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Stone Payton: [00:00:00] And we are back with Business RadioX Pro Tips. Lee Kantor and Stone Payton here with you. Lee, we put so much energy, we’ve invested so much time and resource into what to do in the room to create that ideal scenario, that dynamic that allows for relationship building. What can we do? What should we do as studio partners to go above and beyond what happens in the room to serve our clients?

Lee Kantor: [00:00:29] We use the phrase “surprise and delight” quite a bit in here, And we’re always looking for opportunities to surprise and delight our clients. Some of the ways and some of the easy ways for us to do that is connecting our clients with other guests. You can’t do that enough. That has to be kind of something that’s top of mind, that you’re always looking for the appropriate opportunity to make a connection for your client with that previous guest, somebody that you met networking, somebody that’s going to help your client either get more clients or introduce them to more clients. So, you can’t do that enough. That should be part of your day-to-day routine when it comes to dealing with your business here.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:13] Another thing that we like to do to surprise and delight our clients is swag. I mean, we’ve given them mugs, t-shirts, a lot of Business RadioX swag, right. We’re always looking for that. If they have a kid, we’re giving him a onesie with a Business RadioX logo on it. We’re doing something to do it in that regard. Another thing we do is, a lot of the times, we interview restaurant owners and people in retail, and we’re giving them gift cards or some of the stuff that we get here given to us.

Stone Payton: [00:01:42] And I’ll tell you something else that I feel like is relatively easy for us to do wholly consistent with our mission, and boy, is it just received like platinum. If you’ve got an executive in here or a well-established entrepreneur, and you’ve already provided this experience for them, you learn through the course of that experience that they have a cause, a nonprofit, something that’s really important to them. If you can provide them with a path to let their cause get some exposure on our platform, it means the world to them. It’s good for us, it’s good for them, everybody wins.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:20] And if they have a friend that is a business person, a real micro business, and we can help them, get them on. How many times have we had the kids of one of our clients or guests-

Stone Payton: [00:02:31] Starting their own small business.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:32] … starting their own small business, and we gave them a chance to be profiled on Business RadioX. And another thing is we get our a lot of our guests, our authors, and we get a ton of books. We’re constantly giving away those books to other guests that we think are appropriate. So, surprise and delight, you can’t do it enough.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:01] And we are back with Business RadioX Pro Tips. Lee Kantor and Stone Payton here with you. Lee, we’ve talked a little bit before, I think, on this whole idea of surprise and delight. But how do you add surprise and delight at the studio a little?

Lee Kantor: [00:00:17] Yeah, this is one of the great things that we have at our disposal. There’s so many ways to add value by surprising and delighting an existing customer. We do it all the time in here, and we kind of take some of this stuff for granted. So, we thought it was important to kind of articulate some of them. Now, the number one thing we do is the mug. I think handing them a mug is one, a coffee mug, a Business RadioX coffee mug. Those things are coveted like trophies. I can’t tell you how many meetings I’ve had months later, and they’re proudly in the cupboard, or on their desk. So, the Business RadioX mug is a great surprise and delight addition.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:57] Another thing we do is connect people. By being a connector and by just regularly thinking of people you can connect together, you’re helping two different parties, and you’re creating that ubiquity that keeps Business RadioX and your studio top of mind. Other things we’ve done – transcription, we cut out some people segments, create like a really compelling sound bite. You can even create a video for them with that sound bite. When we share the content, when they see their name pop up on the LinkedIn feed, or they’re tagged in a post on Twitter, Instagram, all of a sudden, that’s another thing, a happy memory of, “Oh, yeah, I was part of that show. That’s great. That was nice of them to do that. Another thing we do is with photos in the studio, when we take the time to take photos, or we ask them, “Hey, do you want us to take some photos with your phone?” Those are moments that you’re capturing and you’re capturing some of the emotion. And then, they’re going to feel that emotion later on.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:53] For some clients, we’ve invited them to invent events that we’ve been invited to. When we get invited to broadcast from an event, and we ask one of our prospects, or a client, or a friend say, “Hey, when did you become part of this?” That’s a way to surprise and delight. We’ve done custom mic flags. You have a client you’ve had for a while, make them a custom mic flag. So, when they show up in the studio, and there’s their logo on the mic flag next to your Business RadioX logo, they’re super proud of that. They take pictures with it. It really makes their day. And we’ve done custom intros, custom closes where you intro the show with their name, and their company’s name, and their website, and stuff like that. Anything you can do to help them get the word out to kind of make them more valuable for their customers is a great thing to do. So—and then, if you have any good ideas, send them our way because we want to share them with everybody.

