May 02, 2008
In Radio, Business, and Life, Remember Einstein
You know when you've heard something before but it never fully caught you? This happened recently when I re-heard an Einstein quote (which has a few versions) that goes:
"You cannot solve problems with the same level of consciousness that created them."
Now I see its implications nearly everywhere. The latest was this morning when I read Mark Ramsey's post.
By "level of consciousness", Einstein meant the same thought processes, the same assumptions, mental models, or approaches to the issues.
It's one of those quotes that's almost immediately self-evidently true.
Obviously it applies to solving problems. The world's biggest, even - and we can all look around and see how the same approach has produced little progress and some (or a lot of) backwards movement.
Applying this to radio advertising, this explains why certain products and services are most successful over the long run, and it certainly provides reasoning for why "me too" products, services, and ads don't work.
However, if we expand beyond radio advertising to look at all businesses, all organizations, there are more profound implications of this idea, if we take the time to look into it further.
Look at it more on a daily basis, inside your organization. And replace "problems" with "challenges". Every organization, it seems, wants to "grow" - grow revenues, grow profits, grow in reputation, grow membership... But how does the organization do that? How do you "deliver the results" that produce this desired outcome, "growth"?
According to Einstein, it takes a new level of consciousness - i.e. new thinking. Which means what?
In one sense it means looking with fresh eyes - to peel away the assumptions and mental models that have been practiced, and which resulted both in a level of success and also in the current set of challenges. These are challenges that might be recurring, and toward which progress might be slow or limited - in spite of a lot of focus or dedication.
And then from that place of fresh eyes, again as Einstein suggested, it becomes possible to look anew, with a play-like approach that's now unburdened. It's perhaps a "radical" new perspective. Radical is the only way to innovation.
In radio advertising, you could say we work between two extremes. On the one end is "the way it's done" - the fundamental approaches and tactics that "work" and "don't work". If you create a radio ad purely from this view, it will sound formulaic and flat. At the other end of the continuum is the "creative" approach. If you create a radio ad from purely this perspective, you end up with unique sounding, entertaining ads... that don't produce profitable results. The "new level of consciousness" applied to creating radio ads is one that holds both of these views together as co-conspirators to the final outcome.
In another sense, Einstein's quote leads to the idea that each individual involved in the organization must expand his or her own personal horizons. How else will it be possible to approach today's challenges with a new "level of consciousness"? This is taking a "systems" perspective, and it's easy to see how an organization is a system of interdependence. There is a need for each person to know their "blind spots" where seeking out personal learning can help both the individual and the company.
The point here is that to achieve the "outer" results in any area of the business (growth), it's necessary to first make "inner" movement (new level of consciousness). And there seems to be two ingredients to producing inner movement. One is becoming aware of our own mental blocks to seeing things anew. The other is the act of developing through appropriate learning experiences. If either is missing in the organization, the company's growth (or any success metric) is impacted negatively. When we see this from the systems perspective, we note that only through constant inner movement is it possible to make consistent outer progress.
Contrast this with the approach of trying harder or working harder or buckling down, digging in, pumping ourselves up to go at it with more gusto, determination and dedication. Doing more of the same with more gusto will only get the organization so far, whereas with the approach implicated by Einstein's quote... there is no limit.
The punchline here is that ... it's difficult to do this. It's very difficult to shed mental models and assumptions to see with fresh eyes. And it's very hard to see personal blind spots and to apply personal effort to learn and grow on an ongoing basis.
But in one very real sense, figuring out how to do this, and doing it, is what every organization is here to do.
Einstein might say it this way: that the key to enduring success for any orgainzation is figuring out how to produce a new level of consciousness on an ongoing basis.
Something to think about, for sure.
April 29, 2008
Words of Wisdom From One of the Wisest
There are so few genuine straight-shooters in the world today. So when one of those few speaks, we make it a point to listen. Fortune writer Nicholas Varchaver recently spent time with Warren Buffett and the article provides more than a few of the cow-poo piercing comments Buffett is known for. (Of course, when you deal with Wall Street, you get a LOT of practice. Hmmm. Another insight for another post.)
