Rick Cordella is the EVP and Chief Revenue Officer at Peacock, the NBCUniversal streaming service which just successfully completed its maiden voyage with WWE with WrestleMania this past weekend. Coming off this accomplishment, we thought he would be the perfect choice for this month’s installment of 5 Goals! Here are his goals, in his own words.
1) Be the best Uber-driving dad I can be.
Work/Life balance is never really a balance as much as it is a constant panic that I’ve misaligned my priorities for the day. My wife and I have five children ranging from high school to preschool, four girls and a boy. It’s a handful.
Working from home these past 13 months has forced me to be around more. Seeing the kids before they go off to school, or family dinner time has been great. But I think some of the best one-on-one conversations I have with my kids are when I’m driving them around to various activities in the early evening and to school in the morning. They can’t skirt away to their bedrooms and avoid my probing questions. And I learn more about what is going on in their lives than I ever did before. “How are your grades? How are your friends doing? What else is going on?”
Moving forward after the world returns to normal and I’m back in the office, I want make it a priority to be there to drive them around town.
2) Appreciate being the kid in the candy store.
I grew up in Foxboro, MA, as a die-hard Boston sports fan, rooting for the Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics and Bruins. I spent the vast majority of my time playing sports, watching sports and thinking about sports. And so when I was lucky enough to come to NBC Sports through a small acquisition of a fantasy sports company, Rotoworld.com, back in Aug 2006, I had to pinch myself. I was so proud to be a small part of Sunday Night Football, the Olympics and all the various sports we had rights to air.
I specifically remember during the 2012 Olympics, walking the Olympic Park in London and taking it all in. And then standing on the sidelines during the pregame of Super Bowl XLIX in Phoenix and then seeing my hometown Patriots beat the Seattle Seahawks a few hours later in one of the most exciting Super Bowls of all-time. As a lifelong sports fan, how am I possibly getting paid to be here?
I think it’s easy to get lost on the day-to-day grind of managing a business, but I try to take a step back every now and again and appreciate how lucky I am to be involved in these sports properties that I grew up idolizing.
3) Get across the finish line.
I was a college athlete many years ago but now need a goal or fear of humiliation to motivate me to do something about my dad bod. This fall I plan to run the Boston Marathon. I’ve run three marathons in the past, but this will be my first one in my 40s, and I’m much more firmly in the Clydesdale division than ever before.
Finishing with a good time is nice, but just meeting the challenge and getting across the finish line is the goal.
4) Make appointment viewing in an on-demand world.
Many streaming platforms focus their content investment on original and library movies and shows. At Peacock, we have all of that as well and can further differentiate our catalog with programming from across NBCUniversal that plays to our strengths – like sports and live events – that have existing fanbases who follow their favorite team, sport, and athletes everywhere. When a Manchester United/Liverpool game streams on Peacock, those fans show up. When we recently streamed one of the biggest live events of the year — WrestleMania – WWE fans migrated to Peacock.
When the fans come to Peacock, they are watching other entertainment programming we offer. We can drive them to our platform with the content they are most passionate about, and then anchor them in our service by delivering our massive library of entertainment, news, sports, and more. For example, we have seen this happen with Premier League fans, where more than 90% are watching non-Premier League content on Peacock.
Peacock has been nationally available for just over nine months, and sports and live events have been foundational to our service. And we’re very much looking forward to the Olympics and the NFL coming later this year on Peacock.
5) Try something new and keep learning.
I’m not all that musically inclined, but about two years ago, my 10-year-old daughter took up playing the guitar. She has gotten impressively good at it. I’ve always wanted to try it, and I figured it was also a cool way to connect with my daughter, so during the pandemic, I signed up for weekly guitar lessons. I had never picked up a guitar before in my life. So now, at 44 years old, I can play the opening riff of Nirvana’s Come as You Are and a handful of other 90’s alternative rock songs (not entire songs, of course). But I’m really enjoying it, and it’s been fantastic to jam out with my daughter.
“Santa Maria!”, when you hear it, you know you’re tuned into an MLB game with Matt Vasgersian on the mic. More on the catchphrase in a moment. Vasgersian is one of those guys that you seemingly see everywhere. Why? Because he’s pretty much everywhere. Turn on MLB Network, there he is. Tune into Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN, yep, he’s there. Now, catch an Angels baseball game on TV and he’ll be there too.
Vasgersian has been around the baseball block since the early 90’s. He spent six-seasons as a Minor League broadcaster before being hired for his first MLB gig. Vasgersian was only 29 when he became the play-by-play voice of the Milwaukee Brewers. He worked in that booth from 1997-2001. Matt then took his skills to San Diego, being named the TV voice of the Padres in 2002. He stayed in America’s Finest City until 2008, leaving for the MLB Network after the season.
Along the way, the very busy Vasgersian held down several other positions in prominent broadcast locations. He joined Fox Sports in 2006, working NFL telecasts, MLB Game of the Week games and playoffs and some College Football BCS games. He joined ESPN in 2018 to take over the Sunday Night Baseball lead role, while continuing his role at MLB Network.
Did I mention he was a busy guy?
This year he took on more of a workload and became the new play-by-play man for the Los Angeles Angels’ telecasts succeeding Victor Rojas. Vasgersian will work remotely and will do as many Angels games as his national schedule allows.
He told the Angels media via Zoom the reasoning for taking on this job. “I kind of missed getting my skin in the game with a team,” Vasgersian said. “There’s a fine line between a national presentation of a product, when you’re doing a game for a fan base that knows more about their teams than you do, and doing a game as a team broadcaster where you are much more intimately informed as to what happened last night, and the night before and the personalities behind the game. I kind of missed that and kind of missed being involved with a team and rooting a little bit. The hope is that you appeal to the fan base as a friendly voice.”
When will this guy sleep?
BEST KNOWN FOR
Vasgersian first burst onto the national scene doing play-by-play for the original version of the XFL back in 2001. The league was new and Vince McMahon was in charge and wanted things done a certain way. Vasgersian’s time with the league was tenuous; during the first broadcast he said, “I feel uncomfortable” after a suggestive shot of the cheerleaders. McMahon didn’t like that very much and immediately demoted Vasgersian from the top telecast. NBC wanted Vasgersian back on the first team broadcast and he returned about halfway through the season.
He made a good impression on the higher ups at NBC which ultimately led to five Olympic assignments. Vasgersian called baseball and softball from the 2004 Summer Games in Athens, ski jumping from the 2006 and 2010 Winter Games and freestyle skiing from the 2014 games in Sochi, Russia.
Now, about that catchphrase, “Santa Maria!”. It’s not a copy, it’s an original. Oh, and it has nothing to do with one of the ships that sailed to find America in 1492. Vasgersian explained the origin to MLB.com in 2018.
