The current high rate of inflation is tempering how much Southwest Florida business owners can spend on advertising.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are approximately 31,000 small businesses in the Fort Myers area. There is one thing each of the owners of these companies has in common, whether they own a hardware store in Naples, a furniture store in Cape Coral, or a restaurant on Sanibel Island. They are all experiencing the negative consequences of inflation.

In a monthly survey conducted by the National Federation of Independent Business Owners (NFIB), inflation now ranks second as the single most important problem companies face. A year ago, inflation was barely an issue.

Inflation has not hampered the enthusiasm to spend among Fort Myers area consumers keeping retail sales hovering above pre-Covid levels. But, inflation is taking a dramatic toll on the amount of revenue business owners can keep.

According to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, small business owners see inflation-fueled price increases in almost every cost of operation, including inventory, utilities, rent, and wages.

Because of these rising operational costs, Fort Myers business owners are looking to cut expenses where they can, including advertising expenditures. But, because there is still robust consumer demand for goods and services, these companies need to make sure that the amount they do invest in advertising has the best return possible.

By almost any marketing metric, advertising on Fort Myers radio provides the greatest return-on-investment (ROI) of any medium available to local business owners.

There are 30,689 small businesses in the Cape Coral-Fort Myers, FL Metro Area, according to the US Census Bureau. Based on projections from the National Federation of Independent Business Owners (NFIB), nearly half of these companies have job openings they cannot fill.

As a result of the acute labor shortage, says the NFIB, 29% of small business owners rank the quality of labor as the most important problem they face. A year ago, only 21% said finding workers was their biggest issue.

The labor crunch in Southwest Flordia is being driven, in big part, by a record-high number of employees voluntarily quitting their jobs. Just last month, according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, 4.5 million employees across the country left their current place of employment.

According to the Wall Street Journal, those who are not currently working say they are in no hurry to return to the workforce. The lack of urgency stems from five primary reasons:

• 29% say they don't need to work right now because their spouse is employed
• 28% say they cannot return to work because of care responsibilities at home
• 25% say they don't need to return to work because they have a financial cushion
• 20% say they are fearful of returning to work because of COVID-19
• 5% say they do not need to return because of current unemployment benefits

There seems to be little chance that these resigned workers can be lured back into the labor force. Therefore, to fill open jobs, local business owners will need to focus their efforts towards recruiting among Fort Myers's "passive" job candidates.

To ensure success, every Southwest Florida business owner needs to advertise.

"Think you have a great product?" asks the US Small Business Administration. "Unfortunately, no one’s going to know about it unless you advertise.”

The SBA goes on to say, “Advertising, if done correctly, can do wonders for your product sales, and you know what that means: more revenue and more success for your business.”

There are dozens of ways for local small business owners to advertise. By most metrics, the best way to advertise is on Fort Myers radio. These measures of effectiveness, however, are often obscured by the glimmer and glitz of newer technologies. 

To help reduce the glare that often blinds business owners to the potency of advertising on Fort Myers radio, here are the top five things many local business owners get wrong.

When WFTM-AM became Southwest Florida's first radio station in 1942, there was no Facebook, no Xfinity, no Sirius/XM, no Netflix, and no podcasts. It would be 12 years before there was even a local TV station.  Consequently, it was pretty easy for radio to become the number one reach medium among local consumers.

Over the past 80 years, Fort Myers-Naples area business owners have come to depend on the mammoth reach of radio among local shoppers to successfully market the goods and services they sell. Advertising on Fort Myers radio has helped SWFL companies to survive and thrive during world wars, natural disasters, recessions, depressions, and even a pandemic.

Heading into 2022, local consumers have more media choices than ever before. But, despite the overabundance of social media, video streaming, audio streaming, cable, and other technological marvels, Fort Myers radio is still the most used advertising medium.

Based on projections from the National Retail Federation (NRF), Southwest Florida consumers are on track to spend $17.2-billion with retailers by the end of this year. This would be 13.5% higher than was spent in 2020.

To earn a significant share of these retail dollars, Fort Myers area business owners are expected to spend $621-million to advertise by year's end, according to Borrell Associates. This company tracks advertising expenditures in local markets across the U.S.

To ensure they are spending their advertising and marketing dollars wisely, many SWFL business owners research how to best target prospective customers by using local media. An exceptional resource for local business owners to investigate the media habits of localconsumers is on the advice section of AdvertiseInFortMyers.com.  

Here are the top five most-read articles on the site in 2021:

Every month, 802,000 adults in Southwest Floria use social media, according to Nielsen. Eighty-six percent of these consumers use Facebook, far more than other sites like Instagram (also owned by Facebook), Twitter, Snapchat, Pinterest, and LinkedIn.

As a stand-alone medium, Facebook is used by more people in the Fort Myers area than watch local TV stations. Only Fort Myers radio reaches more consumers.