The entire article is great - you'll be glad you read it. Here's one exchange as a teaser:
I know you had a paper route. Was that your first job?
Well, I worked for my grandfather, which was really tough, in the [family] grocery store. But if you gave me the choice of being CEO of General Electric or IBM or General Motors, you name it, or delivering papers, I would deliver papers.
April 24, 2008
Something All Direct Response Copywriters Should Know
There are few things we can unequivocally say DON'T work in radio advertising. The trouble with saying something doesn't work is that it shuts down the process of seeing possibilities. The next thing you know, someone has found a way to make it work.
Nonetheless, there is one thing we can safely say you should NEVER do in direct response radio copywriting: Prevention.
Prevention doesn't sell in direct response. It never has, and unless there's a gigantic and sudden shift in human nature, it NEVER will sell in our lifetime. That's because we don't care about problems we might have at some time in the future when we have plenty of things we have to worry about right now.
Now you might be thinking that there are plenty of successful products that are preventative that must be selling very well, otherwise they wouldn't be around for so long.
Often you'll find in these cases the future problem is one of very high probability, which makes it less of a future problem and more of a current one.
Regardless, the key for selling products that are preventative in nature is this: position the benefit to address an immediate problem. In some cases that may be worry or fear about the future problem. In some cases it may be relief of the symptoms of the future problem. Whatever it is, you'll need to find the hot button.
Whatever you do, don't waste your money testing a prevention message in direct response radio.
April 10, 2008
Pulling Teeth and Radio Advertising: How To Be a Rich Dentist
Ed Ridgway has a great post about marketing for dental practices. We love it because it shows yet another example of a business that can benefit from radio advertising.
Reading Ed's post, we notice that there's a bit of a knowledge gap. He advocates a lot of patience, stating that you have to lose a lot of money before radio is profitable. That may have been true before the developments in direct response radio advertising. These days it's possible to methodically test early on, which drastically cuts the upfront losses and puts the campaign in the profit-generating phase much more quickly.
This is a GREAT example of the need to understand the business model of the entity doing the advertising. Most businesses get one, two, maybe three transactions from a customer. Dental practices get LIFELONG customers who come back again and again and again -- and, they bring their spouses, kids, and friends into the practice. Therefore, the lifetime value of each customer is large, and that means the business can pay a LOT to acquire a new patient and still be very, very profitable. BUT - if the dentist doesn't know what that lifetime value is, he or she will have NO idea how to evaluate the radio advertising campaign. In that case, often the campaign will get cancelled when in fact it is producing profitable results.
April 09, 2008
Exciting News: "Direct Response Radio" is Published!
We are excited to announce the completion of our new book, "Direct Response Radio: The Way to Greater Profit with Measurable Radio Advertising". You will find our book a no-nonsense, straight-to-the-point guide for using radio advertising to bring in new customers, establish and defend your position in the marketplace, and grow your profits in a measurable and manageable way.
The subtheme of the book is "What Matters, What Works". We chose this because this is the essential point of all of what we reveal in the book. From media buying to radio ads to strategy and profit maximization, Direct Response Radio is a compilation of what matters and what works in direct response radio advertising and direct response marketing.
The web site for the book is at www.directresponseradio.com, and it includes more information about the book as well as some selected excerpts from various chapters. Direct Response Radio is available through Amazon, and soon will be available through www.BookSurge.com, www.Abebooks.com and www.Alibris.com.
Please let us know what you think once you've read the book.
Subscribe via RSS The Power of Persuasion, Robert Levine
Influence: Science & Practice, Cialdini
Words That Work, Frank Lutz
My Life in Advertising and Scientific Advertising, Claude C. Hopkins
Or Your Money Back, Alvin Eicoff
Being Direct, Lester Wunderman
Radio Blog