“Man, I wish there was a better story to this. [Laughing]. My family — and my sister, in particular, has one of her oldest friends — [from an] Italian family. My sister’s friend’s mother is a wonderfully animated Italian woman, who says “Santa Maria!” at a drop of a hat. For example, she goes to the grocery store and sees tomatoes are on sale. She will say, “Santa Maria, what a deal!” he explained. “I spent enough time around this wonderful lady for her to rub off on me a little bit. And I started saying “Santa Maria!” when there would be some kind of superlative moment on a baseball field. When I was in the Minors, you never want to sound gimmicky, but I try to keep it in my pocket for the right time. It’s kind of a sanctioned way of saying “Holy Blank.”
So, there you go, the explanation right from Vasgersian himself.
WHY IS HE SO GOOD?
Vasgersian has a way about him. Not too many broadcasters are able to showcase immense talent in describing action and adding personality, wit and a sense of humor in with it. He can do it. The style isn’t for everyone, but to me in watching a baseball game, I want to be entertained, I want to laugh a little too. All of this of course shouldn’t interfere with the game itself and for Vasgersian he makes that a priority.
He’s been known to get excitable on a broadcast, but not to the point where it’s out of bounds in a broadcast sense. Big plays happen and Vasgersian’s voice goes to a different level. He’s excited and you can sense it pretty easily. There’s a “smile” in his vocal range during a big moment, key homer, or great defensive play. In some announcers it seems forced, that’s not the case with Vasgersian at all.
Vasgersian clearly enjoys what he does for a living. It’s pretty obvious by the way he comes across in each broadcast. You could forgive a guy with as busy a schedule as his to sometimes sound less than interested, but that isn’t the case for Vasgersian. The more games, the merrier to him.
Along those lines, it can’t be easy to prep for so many games in a week. He does have the advantage of being very dialed into the baseball scene with his work on MLB Network. But still, its impressive the amount of information he’s able to work into a game without a ton of time to prepare.
It seems that everyone he works with enjoys being on a broadcast with him. Vasgersian keeps an analyst on his/her toes. He seemingly is able to work with anyone they throw at him. He works with Alex Rodriguez and that isn’t easy to do. Still, he’s able to navigate Baseball Road when A-Rod continuously wants to take him down A-Rod Avenue.
DID YOU KNOW?
Vasgersian started his career as a child actor? I didn’t know that and I worked with him for a couple of years in San Diego. Vasgersian appeared in an episode of “The Streets of San Francisco” and the movie “The Candidate” starring Robert Redford.
CONCLUSION
Vasgersian is a very talented guy, they just don’t give out high profile jobs to anyone. His success has been earned because he’s a hard-working person that constantly is honing his craft. His combination of pop culture, humor, sarcasm and wit are well balanced within his broadcasts, making them not only entertaining but informative. Isn’t that what it’s supposed to be all about anyway?
When we decided a few months ago to create a Meet The Market Managers series, I told Demetri Ravanos that John Kijowski needed to be a part of it, and I’d run point on writing the piece. It’s not everyday that I get to flip the script and ask questions of someone who once hired me, and peppered me constantly with questions related to 101 ESPN’s programming challenges and opportunities. John is so used to asking the questions that it was fun to hear his answers to my questions and see his visible reactions to a couple of curveballs I tossed in his direction during our Zoom chat.
Aside from my personal connection to John, and he’ll hate me for saying this, but he’s one of the best market managers in the business. Period. You may not know that if you follow the trades and see most of the larger markets earning all of the attention, but anyone who’s worked with or for John already knows this to be true. He prefers flying under the radar. He’d rather his team get the credit for their results. If his family is healthy, his employees are happy, his clients are served, his partners are pleased, and his bosses approve of the work he’s doing, that’s more than enough for John.
What I appreciate about John is that he never had to do a lot of yelling or pounding his fist on a table to make his point and get people to perform. He’ll ask questions to test your conviction on specific issues, he’ll challenge his team to raise the bar, and he’ll seek out new ideas from anywhere in the office, and ask how he can help make your job easier. He’s also accessible and interested in helping all of his managers whether they’re in sales, digital, promotions, engineering or programming. It’s why so many who work for him respect his input and trust his decision making.
As important as John’s professional skills may be, his ability to create a family like atmosphere matters even more. When you work at a John Kijowski led operation, you realize quickly that you’re part of a special kind of culture that others want to be a part of. I was a young programmer in 2008, convinced my better days were ahead of me, but still struggling to find the right leader and company to trust me, believe in me, and allow me to put my vision into action. John and I met to discuss the possibility of creating sports on the FM dial in St. Louis, and at first I thought he was doing what a lot of radio people do, seeking me out for information. I learned though that John was serious about hiring me, the outside noise mattered little to him, and as long as I assembled a great staff, worked well with multiple departments, provided sound reasoning for the decisions I was making, and managed my team to success, he’d have my back every step of the way. It’s why leaving St. Louis for San Francisco was incredibly difficult in 2011. I’ve been fortunate to reconnect with John and the 101 crew over the past few years in my current role.
Having shared all of that, I’d be doing this column a disservice if I didn’t point out one well known Kijowski specialty that those around him know all too well. Working for John requires being smart, strategic, giving maximum effort, and delivering results, but you also better have a good sense of humor. The second you turn around to tackle the day’s agenda, you may find a chair on your desk, a fork in your pocket or a ladder blocking your entrance into the office. It doesn’t matter if you’re the host of afternoon drive, the program director of one of his radio stations, the receptionist at the front desk or a part time member of the street team. If John sees an opportunity to create laughter, he’s going to take it. Those innocent pranks keep the office loose and remind people that it’s ok to work hard and play hard.
Our conversation covered a lot of ground including John’s entry into management, the future of sports betting, what he believes is most important when going thru a merger, the quality he values most in a program director, and what the process was like leading up to the decision to pursue sports on FM in St. Louis. I could easily write another 5,000 words on why John Kijowski is one of the best in this business, but the following interview will allow you to see that for yourself. Enjoy!
Jason Barrett: I was looking at LinkedIn prior to this conversation and it has you stepping into the GM world in 1995. Is that right?
John Kijowski: That’s correct.
JB: So when you were making a pitch for the first time to become a GM, what do you remember from that process?
JK: It’s interesting because before Sinclair, I was with Gannett as a DOS going for the GM position. I’ll never forget the president of Gannett broadcasting asking me to tell him about the different areas of the radio station and rank them in order of importance. I was a DOS so what do you think I said?
JB: Sales.
JK: Sales department, of course. Nothing happens unless we sell something. He just nodded, and said ‘what else’? I said, ‘well, you need a great signal, and programming’ and he said ‘OK, put them in order’. I said ‘sales, programming, signal’. He told me ‘John, you’re not ready for this position yet’. He said ‘unless there’s great programming, even the best sales staff won’t be able to sell it at a high premium consistently unless the programming is right’. That was the first great lesson of many that I learned.
JB: So that was your first taste of being close to running the show. The next time around, you did get the opportunity. When did you know you had the job?
JK: Barry Drake was the one who hired me as a GM from a DOS position at Sinclair. I can’t tell you I knew I had it until he said ‘this is yours’. I felt like I did the interview very well. Barry is an incredibly bright man. I thought I did a good job with him but I really didn’t know I had it until he said it was mine.
