Innholdsfortegnelse for October 24, 2016 i Radio Ink Magazine

I cringe when I think about my management style when I was a young new manager. I was arrogant and full of myself, and didn’t understand how lucky I was to have the people who worked in my various radio stations. Most of us probably go through that. We don’t know what management is until we become managers ourselves. And if we’re not trained by great managers and made ready for the position, we can easily think management is about control, or “bossing people around.” I was blessed with a lot at a young age. I ended up owning and running three stations before I was 30. And I can remember the very day I closed on the purchase of my first station, sitting in my nice, newly remodeled…

Selling, and this is my definition, is simply the modification of the behavior of another person, without that person’s necessarily knowing that his/her behavior is being modified, in order to arrive at a mutually beneficial conclusion. Would you go along with that? In other words, it’s practicing psychology without a license. And when media is what you’re selling, if you’re good at it and you’re involved with creative, now you’re practicing psychology without a license on a massive scale! So, if you’re into this for a living, why would you unintentionally drop bombs into your presentations that make it seriously more difficult for you to arrive at that mutually beneficial conclusion? Understand that I have hardly ever met a local direct decisionmaker who is an expert at creative, much less…

Constant recruiting is vital to building a great sales force and insulating revenue from attrition. Online job sites are highly effective and a must, but can’t match on-air recruiting to reach potential candidates already living or working in your coverage area, including the most desirable of all: employed outside salespeople you can persuade to jump ship. On-air recruitment ads can also showcase your stations, talent, and retail success stories to more local listeners and business owners than online. Many on-air recruitment ads make a station sound desperate and plagued by constant turnover. But that’s only because that’s how most are written. Instead, write recruitment ads like you would a station promo. Radio is show business. Put on a show! Your intro line should always be a promised-benefit statement based on…

What are your hobbies (outside of radio/your company)? My hobbies are travel, working out, fly fishing, golf, and reading American history. Who is/was your role model, and why? Jack Welch. He was self-made and was totally committed to succeeding through strong team-building and demanding excellence. What are you reading right now? The Mantle of Command by Nigel Hamilton. Favorite movie? Schindler's List. Favorite TV show? Game of Thrones. If you had 30 minutes, a tape recorder, and your choice, who would you interview, and why? President John Kennedy. He was a transformative figure in both politics and setting America on the path of social change by supporting the civil rights movement. Name three stations you listened to as a kid and three you listen to now. WAEB, WABC, WFIL.…

RAB President/CEO Erica Farber with newly appointed Cox Media Group President Kim Guthrie Talking finances at the Pillsbury's Broadcast Finance Leadership Breakfast : Alpha Media CEO Larry Wilson, CMG EVP/Radio Bill Hendrich, and Beasley CFO and interim CEO Caroline Beasley. Bring on the lunch: Rolland Johnson of Three Eagles Communications, Cromwell CEO Bud Walters, and broadcast attorney John Garziglia catch up on old times before lunch is served. Radio Ink Publisher Deborah Parenti presented the Radio Ink Radio Wayne Awards at the annual Advertiser Breakfast. The highlight of the event was when Cox Media Group Tampa Market Manager Keith Lawless got up on stage to accept his award -- and thanked every person he’d ever met in his life. Pictured here are the winners: (l-r) Jeff Gonsales, Jeff Smulyan, Keith…

The number one most important thing needed to hire your next great seller is: Don’t wait until you have an opening! When I hear about a company dictate to hire multiple salespeople in the next 30 days, I shake my head and wonder what in the world that corporate team is thinking. Even a dedicated team of recruiters will find that this is an impossible task. Managers, who are already stressed, try to find anyone who has any interest to hire, then train, and hope that some of them will end up staying. Not the correct way to hire great sellers. This takes us back to the early ’90s, when a major broadcaster sent out an edict to hire as many sellers as possible and see who sticks. Ouch! Not…

With an engaging smile and warm handshake, Heidi Raphael is one of radio’s most recognizable, respected, and well liked communicators. As Greater Media’s SVP of corporate communication, Heidi has leveraged her 20 years of radio experience in positioning the company’s brand as one of the most admired in the industry. Here, she shares some of the secrets to her success. What are the most important functions of a corporate communications manager today? It’s having the ability to think five steps ahead, to be proactive and ready to embrace (as well as monitor) any situations that may arise. Social media has changed the landscape in today’s multimedia world. There can be no silos in the communications space. It’s fast, immediate, and occurs simultaneously on all fronts. Being able to respond clearly,…

Our 2016 roster of top managers is certainly a group of experienced and successful leaders. They come from all over the country and from large, medium, and small markets. They’ve accumulated hundreds of years of combined radio and management experience. Some are leading 20 employees, others 50, many 100 or more. They may operate a single station or run multiple clusters across several markets. But they all have one thing in common: Their employees love to work for them and their companies love having them on their team. To help you become a better manager heading into 2017, we peppered our list of Best Managers with the tough questions you submitted. We picked the best answers for the report that follows, and in some cases we highlighted managers and posted…

The biggest mistake made by modern media buyers is that they pay too much of a premium for targeting. We live in an age that worships data, but what I'm about to tell you is the truth nonetheless. The best ROI for most businesses in 2016 is to buy massive reach and frequency using woefully undervalued, untargeted radio (Adults 18+) and marry it to a message that is both relevant and credible. That's right. I said untargeted radio. Adults 18+. Marc Pritchard, the chief marketing officer at Procter & Gamble, is a very smart man. In an August 9 story in the Wall Street Journal, Pritchard said, "We targeted too much and we went too narrow." The headline above that story read, "P & G to Scale Back Targeted Facebook…

One of the leading indicators for sales success is the number of appointments a salesperson has each week (this is not the only leading indicator you should be looking at, but it is one of them). The idea is that if a salesperson has a significant number of appointments each week — the kind where they are either finding needs, getting assignments, presenting solutions, or delivering a proposal — this quality sales activity will lead to good, solid revenue performance. There are other kinds of appointments, but let’s focus on those that are aimed at bringing in new business. Here’s where it breaks down: Too many salespeople are confusing “I have an appointment” with having heard the statement “Follow up with me next week.” To be clear: Hearing “Follow up…

“When you are in a leadership role, people need to feel that you have their back, that you care about them, that you’re committed to their success.” Drew Horowitz started his radio career fresh out of college, selling advertising at RKO Radio’s Oldies WFYR/Chicago. Like many new radio sellers back in the ’70s and ’80s, Horowitz was given the Yellow Pages and told that was his account list. After receiving some training, and getting thrown out of a few local businesses, Horowitz got his “elevator pitch” down and began to get the hang of selling. He closed a sale to a motorcycle company, then a bookstore. He says, “Once you get that first sale or two under your belt, you get confidence, and then I was off to the races.”…