Recession Lesson
The recession is not over!
Now that I have your attention, I’m going to ask you to tell yourself this every day… “The recession is not over. The recession is not over.”
Many of the stations I work with learned some valuable lessons during the recession that helped them build revenue increases even though their competitors experienced losses.
Now that the automotive industry is picking up steam and we appear to be on the road to recovery, I’m afraid we’ll go back to our fat and lazy ways and forget those lessons.
Instead of falling back into ‘order-taking’, let’s keep selling as if we are in recession so that those orders take us to never before achieved revenue heights!
Most of you know the psychology behind the four minute mile. Until Roger Bannister achieved it, it was thought it could not be done.
Since he broke that record, it has been broken numerous times and the record is now 17 seconds better than the four minute mile.
Many stations have broken records and proven there is more business out there, even during tough times. Let’s not turn the clock back.
Let’s take those lessons into the new economy to continue breaking records.
Those lessons?
1.) Look beyond top-line sales reports. Your top ‘biller’ is not necessarily your top seller. Many top billers didn’t make the cut when their dependence on order-taking, and heritage or entitlement accounts caught up with them.
2.) Leverage your websites. You can now offer one-stop shopping, leveraging the pictures, promotions, details and fine print you can publish on your website to dramatically increase your airtime buy.
3.) Print is dead. Your clients no longer need to pay lumberjacks, truck drivers, paper mills, printing press operators, postal workers or carrier boys to produce and deliver their messages. The internet has freed up former print budgets for you!
4.) Local is reliable. Stations that have learned to reduce their dependency on agencies and ratings actually grew their sales in tough times! Less than 10% of the businesses in your market currently use radio. There’s lots of room for growth. Once you teach those businesses how to get a return on their investment with radio, you’ll have friends (clients) for life.
5.) We’re in a knowledge economy. Busy multi-tasking business owners are looking for someone they can trust to direct their advertising buys. Media sales people who continue to learn the new media landscape and how to produce measurable results for their clients will continue to break revenue records.
The economic downturn forced many of us to become physically and mentally fit. Let’s stay in shape to continue breaking revenue records in the new economy!