JB: So you begin your venture into management with Sinclair, who then transferred ownership to Bonneville, a great company that you spent over 11 years with. Bonneville then sold to Hubbard, another amazing group which you’ve had the pleasure of spending another decade with. You lucked out the past twenty years working for two great broadcasting groups. Having been thru a few mergers, as a GM, what’s that first month or two like when new owners are coming in? You have to think about your own future, your staff’s future, if they’ll tinker with the products you’ve helped build, and possibly change the strategy or even a format. Where does your focus go?
JK: I think of me last. You have to think of your team first. Our job is to acquire the best talent around us, and put them in the right seat on the bus. But you also have to retain them. When there’s a potential merger, you want to retain a great team. Whether the company retains you or not, obviously it’s critically important, but the team comes first. You want to make sure that what we’ve built is preserved for growth. I always looked at the team first, and communicated with the buying company on the aspects of what they’re going to be looking at, which are the obvious metrics of cash flow, net operating expenses, and net revenue. Where’s your growth come from? How do you look when the ratings aren’t so good? How is the cash flow? If you have good cash flow years while the ratings aren’t good, how do you do it? It’s mainly about protecting the team, and showing what the mission’s been.
JB: As you know some may be more focused on their own futures especially during a time when there’s a lot of uncertainty. Your answer explains why you’ve come thru it in great shape each time.
JK: You said before that I’ve been lucky, and I have been. I’m very fortunate to have worked with some great broadcasters. Bonneville under Bruce Reese and Drew Horowitz, and then coming over to a family owned business with Hubbard led by Ginny Morris, these are just amazing companies with great people. What the two have in common is shared vision, and leadership. You know exactly what they want you to do. Everybody is a part of the process and they want to show you where they’re going but they certainly want strong opinion from the market manager. Do you agree with the plan or should we avoid this? Do you see other options for growth? I’ve been lucky to work for two great companies.
JB: You mentioned how they seek your input when dealing with important business matters, so when you’re reporting to your bosses and having to either relay bad news about a talent or a quarterly sales performance, ask for additional funds that might not have budgeted or offer a point of view that differs from something they want to do, what do you think is important to communicate so they remain confident that they have great leadership in place overseeing their markets and know you’re looking out for the best interests of the company rather than just offering lip service to give them what they might want to hear but may not necessarily be what’s best for the long term interest in growing the brands under your watch?
JK: It’s all a process. I believe confidence comes from competence. You have to be competent over years. Then it’s the ability to communicate tough decisions honestly and transparently and say that you’ve looked at it from all angles and you didn’t do it by yourself. You include your Operations Manager, Director of Sales, Chief Engineer, Business Manager, the Marketing and Promotions team. You’ve brought everyone into the conversation who’s part of that small circle and said ‘what could we get tripped up on? This looks too good to be true, what’s wrong here? If I were the opponent, how would I attack it? And remember the opponent may not be another radio station or radio group. Maybe it’s how consumers are engaging with media in general right now. If you’re not doing it for them, the end user, and you’re only doing it for yourself, you’ll fail. How you communicate that takes confidence, but you have to some competence too.
JB: You hired me to help build 101 ESPN in September 2008. The station launched a few months later in January 2009. Before we even talked though, you had to have a number of conversations internally about the benefits of flipping to sports and the concerns associated with making a move into the format. Those same types of conversations take place all the time whether it involves talent, program directors, play by play partnerships or other business challenges and opportunities. When you’re considering a major move such as a format flip, what is it that you have to see to convince you that it’s worth pursuing and changing your current direction?
JK: You take that team that I just described, those critically important department heads, particularly on the programming side, and you ask ‘where is there an underserved part of the audience in our market?’ Even if you see a direct competitor, is the space itself under served? You certainly are aware of what we did putting 101 ESPN on in 2009. There was no FM outlet for robust and strong sports talk. There was guy talk on the AM dial, and we looked at the situation over and over again and said ‘do we need another rock station in town?’ There was no Triple A station so that area was open, but it looked like it was covered well between the classic rock and alternative stations in the market. We asked ‘is there easy listening?’ Yep. We’ve got that. Was Urban available. Nope, there were three of those stations. So we kept looking and asking ‘where are their holes to fill’ and we did our logistics and hired Coleman to do what was called a format finder. We made the investment to see if the research supported what our gut was telling us. Decisions made on science and gut are usually pretty good. Then you gather that team and ask ‘what will the ratings look like’, and you take that number down. ‘What will the revenue be’, and you take that number down too.
JB: Since you brought up asking for projections, I always wondered why you’d even ask me to project the radio station’s results for the following year. I’d be thinking ‘I’m not a fortune teller, so do you want me to just write something down and make an uneducated guess on where the audience might be in twelve months?.’ Case in point, nobody could’ve predicted going into 2020 that a pandemic would hit and do a number on the media industry. So what good are those actual projections?
JK: (laughs) But you still have to do it. You have to do the work and study where you think things might go. Our owner Stanley Hubbard, and Ginny Morris who runs the radio division, already had us doing a ‘what if’ plan before the pandemic hit. What if the market all of a sudden shrunk by 25%. Go five years out, what does that look like? We had just done that plan the year earlier. It was extremely helpful because as soon as you think you can predict things, the unexpected happens.
JB: I want to ask you about radio play by play partnerships. When the station launched in 2009, it went on the air with the St. Louis Rams. I remember Drew Horowitz not exactly loving that deal (laughs). Obviously the state of play by play today is much different than it was 12 years ago. Streaming is now a bigger part of the picture. Some teams now want to sell their own inventory or they’ll give up more commercial time in a broadcast to try and retain their rights fees. You work with the St. Louis Blues who are well received by your audience and clients. There are a lot of positives to being in business with teams but there can be some challenges too. What does a good partnership between a team and sports radio station look like to you?
JK: You asked earlier about selling up ideas to ownership. The process isn’t much different when it comes to creating a partnership with teams. Isn’t that why we’re here? We’re trying to create partnerships with our listeners, our colleagues inside the building, and with our advertisers. So what is the shared goal? I knew what the Rams goal was and how they measured it, and I know what the Blues expect. They’re both very different. When you ask the question ‘what does a good partnership look like?’ I think it’s important to describe it as if you were telling a story. Five years from now, I will evaluate this partnership by looking at how we hit this, this and this. Is that revenue? Non-spot revenue? Ratings? How can we help the club? We have tremendous access to players. That was important to us. Before we had the Blues, we had access to players with the Rams, but it’s not like what we have now. Why that’s important to us is because the listening audience, and the people who view us and engage with us on social, they want to hear from them. They want to hear from hosts on our airwaves who’ve played the game such as Jamie Rivers and Brad Thompson from The Fast Lane who played for the Blues and Cardinals respectively. They want to hear the stories of what took place behind the dressing room doors. What’s important to the club, and what’s important to the radio station, and how can we find common ground together to help each other. Yes it always comes down to money, but there’s a lot of different ways to do the deal then to just pay a ridiculous rights fee, that you’ll probably never get back, unless you’re in a Top 5 market. It’s incredibly difficult.
