In a recent interview with Mark Ramsey (Hear 2.0), marketing smart-guy Seth Godin talked about his new book, The Dip, and how some of the ideas therein apply to the future of radio.
Category Archives: Business & Marketing
“Introducing the Missourinet”
A lot of our company’s history is jammed into cardboard boxes and I stumbled upon a little piece this afternoon. This is a copy of an ad [larger image] that ran in Missouri Life Magazine, sometime in the early ’70’s.
Now Missourians from border to border know what their neighbors are doing.
They know what is going on in Jefferson City… in the major metropolitan areas… in the arts… in science… business.
They’re listening to their local radio station… an affiliate of the Missourinet.
The Missourinet is a statewide news network… very similar in operation to the national news networks. Some 40 radio stations carry its hourly newscasts. It has the state Capitol’s largest full-time news bureau. And each week its programs feature hundreds of on-the-scene reports from correspondents and newsmakers over the state.
Missouri + net? Get it? The official name of our company was “Missouri Network, Inc.” back then.
Building your personal brand through your blogging
Darren Rowse (Pro Blogger) offers tips on how to build your personal brand:
- Build trust. Talk both about your successes and failures.
- Be personal. Show something of who you are. This doesn’t mean blogging about your personal life, but show you’re human.
- Use story. Stories of my own experience, stories of other clients (shared with permission as case studies) etc.
- Establish expertise. Show what you know, show how you apply it and be a thought leader in your niche.
- Establish relationships in your niche.
- Be consistent. Every time you post you have the opportunity to add to or take from your reputation and brand
While reading Darren’s tips, I mentally scrolled through the last five years of posts here at smays.com, and –more by luck than design– I think hit most of these. And a week doesn’t go by that my blog doesn’t come up in conversation with current or prospective clients (from them, not me). I’m not sure how valuable smays.com is as a brand, but it’s out there.
Start building your brand. Your company is not and cannot do it for you. [via LexBlog]
eBay to auction radio advertising
eBay is ready to begin auctioning advertising airtime on 2,300 participating U.S. radio stations. The venture –which puts eBay into competition with Google– includes both conventional terrestrial radio and Internet radio advertising. Stations in all of the 300 top-ranked radio markets are covered. Advertising inventory includes primetime spots with 90 percent in morning drive, midday or evening commute hours from Monday through Friday.
How (if at all) will this impact companies like ours that barter our services for radio station commercials? When you finish the quiz, close your Blue Book and raise your hand.
Seth’s Organic Path to Google Happiness
Seth Godin on the “organic success” path to a high Google rank:
“If you want to be on the front page of matches for “White Plains Lawyer”, then the best choice is to build a series of pages (on your site, on social sites, etc.) that give people really useful information. Once you’ve done everything you can… once you’ve built a web of information and once you’ve given the ability to do this to your best clients and your partners and colleagues, then by all means apply the best SEO (search engine optimization) thinking in the world to your efforts.”