Stone Payton: [00:02:46] Yeah. Well, actually, that’s an idea. Now that we’re saying is, maybe we should start a list of surprise and delight ideas that we can all tap.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:52] Yeah.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:03] And we are back with BRX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. Lee, you are so good at this. I want to ask you to talk about it a little bit. How can we leverage our existing network to serve a new client, a new sponsor?

Lee Kantor: [00:00:18] One of the benefits of operating your own Business RadioX Studio is that your network is very diverse. You have interviewed or been part of interviews of people in a variety of industries that most people really don’t have access to. Most people work in a certain field, and they know certain types of people, but because you interview people from all across the business community, you have a very wide and deep network.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:46] So, when you have a new sponsor, one of the most generous things you can do to really help them have a successful launch is reach out to your network and make a connection. I do these all the time, “Bob, meet Mary. Mary, meet Bob.” And then, get them together, and so they can start helping each other. So, now that your new sponsor can reach out, and then take it from there, and then start building a relationship, you’ve served both of those parties. You’ve made it easier for the sponsor to make a new friend and maybe meet a new potential prospect or client for them. And you’ve helped the past guest get onto another show to help give them more exposure and get the word out about their work. And they might have a new business acquaintance that can help them in their business.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:32] So, by being this kind of mega connector, you are really living into the mission that we’re trying to help our studio partners do in the markets they serve is to being that de facto media outlet, that hub, of business knowledge and influence in their market.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:01] Welcome back to Business RadioX Pro Tip. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. Lee, you are so good about keeping you and I on task in this regard. You’re just wired this way. But if I’ve heard you say it once, I’ve heard it a thousand times, be a connector.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:17] This is one of the biggest responsibilities, I think, that we have running studios in our unique market is being a connector. We have the gift of being able to meet so many different people in so many different industries. And if we can use that gift that we have to connect people who would never in a million years meet each other, that is something that we try to do every week here in our studio. And we make a point, we have a meeting about it, and we look at each one of our clients and go, “Who can we connect with who? Who came to the studio this week that we can make a connection with somebody else?” Whether it’s a guest, a host, two guests together, two hosts together, a guest with a host, it doesn’t really matter. This is an important part of the mission.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:08] And by being this connector, you’re helping yourself in so many different ways. You’re becoming a valuable resource to your client especially because you’re helping bringing them potential business. How many of their other vendors are out there actively looking for more business for them? It just doesn’t happen. So, we have this ability to do this every week. It happens organically in the work that we do. So, make sure you’re leveraging that, and spending some time, and mindfully connect people together.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:00] Welcome back to Business RadioX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. Lee, we have, now, for some time, been practicing a discipline of getting together here in our studio with our team and, specifically, asking ourselves each week, “What are we doing for our clients?” Talk about that a little bit.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:21] I think it’s really important to be a connector. And that is one of the benefits we have as running a studio is that we should be mega connectors because in each of our episodes, we are meeting kind of a niche group of people in an industry on behalf of every client. And when we do our house shows, we’re casting a wide net, and we meet a variety of people. So, every week, it’s a great discipline to sit down and go, “Okay. Who did we meet last week, and which client can we connect these people with?”

Lee Kantor: [00:00:55] I know it seems like it’s a lot of work and a lot of effort to do this, but this is one of the things that we kind of take for granted is that we meet so many people from disparate industries, and nobody else does that to the degree we do. And so, when you’re mindful, and you go, “Okay, Mary would be good for Sue. Bob would be good for John. These people should meet each other.” And we send a quick note, “Hey, Bob, meet John. John, meet Bob. Bob does this. John does this. I think you guys would be a benefit from knowing each other.” And then, just get out of the way. The client appreciates that, the guest appreciates that, and you’re living into our mission of helping people connect and grow their business.

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Scott Payton: [00:00:00] And we are back with Business RadioX Pro Tips. Lee Kantor and Stone Payton here with you. Lee, I’ve heard you say more than a few times, it is absolutely critical that the producer takes on the responsibility to be the client, the clients’, the host’s wingman. What do you mean by that?

Lee Payton: [00:00:21] I think when a client has a show with you in the studio, it’s very important for the producer to kind of take some of the heat off of the client in terms of asking the guests in the room for other people that might be a good fit to be a guest in the room for the client. So, this way, the client doesn’t have to look like they’re asking the guests for anything. We take that responsibility and become the wingman.