JB: Another partnership I want to ask you about is ESPN Radio. Your station has worked with the network for over a decade. When you say the four letters to most sports fans, they instantly carry weight. People know what brand you’re talking about. On the other hand, the radio network is different today than it has been in the past. Some are good with the changes, others aren’t. When you analyze your relationship with your national radio network partner, how do you evaluate it? What do you think they do a great job helping your brand with, and where can they improve?
JK: The brand of ESPN still matters. It hasn’t suffered a lot since we started the partnership, in fact I think it’s as big as ever. The ESPN brand is spectacular and the association with it is important to us. As an affiliate, I think there are a lot of ways to do a deal. I’d like to see them provide a little more flexibility on the barter. The gentleman I work with is flexible and reviewing our arrangement right now. Our brand though is live and local from 7a to 6p and then we go into games whether it be the Blues or the ESPN offerings from the NBA, MLB, college games, etc.. So that covers a lot of our main programming windows. I think the lead in to our morning show is really important. We launched with Mike & Mike and they did a spectacular show. It performed well here. That then morphed into Golic and Wingo which featured Trey Wingo, a guy with a well known national profile who spent a number of years here in St. Louis, and that too did well. Now they’re going thru an additional evolution with their new morning show. I think the jury is out but they are talented guys. We carry that show from 5a-7a and it’s important because it launches into our first local show of the day. So we’ll be monitoring that situation closely but the brand itself is super strong, if we’re able to get a little flexibility with the barter that’d help, but I’m proud to partner with them and appreciate the way they’ve treated us over the years.
JB: An area that a lot of industry people are hot on and see huge upside for the future in is sports betting. Missouri hasn’t been declared a legal state yet.
JK: Not yet but it could go thru in 2022. I think it will. It’ll be big.
JB: Knowing that it’s coming soon and the advertising dollars could be bigger and the appetite from the audience may continue getting stronger for that type of content, how do you expect sports betting to change the way sports radio is presented? For instance, the growth of gambling will be received differently by on-air talent. Some are going to be into discussions that revolve around looking at lines, prop bets and changes in betting behavior on a specific game, others might not want any part of those conversations. Taking all of that into account, what excites you and concerns you about the space and how do you see it changing the format?
JK: The part that excites me most is the revenue potential obviously. We know it’s coming so having a plan is important. We have a team that is meeting and reviewing what it might look like and developing it so we have it ready for execution this year even if we don’t start it until next year. Yes there may be some hosts that aren’t into it right now but this is going to continue gaining steam so more hosts are going to have to be into it because it’s where things are headed. Most of our talent have either a FanDuel or DraftKings account. Some have both. They have responded well to it. I think there’s going to be a lot of future opportunities for sports radio stations and talent for live events and on-air endorsements around sports betting. We’ve already started hiring street team to start in the 4th quarter because we expect big events around Busch Stadium and ScottTrade Center and we have soccer coming soon. I think the combination of events, endorsements, hosts being into the content, and special programming being available thru our brand is going to be part of it. I know a lot of people haven’t embraced HD2 to this point, however, I think there could be a dedicated HD2 channel for this that people go to for alternate broadcasts around the Cardinals or Blues that focus heavily on the sports gambling discussion around the game. You might hear ‘It’s 3 and 2 on the batter, is he going to get on or make an out? The odds say it’s 60% likely that he won’t succeed.’ I don’t rule out that possibility of HD2 being utilized in a bigger way.
JB: The last two things I want to pick your brain on are podcasting and social media. Each are important for branding and connecting with an audience but from a revenue standpoint they’re not on the same playing field yet with radio dollars. I see and hear a lot of noise out there about running away from the word ‘radio’ but radio is still driving the revenue bus. I love podcasting and social media as much as the next person but I don’t understand the fascination with distancing ourselves from the one word that has represented us for decades and still helps us generate dollars and interest. That said, younger people have different ways of consuming radio than you and I did. I understand why the industry is planning now for where we might be in 10-20 years. When you look at podcasting and social media, what do you feel needs to happen for both to become a bigger source of revenue for radio brands?
JK: It is called dual tracks. We have to keep doing what we’re doing on the radio side because that continues to be the big megaphone. People that are branding need radio. Definitely. No question. Advertisers definitely need radio, especially sports radio because it works for the client. Podcasting is an area we are involved in. It’s critically important to where we think growth is. We have to be able to create and innovate by introducing new podcasting content. For instance, we have a Blues podcast that takes one member of 101 ESPN, and two members of 105.7 The Point, our alternative station. It’s not something you’re going to hear on either radio station so that helps draw people in. We also want to create the best Cardinals podcast in St. Louis. We have the talent to do it but the right idea and personnel for it is important. We are always looking at ways to get more eyeballs and ears on our podcasts and video content and it comes from delivering original entertainment around the teams and people they care about most. If we produce material that people value, regardless of where it’s distributed, we’ll be able to monetize it.
JB: Before we wrap up, I’ve got to ask you a question about choosing a program director because you hired me to start 101 ESPN, Kent Sterling to succeed me when I left for San Francisco, Hoss Neupert to step in after Kent, and Tommy Mattern after Hoss. All four of us are different people, each with a different programming style and philosophy. When you’re looking for a candidate to run a brand, what sets someone apart from others when you’re going thru a process and trying to determine who to trust with programming one of your stations?
JK: One word – leadership. It all comes down to leadership. I don’t need a program director or a manager of things. I need a leader of people. That’s not just all about motivation. Motivation is a small part of it. A leader recognizes what everybody’s role is, puts them in the right positions, and is constantly self-directing it when they get off the road or cross the line a little bit. The leader also has to understand sales and content. I used to say ‘ratings = revenue’. Not anymore. Ratings are very important but it’s all about content generation now. We need on-air talent that are content machines and put it out on multiple platforms and have that entertaining way to make it sticky. A leader has to find those people and have a great relationship with the DOS and understand their strategy and tactics to help them monetize the content.
JB: I’m going to end with this, when you think about the present and future of the business, what’s the one thing that keeps you up at night and don’t tell me it’s your retirement because you have some time before that happens.
JK: I hope Ginny and Dave Bestler read this because I do have time. The one thing that keeps me up at night is figuring out where to look and find unique talent. And I’m not just talking about on-air. I’m talking about sales talent. Cost per point sellers are over. It’s been over for a while. We need people who need to think client first or listener first and what are their goals and how can we help them because it’s not about a one-time sale or a one-time great rating month. It’s about consistent success. The only people that can do that in my opinion are the people that, and I keep saying this, the content mavens. Those who listen more than talk and understand what the client or listener is looking for and finding a way to deliver it to them in a very creative way. These are entertainers. You can be funny in this format. Look, the pandemic should’ve taught everybody that we have to be entertaining even when there are no games being played. We’re in the entertainment business. We’re in the acquisition business. Our job is to acquire new customers and new listeners, and how we keep them engaging with us and supporting us depends on having great unique talented people representing our brands.
