Selling anything is about transference of TRUST, which comes from awareness and frequent exposures over time.

Ever hear the term "Building a Friendship?" Building is a key word. When you first meet someone there are certain things you don’t do, don’t ask. It would simply be too odd. But over time once you know someone you can ask for a favor because you are known to be responsible with that favor to the friends with who you have BUILT trust.

Those unfamiliar with advertising want instant results (who doesn’t?)… But the same principals of friendship apply to advertising. You have to build one brick on top of another. Eventually you are trusted.

When we first started we received some advertising resistance. People said they wanted to "watch" us. What they are really saying is we want to see if you’re trustworthy. See if you continue to produce a quality product, etc. Same holds true for advertising.

If you’re targeting a new group of people who do not have the advantage of knowing about you and your brand…. you have to build that trust before they will confide in you with their dollars. It’s rare someone will send a check for thousands or tens of thousands of dollars unless they can feel comfortable that they will receive what they purchased and it will be authentic. That comes with trust. Trust can come through the references of others (good reason to use testimonials or quotes from known people in your marketing to new people).

It’s important to remember that TRUST IS A PROCESS. The reason advertising specialists recommend CAMPAIGNS instead of single ads is that ONGOING visibility helps people become more comfortable with you. Just like a new friend… each time you get together you trust them a little more. Eventually you’re real friends. Same with ads.

Can you speed the process? Somewhat… through the HALO EFFECT of others (testimonials or known spokesmen). Design quality and association with GREAT art also helps. Also size of ad sends a message of confidence. Ever see a spread from a gallery which is six or eight full pages in a row? It says "Wow! These people must be big if they can afford this." Of course TWO pages together send a similar impression. Full pages send an impression over fractional sizes. Its human psychology 101. Still FREQUENCY and CONSISTENCY is critical. If you’re there…then you’re not (and the potential customer is paying attention) it raises question. Also it reinforces your messages. It’s a cumulative effect, not a single ad but the impressions of multiple ads. Author Roy Williams says that people LOOSE impressions over time and if you are away too long you have to start from scratch.

Trust is a building process.

The following was written by my friend Roy Williams who is a best selling marketing author.

Is your business growing slower than you think it should? Do you suspect its slow pace might have something to do with ineffective marketing?

The average business owner feels their business should be growing faster, but few know how to isolate the problem. Today we’re going to fix that.

The elements that affect the growth of your business will fit into one of four distinct categories. Understand these categories and you’ll have a framework for self-examination.

1. Share of Voice: What is your percentage of the total exposure for all the businesses in your category? How much of the total signage is yours? Magazine advertising? Directory advertising? TV advertising? Radio advertising? Newspaper? Direct mail? E-mail? Web traffic? If there are news stories related to your category, do they mention your brand or someone else’s? What percentage of the word-of-mouth advertising is yours? Each of these things contributes to your total Share of Voice.

Share of Voice can be purchased. But be careful; most advertisers try to reach too many people. A message of true importance needs to be delivered only once to be remembered. But is your message really that important to your customer? Is it safe to assume that your message will be remembered after being heard only once or twice?

Problem: You’re reaching too many people with too little repetition.

Solution: Buy more repetition from fewer media vendors.

Tip: Be an important advertiser to one or two audiences instead of an invisible advertiser to three or four.

2. Impact Quotient: How impressive is your offer when compared to the offers of your competitors? To be impressive, your message must first be believable, so close the loopholes in your message.

Loophole Open: Advertisers often cry, “Everything Must Go!” But the listener is thinking, “Or what? What happens if you don’t sell it? You’ll just come up with some new angle next week, right?”

Loophole Closed: “Everything must go! Any jewelry not sold by the end of the day will be melted down and sold as scrap. This means that until 9 o’clock tonight you can buy finished jewelry for slightly more than the value of the raw materials.”

Question: “What about targeting? You haven’t said anything about reaching the right people.”

Answer: I’ve never seen a business fail because they were reaching the wrong people. But I’ve seen hundreds fail because they were (1.) reaching too many people with too little repetition, or (2.) delivering a message that no one cared about. You’re going to be surprised how many people suddenly become “the right people” when you begin delivering a more impressive message.

3. Personal Experience Factor: Are you exceeding your customer’s expectations or falling short of them? Do you have the brands they prefer or are you pushing a weak alternative? Are your prices higher or lower than your customer expected?

A strong ad will only temporarily prop up a business that delivers a weak Personal Experience Factor. Unimpressive reputations nullify impressive ads. Have you been trying to solve an internal problem with external advertising?

