(By Mike McVay) During the past 12 months, I’ve been to many different conferences that support Radio, Podcasting, and Media Management, including an opportunity to speak at Radio Ink‘s Hispanic Radio Conference. Each is focused on content creation, sales, management, technical, digital social media, and new trends. Showing up to these conferences and seminars is an opportunity for me to learn, network, market the services of myself and McVay Media, and give back to the industry that’s been so very good to me. It’s about staying top-of-mind and remaining relevant. When someone is looking for a consultant, I want them to think of McVay Media.
Reflecting on my media event attendance over the year has been eye-opening. There are some major companies and businesses that are almost always present – and those that are noticeably absent. Executives on all levels and all categories of media sometimes never show up at an industry conference. People notice. It speaks volumes for those companies that are there and for those that aren’t.
The message that is sent and received is positive or negative by merely showing up … or not. How much do you care about Talent, Sellers, Managers, Engineers and Promotion/Marketing team members? The judgement may be unfair, but it is real.
When a major company sponsors and produces an Opening Cocktail Party at a conference designed for talent, the personalities walk away with admiration for that company, because they did something special for them. That happened recently. When any senior executive is interviewed or participates on a panel, it can be an advertisement for that company as a great place to work. One’s own employees will receive that message as well as potential future employees.
It is obvious that poor messaging can be harmful to a business or company. I am sure that some companies disallow attendance or participation because something went very wrong at some point in their company’s past. I know of examples of such missteps. Those are things that people talk about. My experience is that such instances are rare. My belief is that the positives of showing up far outweigh those of being absent.
Being there supports the commitment of a company and sends a signal to programming, sales, digital engineering, and podcasting. Anything else is lip service.
Mike McVay is President of McVay Media and can be reached at [email protected]. Read Mike’s Radio Ink archives here.