Selling radio advertising can be like a fight. Let me tell you how you can win it.
What we sell and when we sell it is mostly our choice. As commissioned salespeople, we have many different paths to meet our goals. The longer you stay in the radio business, the more you will be able to create your own path to hit your numbers. But you are new to the business, so you have a lot of choices to make very soon. Digital strategies, play by play sponsorship availabilities, endorsement requests, the promotional package of the month and a lot more will be hitting your inbox soon and often.
Once you have been in the business longer, your inbox will still be filled by your sales manager with packages, but you will be more selective. You will find value in the type of sales you make and don’t make and what types of clients you like to work with. You must decide what your time is worth and work accordingly.
You will see the benefits of moving away from chasing advertisers who only want all the bells and whistles, but only at deep discounts. They want to see remotes, promotions with every buy, month to month contracts, and agency discounts. They’ll be the ones that only are ready to sign on the dotted line when “buy cheap” packages are available or they are the new clients who you are asked to get on the air by the end of the same month you are selling in, so you will have to accept a deal more favorable to them.
You will instead want to focus on annual clients who can run branding commercials with a game plan and are open to in-month ideas, digital ads or whatever else you think is in their wheelhouse. You can still offer any deals management sends to you, but you should have an annual contract in place. That doesn’t usually happen in the first year of selling. I wish it did.
While you are on a guaranteed salary, this is the best time to aim high. Target the biggest advertisers you can imagine with an annual advertising plan. Figure out that plan ONE TIME. Ask others who have similar deals. Learn that deck. LEARN IT NOW! Go see as many people as possible with it and just cut and paste a new client name. If you swing and miss, you still get paid. At least you are aiming high, and the payoff will be great if you connect. You can always go for low hanging fruit, the end of month lowball rate buyers or smaller advertiser to get your feet wet.
Beware if that is all you do while on a guaranteed salary though, because when that salary expires, you will be left with a month-to-month list filled with pressure. That’s not setting yourself up for success. Don’t be the person who brings a knife to a gunfight.
Remember, what you do now can make things easier or harder in the long run.
For a number of years, Mike Francesa has been emphasizing that Baby Boomers were a dramatically undervalued audience demographic for advertisers. His generation was working and living longer, and earning and spending far greater money than the 25-54 year old demo coveted by radio and 18-49 by TV. The New York radio legend recognized a vital paradigm shift sooner than just about everyone else in the business, while also probably being a little too dismissive of young professionals.
“I understand there’s an obsession with youth in this country, but go to a Mercedes-Benz dealer and ask them how many Mercedes did you sell in the last month to people between the ages of 18 and 34?” Francesa mused at the Barrett Sports Media summit early last year. “And then ask them how many they sold to the people between the ages of 55 and 65.”
I’ll acknowledge that my initial reaction to when Francesa started making this point years ago was thinking “Ok Boomer” inside my own mind. I was over-sensitive to the fact that he was hand-waving my generation of Millennials like he would a WFAN caller from Yonkers who suggested a dumb trade. His opinion was transparently self-serving in regards to his own aging audience, and he underrated what habit-forming can mean to advertisers. Nonetheless, as I’ve thought about it more I’ve realized he’s completely right about the considerable spending power of people in their 50s, 60s, and 70s in this country — and brands are also recognizing it and adapting.
Buying for 3-4 Generations
Jill Albert is the CEO of Direct Results, a firm that buys ads across audio platforms including radio, podcasts, and streaming for brands like Omaha Steaks, USC, Home Advisor, Mathnasium and Chewy.com. She told Barrett Sports Media that 25-54 remains the “core” demographic target in audio, but that 55-75 year-olds are “kind of misunderstood and undervalued.”
Lauren McHale, SVP and Director of Sales at the Katz Radio Group ad agency, agrees that 55+ is “often undervalued”.
McHale said, “Advertisers target consumers via their lifestyle choices. Research shows that sports radio, play-by-play in particular, delivers an audience that is educated, employed, and has a higher income and higher net worth than the average adult. Stats from the Federal Reserve and the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that adults 55+ have the highest net worth among all households, and account for the largest share (41%) of all consumer spending in the U.S.”
Albert made the point that Boomers, with accumulated wealth that dwarfs younger generations’, are in a position where in many cases they are spending not just on themselves but on care for their elderly parents, and potentially providing support for their children and grandchildren.
Michael Mulvihill, EVP and Head of Strategy at Fox Sports, affirmed this point. “How many young people use a Netflix password that’s paid for by their parents? A lot,” he said. “How many parents use a Netflix account that’s paid for by their kid? Seems like not many. That seems to flow almost entirely in one direction.”
So what we are seeing isn’t necessarily what Francesa lobbied for in prioritizing the boomers for ad targeting, but a gradual shift in which they’re being valued more than before but still not the priority. “At the end of the day we want as many ears on our platforms as we can get — whether it’s over-the-air or digital” said Mitch Rosen, Program Director of Audacy stations 670 The Score in Chicago and 105.7 The Fan in Milwaukee. “I still believe we live in a 25-54 world. I still think that’s the target.”
Contextualizing the Wealth
It’s one thing to just say that Boomers are rich and thus imply that the youth are poor, but when you look at the data it really smacks you in your face. According to the Federal Reserve, here is the wealth in trillions of dollars for the generations:
Silent & Earlier is defined as born before 1946, Baby Boomers were born from 1946 through 1964, GenX from 1965-1980, and Millennials from 1981-1996. The differential magnitude is stunning: Boomers have nearly twice as much wealth as GenX’ers and nearly 11 times what the Millennials do.
Michael Mulvihill, the Fox Sports executive, pointed me to a study, circulated by the AARP, which said that if you separated out the economic contributions of Americans aged 50+, it would be the third largest economy in the world behind the United States and China. “So the third largest economy on Earth is completely ignored by the advertising industry,” Mulvhill said of those who cut off audience value of those older than 18-49. “That seems like it should be reconsidered.”
Those numbers, as gobsmacking as they are, still do not tell the full story. Part of the emphasis on reaching 18-49 or 25-54 was the presumption of upward mobility amongst generations of Americans. The Boomers, when they were the target demo, were the leading illustration of this belief. However, the ladder got pulled up behind them.
This chart, shared recently by UNC Greensboro economist Gray Kimbrough, takes a few seconds to read, but when you figure it out it plainly spells out what Mike Francesa was stating: young professionals have not been accumulating wealth like their predecessors did:
Incorporating updated Federal Reserve DFAs data, Boomers held a much higher proportion of US household wealth than Gen Xers at similar ages. Millennials continue to hold an even lower percentage of wealth at each age.
How can you respond to that besides acknowledging that fundamental assumptions about buying power must be re-assessed?