4. Market Potential: What will be the total dollar volume sold in your product or service category this year (in your market or nationally)? Do you know the total, potential volume for your trade area? What percentage of that financial pie is yours? If you don’t have access to this information, there are two easy ways to get it. (1.) Carefully list every competitor you face along with your best estimate of their sales volume in your trade area. This can usually be done with a reasonable degree of accuracy. How many employees to they have? How much inventory? Square footage?  Estimate objectively and don’t leave anyone out. (2.) Contact a trade organization or Google to find a figure for total, nationwide sales volume in your category. Divide that number by the population of the

United States

(currently about 298,500,000.) to get a per capita sales volume. Multiply that number times the population of your trade area. I think you’ll be surprised how close the two numbers are.

It’s easier to grow small businesses than large ones. Show me a business selling only 5 percent of the Market Potential in their category and I’ll show you a business with huge growth potential. Show me a competitor 8 times as large, one that’s currently selling 40 percent of their market potential, and I’ll show you a business that’s going to have to work very hard to hang onto what they’ve got.

Uncommitted customers are the easiest to steal. Consequently, early growth comes with less effort than later growth, when the low-hanging fruit has all been picked. The business selling 40 percent of their market potential must now fight to win those customers who have some degree of loyalty to a competitor. Rarely does a business achieve more than 40 percent of the total, potential volume in their product or service category.

Examine your business through the 4 lenses of Share of Voice, Impact Quotient, Personal Experience Factor and Market Potential and you’ll quickly identify what’s been holding you back.

Advertising can’t change your Personal Experience Factor or your Market Potential. But a focused media plan will dramatically improve your Share of Voice (by reaching fewer people with greater frequency.) And better ad writing will dramatically increase your Impact Quotient.

Roy H. Williams

www.wizardofads.com

“Of course you’ll do a story on us,” replied a customer when discussing advertising. My reply was not what he wanted to hear. “ Well, we believe we should do anything and everything we can do to help our customers build their business… but we do not link a quid-pro-quo to advertising.”

Selling editorial is the second oldest profession and is right up there with the oldest profession. It’s a natural for people to want coverage and those of us in the publishing business are usually willing to offer it if there is reason for a legitimate story. However tying it to advertising has a downside…. Readers always know.

In fact I avoid anything that smacks of selling editorial. I remember being impressed with Schiller & Bodo and decided to have our editorial people write a profile on the gallery. In turn they suggested they buy an ad in that issue. “Absolutely not,” I suggested. “I don’t want to make my readers think you bought that story. If you want to advertise, that’s fine but do it in any issue other than the one featuring your story.” I believe Lisa Schiller was appreciative that we would protect their integrity as well as ours.

I once started a magazine called STREAMING. I was convinced by the man I hired to run the publication that we should offer coverage in the magazine in exchange for advertising. My gut instinct was to not do it, but I decided it would be worth considering since I had never done it. The magazine was a run-away success. We got loads of advertising and did loads of stories on our advertisers. This was destined to be one of the great ad successes of the magazine world. We were fat with ads and fat with stories about our advertisers. Our advertisers loved it…. Until they stopped loving it.

It turns out that our readers realized that advertisers had paid for their stories (or received them as a payback for an advertising commitment) and over time it started to backfire on the advertisers and especially on us. Advertisers were telling us that readers were complaining that our entire editorial content was bought. We had two great years… and then it all came crashing down once the readers stopped reading it. The story has a mixed blessing. We made a lot of money in those two years and then in year three we had to close the magazine. Short term success, long term failure.

The ultimate compliment is when a reader decides to pay money to purchase your magazine and when they agree to choose to spend their valuable time reading your content. They feel betrayed when they learn the content is driven by advertisers. Readers will  respond until they start to see patterns and realize that stories on advertisers relate to the same people advertising. It’s been going on for decades and in most cases the same thing happens….readers go away. This is why publishers who have long term goals of credibility avoid short term gains which kill their credibility.

Don’t misread this. All smart publishers will seek opportunities to help the people who support them, but there is a fine line between helping an advertiser and an advertising agreement which is tied to editorial. Readers feel betrayed by the publication and by the advertiser. Though there may be short term gain there can be long term reputation damage, which is difficult to repair. It’s easy to be seduced by print coverage but would you read a magazine if you knew every story was paid? Probably not.

Something about human nature wants to always be associated with the biggest… and the best. But what defines the biggest or the best? Most affluent people want to drive a Mercedes or Lexus, the super affluent want a Bentley or a Roller. They are the finest automobiles but are not the biggest sellers. In terms of volume sold

Toyota and Ford are the biggest. Most affluent people do not buy drive the cars which sell the most, in fact many people don’t want to be associated with the masses. Instead they want what is unobtainable by the masses.

