“Genius is making the complicated look simple.”  – Albert Einstein-

     During the last couple of weeks, I have had clients and radio sales managers tell me our new SoundAdvice radio marketing system is “brilliant” or “sheer genius.”
      Frankly, I find flattery like that a little embarrassing, especially when the three-part SoundAdvice system seems so simple and common sense to me.
      So I began to reflect upon the difference between common sense and brilliance.
     I believe the difference is effort !
      When Alexander Graham Bell was credited with inventing the telephone, many other inventors were working on similar ideas. When Thomas Edison introduced the light bulb, other scientists had been working on the concept too.  These ‘geniuses’ just worked harder and faster to get their ideas to market.
      SoundAdvice has been more than three years in the making; researching topics, developing proprietary software, and testing it in the marketplace.
      I’m sorry, it’s not genius, but common sense with a lot of hard work behind it.  And radio advertisers, prospects and sales professionals are loving it.

 If you would like an on-line demonstration of how SoundAdvice can help increase your sales just contact me at [email protected]

     Depending which survey you believe, approximately 95% of radio audiences find their favorite station “by accident” or through “word of mouth”.
      That’s not because advertising doesn’t work, but because stations are too easy to find.
      Unlike our clients’ locations, listeners can find our location without looking… a simple push of the scan button does it for them!
      So why invest in billboards, TV and other audience-promotion advertising if less than five percent of our audience will be generated by it?
1.) Advertisers are people too. They see and hear our advertising and get the impression we’re bigger than life!

2.) Staff morale, both on air and off, gets a definite lift that you can hear over the speaker and in sales presentations when your station is making the extra effort and investment to improve its profile in the market place.

3.) Reinforcement – Advertising and a high in-market profile tells your existing audience that they have made the right choice and chosen a popular station.

4.) Leading by example. Advertisers expect us to practice what we preach. If we do nothing but wait for audiences to find us by accident, it sends a signal that those of us in advertising do not believe in advertising. 

      I once managed the number thirteen station in a four station market (numbers four through twelve were near-by major market stations) but we actually out-billed the number one station five months out of twelve.
       Much of that sales success was the result of the huge market profile of our window-sticker, billboard and bus-back campaigns that advertisers were exposed to on their way to work every day. We looked successful!
       Audience promotion for radio stations does work, just not in the way some of us think it does.

We’ve always known about the differences, and the synergies, between passive media and intrusive media.
Traditionally, intrusive media, like radio and TV, have been particularly good at creating awareness, building brands and driving traffic.
Passive media like brochures, magazines and newspapers, on the other hand, have been used to provide the details, features, prices lists and other data consumers looked for when making their purchase decisions after the awareness was created.
The problem has been, the printing and distribution costs of these passive media have been huge. These costs cut into budgets that could have gone to us, the intrusive media folks.
Well thanks to websites, those days are ending. 
The internet is the new passive media, providing all of the details, prices and information a consumer could want, with no printing costs and no distribution costs. The production costs for websites are about the same as for printed material but there is no postman, carrier or printer to pay, no trees to cut or data bases to maintain!
Hold onto your hats!  As budgets are freed up from old-media printing and distribution costs, we will be used more and more to create awareness and drive traffic to the new ‘free’ easy-access passive media…the internet and websites.
If you aren’t offering your clients links from your website to theirs, you should be. The more your clients use the internet, the less they’ll have to depend upon printing and distribution of old, more expensive, passive media.  
And at a nominal charge of only $5 per week for 52 weeks for all of your clients to be on your station’s advertiser link directory, you will raise more than $100,000 to cover the cost of operating your site and maintaining the links. 
 

We hope some of these ENS on Sales tips improve your sales. For other ENS Media consulting, training or revenue-development ideas contact [email protected] .

You’ve probably seen a commercial that goes something like this;

The amazing Acme Slice-All Knife! It cuts through steel, slices bread without making a crumb and after cutting through concrete, watch how easily we slice this tomato! Now you can order this amazing Slice-All Knife for just forty-nine ninety-five. That’s right, only forty-nine dollars and ninety-five cents…
but wait order it right now and we’ll also send you this amazing set of eight steak knives…and that’s not all, the first 100 callers will also receive the amazing Blend-All Blender! Still not convinced? Pick up the phone and we’ll also send you on an unbelievable, all expenses paid trip to a tropical island!
How much do you perceive that Slice-All Knife to be worth when the announcer keeps adding ‘unbelievable’ bonuses?  
I’m sad to say, I often see media sales people devalue their product in a similar fashion with either bonuses or ‘value added’. They might as well be saying; “I don’t believe our rate card delivers value, so here’s what I’m going to do….”
Selling today is all about relationships…relationships built upon trust. Ask yourself; “How much faith or trust does a client have in my product if I believe I have to throw in all kinds of bonuses or perks with every presentation?”
 

          Would you agree that being customer-focused, or placing customers’ needs first in your marketing strategy, is essential to building a sustainable business?
          Would you also agree that the airline industry probably has one of the least customer-friendly reputations in all of North America?
          If you agree somewhat to these two statements, would it seem reasonable that a customer-focused organization would adopt the airline industry’s supply and demand pricing model?
          These two models are incongruent with each other.  The airline industry uses a supply and demand pricing model, gouging customers when they are busy, and selling at a loss when they are not.
          Customers know that fuel and crew costs do not go up with passenger demand and they resent being gouged when they need the airline most, like during Spring Break.
          Ironically, this same pricing model is also responsible for one of the most financially troubled industries in North America today…four out of six major airlines are in bankruptcy protection!!  
           I have yet to hear a convincing argument that supply and demand pricing and customer-friendly marketing are compatible models.
          Advertisers do not receive more value, more audience, better service, more brand awareness or more sales because we are nearing sold-out positions, just as they do not receive less value, audience, margins or service when you can shoot a cannon through your log.
          Marketers who default to supply and demand gouging or discounting do so for one of two reasons:

          1.) They do not care about, or have confidence in, the value they deliver,

                                      OR

          2.) They have not trained their sales people to sell their product for what   it’s  worth in slower demand seasons resulting in the need to make up for that weakness in high demand seasons.

          Oh, I almost forgot one other reason for hypocritical pricing….follower syndrome… “We have to sell cheap in slow times because our competitors do”, is not an excuse that leaders use.
          Selling is simply an exchange of value. The seller delivers value and receives value (money) in exchange for that value. It is not ‘selling’ if the seller does not realize value too.
          If you have made a conscious decision to engage in customer-focused selling, then you must build your rate grids around value…..value to your customers, and value to your stations, 12 months of the year.