What it Means for Sports
You can hardly call it a dire situation when the NFL is nearly doubling their media rights money in the next TV contract, but there were some sirens sounded when the median viewership of the Chiefs-Bucs Super Bowl was at 50.6 years old, up from 46.6 in 2018 and 49.1 last year. To illustrate why we constantly hear about the old viewership for MLB and younger for NBA, the World Series was at 56.2 and the NBA Finals at 46.1.
The Boomers are the generation most apt to sit down and watch all or most of a game, while the youngs are increasingly satisfied to nibble on highlights on their phones. Last week, Variety revealed a survey in which different generations were asked whether they preferred to watch full games or highlights. Here are the percentages that preferred watching highlights:
NFL
18-34: 48% 35-49: 20%
50+: 11%
NBA
18-34: 54% 35-49: 47%
50+: 40%
MLB
18-34: 58% 35-49: 48%
50+: 24%
So in the Boomers, sports leagues and networks are capturing an audience that is not only far wealthier, but far more enthusiastic about engaging with their products.
How do you harness that?
When I’ve talked about the undervaluation of older audiences, one response that I’ve gotten is that people’s preferences are set by the time they’re in their fifties and they become impervious to the influence of advertising. That is partially true, and explains why the youth is coveted. Look at what Dave Portnoy and Barstool have built. For two decades they have reached college-aged fans and kept them around. Portnoy isn’t content to let the audience age with them, and earlier this week explained the funnel system of doing drama-filled shows with Tik-Tok stars so that Barstool can capitalize on the young audience when they start making money:
Nonetheless, advertisers who cut off their targets at 49 or 54 are dismissing a remarkable amount of massive opportunities.
“Buying habits may be set on consumer packaged products, so when they go to the grocery store things may be set from that perspective. You’re not going to sell them on a new brand of toothpaste,” said Jill Albert, the CEO of Direct Results. “But their world is opening up. They’re not spending as much time taking care of school-age children or working. So now they get to do whatever they want. Take travel: How many times do you talk to people who are 55 years old that are trying to figure out all the places they want to go? That’s a huge opportunity, especially after coming off a stretch where travel has been shut down and will be opening up.”
Lauren McHale, of Katz Radio Group, says that they’ve discovered that Boomers express feeling excluded by marketers. “Using our proprietary research panel of U.S. consumers across the country, Katz surveyed older adults to gauge their opinions of brands not speaking to them,” she says. “Based on our research, the 55+ consumers are aware they’re being snubbed – they are also aware of their spending power. Our findings show that the 55+ audience want brands to speak to them and they take action when they hear an ad.”
There has been what I think is a misconception that mobile devices and streaming would cannibalize traditional media platforms when in many cases there are incremental strategic advantages. For example, for years Mitch Rosen was selling 670 The Score’s reach in car radios or perhaps in the office. Now, the app can reach you through your phone headphones or home speakers. For the first time ever this season, Cubs games will stream on their app. The audience from all of this can get aggregated and targeted accordingly.
Another element, and this is a topic for a whole other piece, is addressable advertising. Facebook, Google, and Amazon have built an oligopoly in digital advertising with their sophisticated targeting technologies. This strategy is already percolating in audio and TV. Jill Albert said that Direct Results is already using attribution models and pixel tracking techniques across audio platforms — even including terrestrial radio.
To borrow a conclusion phrase from Mike Francesa, the bottom line is that he was perhaps a little too dismissive of young professionals, but absolutely right that the Baby Boomers need to be a focal point in sports media marketing. This is an audience that has more wealth and the desire to spend it than the generations who came before it and the ones coming up behind. For the right industries, targeting them is quite advantageous.
Brad Lane is heading home. After spending the past two years serving as Good Karma Brands’ Director of Content for ESPN Milwaukee 94.5 FM/540 AM and 620 WTMJ, the opportunity to return to Minnesota and oversee programming for Audacy’s legendary news brand 830 WCCO was just too good to pass up.
Lane will fill the seat previously occupied by John Hanson. Hanson had taken over for Andy Bloom. Both Hanson and Bloom had sports talk backgrounds just like Lane.
Prior to heading south to Wisconsin in January 2019, Lane spent spent twenty years at KSTP-AM (formerly ESPN 1500, now known as SKOR North) working as a host, producer, creative director and program director. His familiarity with the city, the talent in the market, and the WCCO brand should allow him to make a smooth transition.
“I’m beyond excited for the opportunity to be back in the Twin Cities programming a station with such a rich legacy, trusted talent and commitment to excellence,” said Lane. “WCCO has an incredible history and a bright future; it’s with a sincere appreciation for the heritage of this storied brand that I am also thrilled to be a part of its evolution.”
“WCCO Radio serves as an extremely important news brand for the people of the Twin Cities and the state of Minnesota who rely on us to be informative, timely, relevant and entertaining,” added Shannon Knoepke, Senior Vice President and Market Manager, Entercom Minneapolis. “Brad brings a wealth of experience leading content teams and his leadership and vision will be instrumental to the success of our station. We’re looking forward to adding him to the team.
No word yet on what Good Karma Brands in Milwaukee will do to replace Lane’s position. Given the quality of both 94.5 ESPN and WTMJ as brands, the company should be in good shape to attract a strong brand leader.
Believe it or not, there was a time when you couldn’t watch every NCAA Tournament game live. Hard to fathom now that you can not only watch all the games live, but you can stream them as well. At any given time, you can dial in one of the four networks covering the action, CBS, TBS, TNT and TruTV and see a live game in its entirety. There were some 12 hours of games brought to you live during each day of the first weekend. It’s incredible and what every college basketball fan dreams of. It wasn’t always that way.
Back in the day, the telecasts were pretty raw. Not many graphics and no score bug. The score and time left would flash up after a made basket and going to and coming back from commercial breaks. Imagine tuning into a game in progress and not knowing the score? How spoiled have we gotten? The answer? Very.
Thankfully the tournament broadcast has evolved as quickly as my bracket was busted on night number one of the big dance. That’s pretty fast, you’ll just have to trust me on that. So how did we get to the point of being able to see every game from start to finish? It was a long slow process that eventually caught up to the needs of the rabid fan.
The current format is more than fans could ask for. When the contract between the NCAA, CBS and Turner was signed after the 2010 Tournament, some were skeptical. The fact that games were going to be spread out over several networks was unique for sure. Would fans embrace what seemed chaotic?
“That’s going to take some getting used to, but it’s a better programming option for the viewer at home and the basketball fan,” CBS Sports Chairman Sean McManus said in an interview with The Associated Press in 2010. “More work on his or her part to find the game, but they get to decide what game they want to watch. In the past, I think we did a very good job of moving around, but it was our decision.” A costly decision with the deal worth a reported 10.8-billion dollars.
“The tournament’s success outgrew one network’s ability to provide the coverage fans were looking for,” David Levy, then the president of Turner Sports, said in 2010. There’s a lot of truth in that statement. This current deal solved the issue of ‘cutaways’ and also infused talent from both CBS and the Turner properties together. Greg Gumbel, Ernie Johnson Jr, Charles Barkley, Kenny Smith, Clark Kellogg, Seth Davis and others joined forces to provide in-depth and informative studio shows. The collaboration is working.
