Enhance Your Market Value

Years ago, it was more accepted for big-name personalities to be temperamental, uncooperative divas. In media today, most companies don’t tolerate drama. The only exception is talent who have stratospheric ratings and are generating a sizable percentage of the station’s revenue.

In the last year, we have witnessed three major market and long-term successful personalities get surprised with a pink slip. They were difficult to work with and constant complainers. All three have yet to find work in radio and are now hosting startup podcasts.

At a time when radio’s greatest strength is personalities, the following guidelines will help you to thrive and our industry to prosper.

Talent Market Value

From a ratings and revenue perspective, talent creates market value two ways:

• The show consistently outperforms the station's average ratings 15-20%.
• Personalities who have a good relationship with sales and clients, and generate revenue through multiple endorsements. If you’re a drama king or queen, only a couple of endorsements won’t make enough revenue impact to save your job.

Endorsements that move the audience sound like part of the show and include brief anecdotes. Businesses today want collaborators who can interact with their coworkers in a positive and respectful way. Avoid the dreaded non-renewal or termination by mastering these four off-mic skills.

1. Interpersonal communication is the process of exchanging ideas, information, and emotional experiences between people in an organization. Effective people skills empower you to be a team player who wins in the hallway as well as the ratings.
   
   Social skills for the workplace:
   
   • Have a positive outlook that is focused on solutions and not complaining.
   • Develop healthy relationships with people below, equal to, and above you in the organization.
   • Collaborate and cooperate respectfully with fellow employees.
   • Active listening with empathy and non-judgment is essential to being an effective communicator.
   • Emotional intelligence is expressing your emotions intelligently and having empathy with your colleagues. Psychologist Daniel Goleman popularized this term, and he sums it up like this:
     "By teaching people to tune in to their emotions with intelligence and to expand their circles of caring, we can transform organizations from the inside out and make a positive difference in our world."
2. Be open to coaching. We all need an outside perspective to keep us on track and growing. That’s why baseball players have coaches and actors have directors. Be willing to take feedback from your programmer, consultant, or talent coach. No matter how successful you are, the minute you stop growing is the minute you will start declining.
3. Multiple skills deepen your value. How can you increase your marketability by offering additional off-air skills? Social media, digital, video shooting and editing, audio production, and music scheduling skills are key ways to strengthen your brand.
4. Create a community footprint. Being involved in improving your local community both endears you to the audience and gives you an advantage over syndicated competitors. Collaborating with community leaders on events, charities, and causes improves your market value.

As talent advocates, we encourage you to expand your communication skills beyond the mic so your gifts can be amplified, appreciated, and rewarded.