The Secret Behind One Small Business Growing From $0 to $12 Million

Many posts on social media that I've read lately are asking how a small business can successfully use that medium to become successful. What we used to do with direct mail, phone calls, etc are now being done with texts, tweets, posts, blasts, etc.

But social media--and in fact digital media has and is evolving over the past five or six years. It's still in it's infancy as far as businesses using it to promote their services, products or brands. Just this week, Twitter filed for it's IPO. Facebooks' was last year.

But I digress. Five years ago, while working in radio advertising--I was approached by our sales manager. Seems a friend of his started a small shop ad agency and wanted to explore airing radio ads to promote his agency.

I was asked to write and produce a script for him--and we'd give him bonus ads as he'd refer businesses that could use radio to us. I was to get any leads that came in for my efforts.

Several weeks later--I was told that he landed a small home improvement firm. It had recently been formed by two men leaving larger firms to do their own thing. The agency determined that it was crucial they gain listeners trust--so he suggested having them remodel a personalities bathroom (who needed it) and let him do testimonials for them.

Nothing happened for several weeks as the personality did "live" reads about his "ugly bathroom". Then--after two weeks, calls started to come in. They decided to ad two more personalities (morning and evening hosts) to the mix--all talking about the same thing. The "live" reads were recorded--and those aired in broad rotating ads throughout the week in addition to the live reads.

As their success grew--they added two more radio stations (sports and adult contemporary) to the mix with several personalities from those stations' doing the same thing.

Over a five year period--they had to cease the ads twice--and switch to "installer jobs" ads--because they didn't have enough installers to handle all the work.

After five years of this--their projected revenue was to be over $12 million that year.

They did some other media as well--but the radio live reads were the majority of their campaigns and reason for their success.

And by the way--they didn't use any of the stations' newly-developed digital assets nor very little social media.

So, what happened here? What we discovered were several things:

1. What was being said wasn't as important as "who" was saying it--and how they were saying it.
2. The scheduling of the messaging was consistent--same frequency year-round.
3. Over a period of time--people began to pick up and relate to their brand--"yea...you're the ones I've been hearing about".

This replicates what other clients I've worked with over 32 years have told me as well. Whether the client did the ad or a personality did it--people would respond.

Isn't that what advertising is all about? Response?

These advertisers utilized radio's magic. They don't have just listeners--but fans.

The fans have favorite personalities who add instant credibility to their brand.

Imagine coupling this proven formula with digital assets of that station, along with the social media used by that station--and you have an affordable small business "measurable" platform to grow business.

Think about it--from Orsen Welles to Rush Limbaugh--listeners have been reacting with passion to their messages!

It's the concept of integrating various media that are now measurable to produce results. It's a proven formula that creates an emotional bond that small business can tap into to grow!