Let’s dive into a little history here on the tournament, which was really the second fiddle to the NIT for many years until the 1960’s. The first broadcast of the NCAA Tournament championship game dates back to 1946. New York’s CBS-TV televised the Oklahoma State vs. North Carolina game, won by the Cowboys. It was estimated that an audience of just 500-thousand saw the title contest.
It wasn’t until 1952 that games were televised regionally for the first time. Then in 1954 La Salle defeated Bradley in the first nationally televised title game. It all changed in 1969. NBC paid about a half million dollars for the rights to the tournament. They televised a doubleheader on the opening day of the tournament, then allowing each market to get two of the four regional final games.
The Final Four started on a Thursday, but each market would get just one of the games. Can you imagine today only getting a chance to see ONE of the national semifinal games? Championship and consolation games were played on a Saturday and both were televised by NBC.
In those days teams were divided into brackets based on geography. So, East Coast teams were placed in the East Region. The other regions were the West, Mideast and Midwest. You would only get East regional matchups televised in the Eastern part of the country and so on. Imagine living in the Midwest or East at the time and only getting to see the great UCLA teams of that day in the title game.
NBC would eventually expand some of its coverage in the early 1970’s, finally airing both national semifinal games. In the late 70’s NBC included opening weekend Sunday games and prime time regional coverage of four regional semifinal games, one for each market.
Things started to change for the better when, in 1980, an infant sports network known as ESPN got into the fray. ESPN picked up the NCAA Productions feeds of a couple of games on the opening Thursday night and then three on the first Friday night of the tournament. ESPN also picked up these feeds for the regional semifinals the following Thu/Fri carrying five games live and the other three on tape delay. Not a perfect situation, but better. Then CBS entered the picture.
In 1982 CBS debuted the Selection Sunday Show to announce the teams that made the tournament and what matchups were ahead. CBS added coverage of the opening round with live late-night games from the West Region on Thursday and Friday at 11:30 pm in the eastern time zone. The coverage featured a tripleheader on the first Saturday as well. ESPN stayed in the picture for the time being, picking up the NCAA Productions feeds and carried live doubleheaders on the opening Thursday and Friday nights. ESPN also ran many games on tape delay after the CBS 11:30 telecast both nights.
The coverage further expanded in 1983 and 1984, but then the tournament itself expanded to 64 teams in 1985. CBS would step up their game. This resulted in almost non-stop basketball for nearly 55 consecutive hours from Thursday at noon through early Saturday evening. Things stayed largely the same until 1991, when ESPN was cut out of the picture and CBS began a new seven-year contract that was for upwards of one-billion dollars. This time the deal included live coverage of all sessions of the championship. No more tape delay.
In 1999 DirecTV entered the picture with the Mega March Madness package. That enabled viewers to see every out-of-market region games during the first three rounds of the tourney.
In the years to follow, the NCAA Tournament was available as a live stream. CBSSports.com and later the official March Madness Live app provided you coverage of the games. Remember the “boss” button? If you were watching on your computer, you’d hit the button and a fake spreadsheet would pop up to make it seem like you were still working. Ingenious.
Things kind of stayed status-quo until 2007. That’s when CBS allowed what was then called CSTV, now known as CBS Sports Network, to air one of the regular network’s games each day on the first Thursday and Friday. This was the case until 2009.
Everything changed after the 2010 Tournament. The mega-deal between the NCAA and it’s now two television partners, CBS and the Turner Networks gave us what is today our “new normal” when watching games. Yes, they are spread out across a multitude of channels, but the games are in HD, the graphics are terrific and the basketball itself has been very entertaining.
Think of how far we’ve come from the early days of the tournament and television. Watching the games in 1990, just 31 years ago, you wouldn’t have known any better not to see on your screen how many timeouts each team had. Right? Could you even have imagined the possibility of seeing the shot clock on your screen at all times? Going back even a little further to 1970, would you have been so bold to demand to watch a game live instead of tape delay? Mindboggling to think that we used to rely on announcers and us actually paying attention to know the details of a game without being spoon fed the info. We weren’t looking at our smart phones or typing on our iPads or tablets either.
Some of you were not around before this wealth of technology and graphics so you are probably reading in horror. It wasn’t so bad, it’s all we knew. Though if given the choice I’d much prefer today’s telecasts. The information, the camera shots, the in-game reports from the sidelines and graphics to support all of the above make it a much more enjoyable watch. Oh and of course there’s our “One Shining Moment”. What did we ever do without that?
In saying all this, there is just one question left to ask; what does TruTV actually show the other 11 months of the year?
When Jason Barrett and I spoke a few weeks ago, the idea of doing a recurring feature for BSM appealed to me. I enjoy writing about the sports media industry and thought it would be interesting to ask on-air talents and executives about five goals they have for the future, and how they plan to accomplish them.
I’ll point out that in addition to writing, I’ve also gotten involved in creating promotional products. Everything from t-shirts, hats, and hoodies to swag like umbrellas, journals, pens, mugs, koozies, water bottles, bags, and anything else you can think of. If you or your company have future needs, email me at Glasspiegel.Ryan@gmail.com for a quote.
The focus of today’s debut edition of ‘Five Goals’ is ESPN MLB commentator Jessica Mendoza. Here are her goals in her own words.
1. One of my biggest goals is I’ve always wanted to reach as many girls as possible.
I guess that’s evolved over time. As an Olympic athlete it was definitely more in the athlete space, and especially getting to a lot more Hispanic girls in terms of getting them access to sports. Having seen what I was able to learn and grow through sports, I was like more girls need to know this. There shouldn’t be economic or gender or racial boundaries for sports.
That involves working on Title IX legislation the last 15 years with the Women’s Sports Foundation in that same regard. Now, in my career, it involves really being cognizant of trying to get more girls to understand the different things they can do — not even within my own job. For example, I just did a piece on Rachel Luba as an agent within the business and I want to continue just spotlighting all the different jobs and access to sports in a variety of different ways for girls and women, and just understanding how that can impact any father or any daughter that’s watching and the decisions they make moving forward to possibly do some really cool stuff with their own lives.
2. Mom goals: Just trying to be as present as possible.
I’ve got seven-year-old and an 11-year-old boys. I’m navigating their worlds. When I say present, literally that can be being a Velociraptor when they’re a T-Rex, roaming all over the couches and jumping all over the place.
Or, it could be my oldest asking me about girls. He’s starting to do that. Mom’s been the go-to for all the questions about crushes and kissing and all of that.
I use the word present because you can get ahead of yourself with what does this mean or what about this instead of actually just really being in the moment and hearing them out, even if some of the things they say may not make any sense.
3. Within work specifically, challenging myself not to just follow the template all the time.
You can get caught up in that. This is how you cover a baseball game. This is how you follow and prepare. You get those routines down. For me personally, I want to continue to grow, and do things differently. I might fail in some of that and hopefully succeed in others, but I’m trying to look at things through different lenses and have career results change and grow as well.
