Imagine you’re fresh out of college and your best friend sets you up on a blind date. You have a good time on the date, and after a few more dates she invites you to join her on a cruise.

During the cruise you have the time of your life, and you begin dating more seriously on a regular basis.

One nervous night, under a romantic full moon, you get up the nerve to ask her to marry you. She says, “Yes”, accepts your ring, and the sale is made.

Who gets credit for the sale? The best friend who introduced you? The cruise line? The months of dating and getting to know each other?  The ring? Or how about the full moon?

Human perceptions, attitudes, relationships and decisions are seldom based upon one singular event, but rather on a series of events, experiences and influences that form our opinions, biases, and prejudices over time.

For as long as I’ve been in this business, some advertisers have under-estimated the introductory role radio plays in making the sale, and they’ve given credit for the sale to the moon…that last touch-point in the conversion process.

In the old days, it was the newspaper. Some advertisers would proclaim their customers actually came to buy with a copy of the newspaper under their arm. Some even went so far as to say “No one ever came in with a radio under their arm.”  Hmm…imagine that.

Then came direct mail, coupon envelopes, flashing neon signs, huge pink gorillas, and a long list of ‘last-touch’ or last customer touch-points.

Google Analytics now flogs a ‘Last Interaction Attribution Model’ that gives 100% of the credit for a sale, which they call a ‘conversion,’ to the clicks that immediately precede the sale.

And advertisers hungry to measure the ROI (Return on Investment) of every expenditure, are eating it up.

The Google model would leave out the best friend who introduced you to your wife, the countless dates, good times and the cruise, and give all the credit for the marriage to the moon.

The problem is radio salespeople have not been trained to understand, articulate and sell radio’s role in the entire ‘conversion’ process, from introduction, to building a relationship and brand, to asking for the order.

Digital media and last-touch clicks are not radio’s problem, any more than a ‘last-touch-point’ car salesperson who takes credit for the sale or other last-touch-points, like coupons, Yellow Pages and pink gorillas on the roof.

All exposures play a role in what those in search of ROI call ‘conversion.’  In reality, there is no one ‘single source’ that can take credit for the sale and no single source that can make the sale without the influence of other touch points along the path to conversion.

Click here to inquire about facilitating our Radio Works workshop for your annual sales conference or broadcast association to train local radio account executives how to sell Radio’s ROI as the launch on the path to increased conversions and sales.