Advertisers have been trained to reach mass audiences and large audiences. This is critically important when selling mass consumer items like cell phones. But if you want to reach a select audience who can afford a specific item shooting for a mass audience is usually more costly and less effective even with a low cost per thousand.

Low Cost per Thousand Examples:
Assume you are selling cell phones and you want to reach 100,000 people. If the ads are $10,000 than you are paying a cost of $10 per person reached (100,000 people divided by $10,000 ad cost). In this case volume is critical. If 50,000 of the 100,000 reached buy a phone and you can get a customer for $20.00 ($10. cost per thousand x 2) who spends $400 a year it’s a big win. On the other hand; if you spend $10,000 to reach 100,000 of the wrong people who won’t buy your product than you have wasted all of your money.

High Cost Per Thousand Example:
Assume you are selling a $200,000 Bentley. If you reach the same 100,000 people as the cell phone provider your chance of reaching your potential buyer is slim and your $10,000 is wasted. On the other hand if you advertise in a media which reaches the “Super Rich.” The publication only has 10,000 people but every one of them is a Bentley prospect. You know that if you spend $10,000 for an ad which reaches 10,000 people and if only 20 of those people buy a $200,000 Bentley you’ve earned $2 million gross revenue on a $10,000 investment. That same $10,000 spent on the same media the cell phone company uses nets you no sales. So which is better? Large audience or very highly targeted audience? The cost per thousand to reach them is much higher but there is little waste, therefore it is actually less expensive to acquire a customer.

Refined Buyer Focus:
Refining the focus to reach people who will buy is more important than just reaching people who can afford to buy. Using the Bentley example what if you are targeting super rich people who live in a dangerous place like Rio where people who drive high end cars are frequently kidnapped. Those people drive non-descript cars in order to avoid attracting attention and would not buy a Bentley, therefore even though they can afford to buy a Bentley, they won’t. Therefore targeting people can afford a Bentley has have no value and no return and your ad dollars are wasted.

High Circulation Vs Focused Circulation:

In 22 years in the magazine business I’ve probably seen every trick. Publishers often employ wholesalers to sell large quantities of copies at low prices in order to drive circulation high, which allows increased ad prices. Often in these over 50% of the circulation are not buying customers, simply people who took advantage of a low price offering for a magazine they thought they might like. (Renewals are usually low among wholesale subscriptions and more wholesale subs need to be sold to keep up.) In the case of art publications using wholesalers these subscribers typically will never in their lifetime be able to afford and original artwork?

I’ve launched six magazines in my company and have tried many differing strategies and the one I like best is what I call FOCUSED circulation, which means reaching customers who buy products and not trying to build circulation by selling to librarians, high school art teachers, and art enthusiasts who don’t buy artworks. I certainly don’t mind if they subscribe, however all of our marketing efforts target qualified affluent people who are known buyers original artworks. Period.

I once asked a dealer which she wanted more: a bus load of people to pull up and enter her gallery and eat her time or to see a Lexus drive up with a single buyer who walks out with a purchase. "Heaven forbid, I don’t want those people in my gallery," said she. "Of course I want the affluent person who might buy something." She went on to say that non-buying foot traffic was annoying and she realized that her ads were generating traffic, internet visits and calls from people who don’t buy paintings.

Which would you rather have? Focused advertising targeting art buyers is more valuable than large reach.

The following is one of the little secrets few advertisers understand and a trick employed rarely.

When art magazines print stories about a particular artist we frequently see galleries advertise paintings by that artist in that issue. This is a common practice and recommended. However, I they are missing an opportunity.

Human beings are… well….lazy. A reader may read about an artist or see an ad in a magazine which they think, "I’d like to own that painting or I’d like to own something by that artist." Then life gets in the way and the thought fades. Unless the reader takes immediate action to buy the painting while that thought is with them you have lost a potential buyer… unless you find a way to remind them.

With 20+ years in magazine publishing this is one of the least known, yet most effective techniques and advertiser can employ. Remind the reader by showing up in the issue FOLLOWING the issue which featured the artists. This acts as an effective reminder. You could even tag the ad with "This artist was featured in the December issue of Fine Art Connoisseur." This reminder is a second chance to grab those with good intentions who have either forgotten, put their magazine on a shelf, or wondering "where did I see that again?"