Even within the context of a baseball game, of course you have two teams on the field and nine innings. You have parameters you can’t change. But, we can continue to grow the way we cover it, the way the viewer can see certain things and understand them. I definitely feel that way within broadcasts.
Overall, in what I do career-wise, I never want to, like, just do these X things. What else can I be doing? Ultimately, going back to goal no. 1, if my main goal is to impact others, what can I do within my career to accomplish that? That could be storytelling [like with the Rachel Luba feature]. It could be certain things that I point out within a game. It could be a SportsCenter hit where I have a different take on, for example, a sexual harassment case that’s come up.
Things like that. I’m always trying to look at it, instead of just going with the more cliche answer, the easier road. Okay, maybe I could really grab someone’s attention by being more honest with this answer or having a different approach.
4. In light of COVID, I want to continue to know the world and see the world.
That kind of falls into travel, but even whether it’s reading more books or listening to podcasts that are kind of off my normal radar. It definitely does include going places too, but that’s been on pause.
I absolutely want to understand different cultures and people. You can do that within your own community, but you can also try to see it as much as possible globally. That’s always been a goal. Hopefully, as things open up more …
I also want to educate my kids with that. I was blessed growing up. My father’s from Mexico, so I felt really lucky as a kid to be able to experience that culture by going down there, staying with family, and experience the language. Foods I’ve never heard of. I literally to now don’t blink at trying liver or all these different things because in my childhood I was exposed to so much off the beaten path stuff from what a normal California kid would be.
I want to do that with myself but also my family. Just expose them, again whether that’s books we’re reading or things we’re listening to and ultimately — eventually — let’s go see them.
I turned 40 this last November and I had planned a trip 9-12 months out to Peru. The way I was going to do that, I have friends locally there. I was going to ride the llamas, stay in villages, hike Machu Piccu, but do it in a way that was more diving into the culture and the history of the region. That will definitely have to get back on the list because that got canceled.
I have this whole idea of parts of Southeast Asia that I want to travel to with my family. We want to do Australia, but through some of the aboriginal tribes. There was a thing I saw where kids could have pen pals there and get to know each other, and then we would be able to go and meet them. I don’t even know if any of this still exists. I’m hoping something like that comes back around because it would be really cool.
I’ve been blessed to travel around, just through USA Softball and doing clinics globally. And, I used to work with Hillary Clinton on some of her ambassador initiatives, where we would go to some of the countries we didn’t have great relationships with and do sports clinics to kind of make people a little happier with the US. I’ve been blessed to travel to some pretty amazing places and I want to bring my kids there.
My son just told me he wants to go to Italy. I’ve been there like 10 times. We trained there leading to the Olympics in Athens. So, I’ve been there done that, but no one in my immediate family has been and I was thinking just that. They came to London and Holland and some places that were easy because of the language. With Italy, it’s a little harder but the travel is accessible and food-wise it’s so simple for them.
When I asked my son Why Italy?, he said, “Mom, it’s where pizza and pasta came from. What better place could we go?”
5. Fitness goals: There’s a thing called Pole, Pedal, Paddle …
My family and I recently moved to Bend, Oregon and there’s a competition called Pole, Pedal, Paddle that combines alpine skiing, cross country skiing, running, mountain biking, and kayaking.
Literally, my gold medal doesn’t mean anything. If you can win Pole, Pedal, Paddle — or even finish it — you’re a celebrity here. The people who win this thing are like put on people’s shoulders and marched around the town. If you can ski and bike and row at a ridiculous pace, that’s an athlete.
For some of us in sales, nothing brings up fear like a negotiation. And, to me, nothing eases that fear better than, get this, being prepared for a negotiation! Alexandra Carter is the Columbia Law School Mediation Director and wrote the book Ask for More.
Read it.
She describes how negotiations can be like fights and bring up fear in us. It doesn’t have to be that way and with proper preparation it can be avoided. Carter reminds us that some of the most important questions we can ask in a negotiation are the ones we need to ask ourselves first. Like in radio sales, a typical #1 question is how much money should I ask for? I think the best answer is to ask yourself question #2: what’s the problem I want to solve?
Let’s say management has demanded a return to 2019 billing levels and a 15% increase in sales for the 2021. That’s a problem. The solution? You will need more annuals, clients who buy more than one station from you, and spend at least 15% more than your average monthly order.
So, imagine this common scenario: You have a meeting with a new client who has expressed interest in radio advertising, something they have not done before. Let’s start applying our logic to how this opportunity can solve our problem, help the client, and steer the conversation to eliminating objections later in the process.
Since we know we need more annual clients buying multiple stations and spending more money we open with the GOOD, BEST, and BETTER budget establishing system.
Try this!
If your average monthly order is $1500 on one station for 13 or 26 weeks, you will need to change that to solve your annual goal problem. Start the process by telling the prospect that you work with annual investments that get the best rates and qualify for a 2-week cancellation. So, why not design a campaign to work? And, by asking our clients to spend at least 15% more for 2-3x longer we will also likely meet our annual goals. Here’s how that sounds:
“I work best with three different types of clients primarily. Most get GOOD results, but some get BEST or BETTER results. I have some annual advertisers who buy one station every month at about $1800 a month or every other week about $900 per week (GOOD). I have a few larger clients, car dealers for example, who spend about $13,000 a month or $3200 every week on all 4 of our radio stations (BEST). I find most of my clients though buy the 2 most complimentary stations for their business in the $3400 per month range, get a 2-station discount and run every other week (BETTER).
“Which one sounds closest to your situation? “
Then, shut up. Most often clients will gravitate to the middle, BETTER, and take the last offer you put out there. And, if they do, you will get an annual advertiser spending way over a 15% increase on your average budget. In fact, even if they take the GOOD option, they are still helping you hit your 15% increase. Make sure you guide the budget negotiation to where you want to see it end and everybody wins!
The field of 64 for the BSM Sports Media MVP Tournament is now set!
Congratulations to ESPN’s Jeff Passan on knocking off FOX Sports’ Ken Rosenthal to earn the final entry in this year’s tournament. To see the full schedule of when matchups will take place, scroll down below.
A reminder, all voting for each round of the tournament will be done on Twitter thru @sportsradiopd. The people’s votes determine who advances, and who goes home. Be sure to print off your bracket, make your picks, and follow along to see how they stack up against the actual results.
As I mentioned previously, there are no layups in this tournament. Round 1 features many difficult and compelling matchups. Those who advance will have even harder matchups awaiting them in future rounds. There will likely be debate over who should’ve made the list that didn’t, and who deserved a higher or lower ranking. We expect that noise, and welcome it. But this is the bracket, we feel good about it, and whoever wins this tournament, will have gone down a long tough road to earn the voters respect, and ultimately the MVP championship.
So, let’s have some fun, and find out who is the MVP of the Sports Media industry.