Lee Payton: [00:00:46] We say to the guests at the end of the show, “Hey, Bob has to do this show every week or every month, and he needs great guests like you were. Do you have any colleagues, or associates, or anybody else in the industry that would be a good fit for this show? You know what the show is like. You just experienced it. Can you connect the host with some really good people that would be good guests for this show?”

Lee Payton: [00:01:11] That action alone should bubble up the next guests for your client. And as is the case in every episode, that next guest should be, in essence, a prospect for your client. And your client is going to appreciate your effort of doing that because your client doesn’t have a lot of other vendors that are out there actively looking for clients for them. And our platform allows that to happen very elegantly and organically.

Scott Payton: [00:01:38] This plays out every time. I’ve taken your advice from day one on this whenever I’ve been producing for clients. And I’ll tell you, the client appreciates it. The person loves to have an immediate way to reciprocate. And then, the end product is, now, everybody wins, and everyone is seen, and rightly so, as genuinely serving the other people in the circle.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:01] Welcome back to Business RadioX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. Lee, let’s talk a little bit about helping a, particularly, new host with some host coaching, sharing some mechanics with them that will help them get the most out of this thing of ours.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:19] Yeah. That’s one of the fears a lot of people have is that they feel that they’re not qualified enough to be a good radio host. And some of that is they’ve been a guest before, and the guest experience is totally different than the host experience, which, ironically, I believe, it’s easier to be a host than it is to be a guest.

Stone Payton: [00:00:37] Me too.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:37] Because the host just has to ask the questions. You don’t have to know the answers. And so, some of it is just a confidence element where they just have to feel good about it. And what we do some of the times is the practice, and we do mock shows, or we’ll do a practice show where they bring in kind of friends and family, somebody they know and feel comfortable with, and then they host that show. And we don’t charge them for that. We just include it in their package because that gives them kind of some of the practice they need, and it builds their confidence.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:11] And then, after we do that, we do a debrief where we kind of go through it and say, “Okay. What felt good? What didn’t feel good?” But a lot of it has to do with confidence. A lot of it has to do with them not thinking so much, and just being in the moment, and focusing their attention on their guest in helping bring out the best in their guests.

Stone Payton: [00:01:33] And we do have some hosting mechanics pro tips that are available for, not just, you, our studio partners, but also your clients. And you should probably avail yourself of those as well.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:01] And we are back with Business RadioX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. Lee, lots of strategies, tactics in helping someone make the right decision to invest their energy and resources in using the Business Radiox platform to help people and grow their business, one of which is to have the prospect pull their network.

Lee Kantor: [00:00:23] Right. This is one of my favorite tactics in order to move somebody that’s on the fence about doing this or not, because it works pretty much every time. What I like to do is say, you know what? I don’t know if this show idea is a good idea or not, but one way that kind of test it in a safe way is, why don’t you just go out to your LinkedIn, and then ask them, and say, “Hey, my company is thinking I’m sponsoring a radio show on the Business RadioX network that targets business attorneys. Do you know any local business attorneys that I can interview that you think that would make a good guest on my show?” Just pull them, ask the question. And then, all of a sudden, these people are gonna be getting bombarded with their people in their network of, “Yeah, you should talk to Bob,” “Oh, you should talk to Bill,” or “How about me? Why don’t—I’d be happy to come on your show.”.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:15] When they see all this positive feedback, number one, they’re gonna be encouraged that this is viable. And number two, they’re pretty much announcing that they’re going to do a show because, now, if they don’t do the show, they’ve got to explain to people because the people are going to ask, “Hey, what happened to that chair you were thinking of doing?” They’re gonna have to say, “Yeah, I decide not to do it.” So, people don’t like to do that because it feels like they’re losing something. They’d rather be gaining something, and this is a very simple way to move the relationship forward, so they buy a show from you.

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Stone Payton: [00:00:00] Welcome back to Business RadioX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. This is our final segment in the Show Concept Meeting Series. We have covered opening the meeting, painting the room, establishing ROI, and we talked about the three disciplines, but we really didn’t dive into this third discipline. We talked about landing on a show title and a time slot, so you would have something to protect for the client and candidly something to take away. It is key that before they walk out of that room, you establish a confirmed release date, a specific point in time when they are to get back to you with a yes or a no.