Advertisers who might have several artists who have recently been featured may wish to consider an ad with several smaller icons of images (paintings) in the ad act as reminders of previously featured artists. Sometimes readers need time for the thought of purchasing to germinate. If not reminded they easily forget (thus the value of frequency). I’ve had paintings I cannot stop thinking about for months but cannot remember where I saw it or even who the artist is. This acts as a powerful reminder.

“Eighty percent of success is showing up.”

-Woody Allen

Reluctantly I once ran an ad in a publication, which I was not convinced, was a complete fit for my target but I took a shot at advertising in it. I was not thrilled by the results because I did not receive any phone calls. But being true to what I preach about marketing I continued to advertise because I know advertising is not an event it’s a cumulative effect. My rule is that if I advertise somewhere I need to commit for at least a year because the audience does not know my product, has not yet developed trust, and needs to get comfortable before they buy from me.

I’m often so close to my product that I think everyone knows about it, yet I am reminded how wrong I am anytime I advertise to a new audience thinking I’ll get instant results. According to marketing author Roy Williams showing up consistently is one of the hidden secrets of advertising success and advantage is gained by understanding this. While your competitors try something a time or two with a new audience and back down due to lack of “success” they do not understand the process that is quietly happening in the minds of readers who see your ads. Meanwhile you’re building a reputation with an entirely new group of people which leads to new business.

My ad in this new publication was “showing up.” The resulting presence did not net immediate response yet the long term effect was powerful. One never knows the impacts which cannot be measured, which in this case opened new doors to new deals I would have never had otherwise. I also benefited from awareness which opened doors down the road, which would not have opened had they not seen my ad continuously.

Advertisers have been trained to seek response yet the world’s largest advertisers don’t focus on response. Unlike the guy with the colorful sweater and his infomercials, which are designed to make you pick up the phone and buy a pasta maker, most advertisers are establishing trust and awareness while building a brand. Your brand is critical to your success. If seeking affluent art buyers they want to buy from trusted, credible and quality dealers. Would you buy from a dealer you were unaware of previously or one who did not appear to represent high quality? Some people will but most will not. The response trap will prevent critical brand awareness which results in trust building. Sometimes building a brand is 80% showing up.

If Radio were a company whose share of market remained in the single-digit zone against weak competitors for as long as ours has, the board would’ve long ago forced us to reinvent ourselves, to hire someone to identify the problem and then to execute dramatic change.

Perhaps grubbing for the crumbs that fall off the media table has been good enough for Radio. Our consolidated owners continue to grow, and I suppose that keeps Wall Street happy — for the moment. But Radio’s “growth” is coming from budget cuts and tight management, not from getting a higher percentage of the total advertising pie. Owners aren’t likely to pay attention to the need for Radio’s share-of-ad-budget growth until it becomes the only alternative left for growing their companies. By then, it will likely be too late.

I’m not so delusional as to think that Radio will displace broadcast television and cable TV to become the leader in nabbing electronic advertising expenditures. I just know we’re a much stronger medium than we get credit for, and we can do much better.

I believe we can get a respectable 20 percent, instead of a pathetic 7 or 8. But I don’t think Radio believes it.

I know in my heart that Wal-Mart, America’s largest retailer, could use long-term Radio to significantly strengthen its brand in the hearts of Americans, but Wal-Mart doesn’t believe it. According to Cult Branding author B.J. Bueno, the problem is that Wal-Mart and other corporate giants believe Radio’s ill-advised sales pitch that it is primarily a transactional medium, rather than a relational or “brand-building” medium. What are we doing to change the minds of America’s corporate giants? Nothing! We haven’t even corrected our faulty presentation!

Those of us in Radio know that well-executed Radio strategies get incredible results. The problem is that advertisers don’t believe us, which means we have a marketing problem. Because we’re too close to it, we need to tap the best minds in marketing to help us solve our image problems. What will be the Master Marketing Plan to change Radio’s image in the minds of advertisers? When will we demand that Radio focus its strength on curing this deadly disease called Apathy?

Frankly, I’m tired of screaming. So I’m making it my mission to develop a plan to solve the problem. That’s why, in early 2004, Roy Williams, BJ Bueno and I will be hosting a small, invitation-only conference of Radio’s boldest brains to explore what can be done to help Radio find the land of milk and honey. If you are as passionate about this as I am, and feel that you have a solution or know how to find one, tell me; and I’ll carry your message to the hilltop. Ultimately, we’re all in this together. If you’re sick and tired of eating leftovers, your commitment to change will be imperative.

Or are you okay with not getting what you deserve?

12/08/03 Radio Ink Magazine. By B. Eric Rhoads