{"id":145,"date":"2010-05-06T15:37:14","date_gmt":"2010-05-06T15:37:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wensmedia.com\/\/salesarchive\/permalink\/2010\/5\/6\/113714.html"},"modified":"2010-05-06T15:37:14","modified_gmt":"2010-05-06T15:37:14","slug":"were-you-following-pessimistic-forecasters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/uncategorized\/were-you-following-pessimistic-forecasters\/","title":{"rendered":"Were You Following Pessimistic Forecasters?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b><span style=\"font-size: 20pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">Oops<span style=\"color: black\">!<\/span> Were You Following<\/font><\/span><\/b> <b><span style=\"font-size: 20pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">Pessimistic Forecasters?<\/font><\/span><\/b><\/p>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\">&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"color: black\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I worry about managers limiting their potential when they rely solely upon alleged &lsquo;forecasters&rsquo; when setting their targets.<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"color: black\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; In the U.S., for example, forecaster Barclays originally predicted a 4% decline in radio revenues for 2010. They have had to repeatedly revise their forecast for radio upwards. They are now forecasting radio will grow by 7.4%!<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"color: black\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; How many stations have limited their growth or just barely achieved pessimistic targets based upon Barclays&rsquo; or other forecasters&rsquo; original gloomy forecast?<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Is your business plan a <span style=\"color: black\">self-fulfilling<\/span> prophecy? <\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; One of the stations I work with consistently just barely reaches target every month. I can&rsquo;t help but wonder<span style=\"color: black\">, <\/span>&ldquo;Would they still have &lsquo;just barely hit target&rsquo; had we set the targets higher?&rdquo; Or, &ldquo;Do they quit selling when they reach their goal?&rdquo;<\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Henry Ford said<span style=\"color: black\"> it best when he said, &ldquo;Whether you think you can, or think you can&rsquo;t, you are right!&rdquo;<\/span><\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Targets are unquestionably important motivators and can be <span style=\"color: black\">self-fulfilling<\/span> prophecies. When you plan for 2011, we recommend not sticking your head in the sand or simply going along with industry <span style=\"color: black\">prognosticators.<\/span><\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"color: black\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Don&rsquo;t simply look at things as they are, or predicted to be. Look at what could be and what you can do to get there.<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\"><span style=\"color: black\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; When we work with stations in their planning cycle, we have two underlying principals we apply to targeting.<\/span><span style=\"color: red\">&nbsp;<\/span><\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\"><span style=\"color: black\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; First<\/span>; targets must be realistic. By &lsquo;realistic&rsquo; we mean from your point of view and your staff&rsquo;s point of view&hellip;get their input. &lsquo;Realistic&rsquo; is a perceptual term, but whether you perceive targets are achievable or unachievable, will dictate your level of commitment to them.<\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Secondly; targets must be challenging. There is no satisfaction or sense of achievement in hitting &lsquo;safe&rsquo; targets. Push the envelope with extraordinary initiatives and you are destined to hit extraordinary targets.&nbsp;<\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; One final thought on targets. Don&rsquo;t measure &lsquo;success&rsquo; by your share of alleged radio <span style=\"color: black\">budgets. Build a plan that helps you capture a larger share of overall marketing budgets&hellip;.your station will grow and overall radio budgets will grow as a result of your efforts.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; <\/span><\/font><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0in 0in 0pt\"><span style=\"color: black\"><font face=\"Tahoma\">&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jack Welsh once said, &ldquo;Our problem is not that we set our aim too high and miss. Our problem is we set our aim too low and we hit our target.&rdquo;<\/font><\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Oops! Were You Following Pessimistic Forecasters? &nbsp; &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; I worry about managers limiting their potential when they rely solely upon alleged &lsquo;forecasters&rsquo; when setting their targets. &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; In the U.S., for example, forecaster Barclays originally predicted a 4% decline in radio revenues for 2010. They have had to repeatedly revise their forecast for radio upwards. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-145","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/35"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ensmediausa.com\/ens-on-sales\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}