Similar to the bottom group but at least they have ideas on how to get better.

Those at the top are a different breed.  They are not willing to settle for mediocre.  They don’t want to be average.

Of course there are fewer of these winners than the other two groups but they are also significantly outpacing the others.

And finally when I say, You Can’t Whine And Win At The Same Time, Winners also whine sometimes too.  But they don’t get stuck there and make whining a lifestyle.  Winners push thru the tough times and realize that they are not helpless victims of circumstances.  They adapt, they innovate, they create, they find a way to move forward and don’t let the set backs paralyze them forever.

If you run a business that wants to win and you are in the Fort Wayne, Indiana area, contact me.  I have some marketing wisdom to share.

If you are an individual with a winner’s heart and attitude, contact me too because I am always looking for that kind of person to consider for openings on the WOWO Radio Advertising Sales Team.

Scott@WOWO.com is my email or you can find me online by Googling ScLoHo.

 

Navigating The Economy & Making Money

Navigating The Economy & Making Money

by | Jun 28, 2022 | Marketing and Advertising Insights, The Not-So-Secret Writings of ScLoHo, WOWO Fort Wayne Radio Advertising with Scott Howard

If you are listening to, watching, or reading all the doom and gloom stories in the news right now…

Stop It.

My friends, instead of getting swallowed up in the bad news of rising prices, staffing and supply chain shortages and whatever else we have going on in the political world, take a look around.

People are still buying stuff.  It’s one of the reasons prices are going up. Not the only reason, but it’s the universal law of supply and demand.

I work in the media. Specifically as the General Sales Manager of the leading conservative talk radio station, I know our conservative talk show hosts point out how bad the liberals are and on TV at home I see the liberals talking about how bad the conservatives are.  It’s the nature of what political commentators do… point out the bad stuff the other side is doing and ignore the good anyone is doing.

However people are still spending money and your job is to adapt your business model to help them buy from you.

We did it a couple years ago in 2020 when we were told to shelter in place and stay home to stop the spread of Covid. Our country has lived thru other challenging times and come out stronger on the other side.  Wars, inflation, recessions, you name it, we’ve been thru it and those that adapt usually make it.

Here’s what I’m telling my advertising sales team to tell the businesses they work with…

You need to invite people to your business to spend money with you instead of pulling back and letting your competition scoop up all the customers.

Let’s put together an ad campaign and invite our listeners to spend with you.

It’s that simple.