Stone Payton: [00:00:37] And it can be teed up very easily. Most people will not hand a credit card to you across the table during that meeting or write you a check; although, I must say, it has happened on more than one occasion. Most people need to check with their spouse, their business partner. They need to think about it. All of that is fine. You should make that very comfortable and, perhaps, suggest, “Terrific. Today is Thursday. How about, you know, by next Wednesday, you think you’ll have that figured out and know that this is going to be a good opportunity for you?” Typically, most people are reasonable. They’ll say yes. They’ll appreciate the breathing space, if you will. That day, that next Wednesday, that is your confirmed release date. Here is the key though – you need to be prepared to do the release part. Lee, talk to that a little bit. And I will swing back around on this because this is very key, in my opinion.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:29] Right. So, the mechanics of doing this properly, we believe, is once you have the photo of the studio that you built, the show concept that they’ve agreed on, that they are all excited about, that they’ve co-authored, you send them at the end of the day a note that kind of recaps the meeting, right?

Stone Payton: [00:01:48] Yes, yes, that’s a great idea. It’s good discipline.

Lee Kantor: [00:01:50] So, now, you show them where they are in the process of having a show. They’ve already completed the bulk of the work, right. We have a name, we’ve got a date, a time. We know that there are studios available. We know that there is an ROI here. We know we’ve identified the key guests. The show is 80% there, right?

Stone Payton: [00:02:11] Yeah.

Lee Kantor: [00:02:12] So, now, we’re checking boxes, “Done, done. This part’s done. This part done.” We’re literally waiting for this one last element, this confirmation that they’re in, and they want to do this.

Stone Payton: [00:02:24] Absolutely. And key to me is we’re not waiting. We’ve provided the opportunity. We’re giving them the breathing space to make an informed decision based on the conversation we’ve had. From our perspective, we just invested the time and energy to design a great show concept that is going to move the needle for someone’s business. We hope it’s them. And so, to me, that is the tone and the tenor. And if the confirmed release date is Wednesday, here’s the human nature that I’m going to encourage you to try to resist, don’t wait till 5:00 on Wednesday, don’t wait till Thursday, because maybe they got busy.

Stone Payton: [00:02:55] No later than noon on Wednesday, if you’ve not received a confirmation that they’re going to move ahead with this, you send the release note, and you very nicely say, you have a subject line that says, “Releasing your show concept and time slot.” And you put down in the body of the other note, “Jill, sorry it didn’t work out for you to sponsor the Bumpity Bump Show on the Business RadioX network at this time. If circumstances change,” and they often do, “we’ll look forward to entertaining a similar idea in the future if the category and the show concept are still available. In the meantime, we’ll look forward to having you back in the studio some time when we have an episode focused on your area of expertise,” or something with that tone.

Stone Payton: [00:03:42] Here’s a couple of things that it does for you. That’s not going to run anybody off that really wants to buy. The person who doesn’t want to buy and maybe doesn’t feel comfortable telling you, you know, you’ve given them a nice face-saving out, you’ve left the door open for them to come back another time, and you’re not waiting on that phantom phone call, and you really have a show concept that you can take to the open market. That’s my take on it, Lee. I can’t stress how important this is.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:15] Yeah. This is — and it’s important, in order for this to really have the impact you want to have, during the course of doing the episode, you have to get them to understand and agree that this show would be great for anybody in their industry, and it sure is lucky that we came up with this together that’s going to work for them. So, they have to feel a sense of ownership of this concept and feel that this concept has value, and they don’t want to risk letting this slip into the hands of a competitor.

Lee Kantor: [00:04:47] So, you really have to make a point during the building of the show to say, “Man, if this would work for you, man, this probably would work for anybody in financial services,” or whatever their industry is. So, you have to make it clear that when you are taking it away, there is a real chance that a competitor is going to get their hands on this and execute the show that they spent a lot of time and effort co-authoring.

Stone Payton: [00:05:11] And I will say this, maybe one of the biggest mental shifts that we ask our new studio partners to entertain this strategy, tactic, technique, this discipline, if you will, it works. And if they really want to buy, how many times of the year, Lee, have they come back very quickly saying, “No, no, no. I just hadn’t had a chance to talk to my partner. Can you give me another couple of days?” or “Oh, I’m so sorry. Yes, I want to pull the trigger.” You’re not going to run off. You’re not going to cause a problem with the person who genuinely is interested, and you’re going to provide a great face-saving way for the person who’s not ready for whatever reason.

Lee Kantor: [00:05:46] Right. And you know, on that date, you’re going to know one way or another if this is a go or not.