The large audience commanded by social media has attracted a significant amount of advertising dollars from local advertisers. According to Borrell Associates, a company that measures advertising expenditures across the county, Fort Myers area businesses are expected to spend $112 million on social media advertising, a 27.9% increase over 2022. The overwhelming majority of these dollars are being spent with Facebook.

Yesterday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg announced the company was changing its name to "Meta".  This change, though, only affects the name of the parent company. There will be no change to the company's brands like Facebook, Instagram, or WhatsApp.

How will this name change affect Fort Myers area businesses that advertise on Facebook?

Since 1939 when WFTM signed on, Southwest Florida small business owners have been advertising on Fort Myers radio to market the goods and services they sell.

Lately, some of these advertisers are voicing concerns, though, that the accelerating use of smart speakers could erode the effectiveness of commercials on local stations. Current research, however, reveals that these devices actually extend the reach of the medium and its ad content.

More than 240,000  consumers in Fort Myers have a smart speaker in their homes, according to Nielsen. This is 24.9% of the local adult population.

Smart speakers are internet-enabled devices controlled by spoken commands and capable of streaming audio content, relaying information, and communicating with other devices. 

According to the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) data, Amazon Echo (aka Alexa) accounts for 69% of all smart speakers in use. Google's smart speaker makes up another 20% of the market. The remaining 11% of the market comprises Apple Home (aka Siri), Sonos, and Bose.

SWFL consumers can use their smart speakers to accomplish a diverse range of tasks, including accessing news, weather, and sports information; turning on lights in the house; shopping; and food delivery.

The most common use of a smart speaker, though, is streaming audio, including Fort Myers radio stations, according to eMarketer. Edison Research's Share of Ear Study indicates that consumers devote 13% of their total time using a smart speaker listening to AM/FM radio stations. This is second only to the time spent listening to Amazon Music at 19%.

Southwest Florida business owners who sell goods and services related to Halloween can expect far more treat than trick this year.

Based on estimates from The National Retail Federation (NRF), Fort Myers consumers are expected to spend a record $38,190,461 on Halloween. This would be 19.3% more than was handed out in 2020.

The NRF estimates that 65% of consumers intend to celebrate Halloween or participate in Halloween activities this year, up from 58% in 2020 and comparable with 68% in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic.

The top ways consumers are planning to celebrate include handing out candy (66%), decorating their home or yard (52%), dressing in costumes (46%), carving a pumpkin (44%), and hosting or attending a party (25%).

Fort Myers small business owners looking to scare up a share of this Halloween cash will need to advertise to drive local consumers to their stores and websites. But, to make a difference, advertising needs to begin right away.

"This year consumers are shopping for Halloween items earlier than ever," says the NRF, "with 45% planning to shop in September or earlier and another 39% during the first two weeks of October."

According to the US Census Bureau, there are 32,556 businesses in Southwest Florida. Some of these companies are small. Some are large. Some sell machine parts. Some sell software. Some provide legal services. Some provide eyecare.

Regardless of the size of the business or what it sells, all of these local companies have one thing in common: they are struggling to fill open jobs with qualified candidates. This is true in Fort Myers as well as Naples, Cape Coral, Marco Island, Punta Gorda, and every point in between.

Right now, across the country, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are 10.9 million open jobs. This is an all-time record.

To put this mammoth number of open jobs in perspective, the Federal Reserve says there are now five job openings per every four unemployed people.

Attempting to recruit SWFL workers from the ranks of the unemployed has proven fruitless for local companies. This is because many people who lost their jobs during the pandemic have no intention of returning to the workforce anytime soon.

There are several reasons so many Fort Myers area workers are not coming back.

First, older workers have opted to retire earlier than expected. Second, childcare issues are making it necessary for some parents to stay home. Third, other workers cite health safety issues for the reason why they chose not to work. Finally, some of the unemployed are choosing to live off the savings they amassed during the pandemic.

So rather than focusing recruitment efforts among former employees and the ranks of the unemployed, local business owners need to target the 421,026 passive job seekers in SWFL.

If you were one of the 831,247 adults who tuned in to Fort Myers radio last week, then chances are excellent that you heard advertising for ZipRecruiter.  That's because the company purchased 764 advertisements to air on local stations during the month of August, according to Media Monitors.

ZipRecruiter is an online recruitment site that helps companies of every size advertise open jobs. Overall, more than 2.8 million companies have posted an opening on ZipRecruiter.com

It is no wonder that ZipRecruiter and its competitors like Indeed have been making significant advertising investments on Fort Myers radio. Finding qualified workers is one of the toughest challenges facing local business owners. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of job openings in the U.S. has reached a record high 10.1-million jobs with just not enough candidates to fill them.

If you've heard these commercials on Fort Myers radio, then you know that ZipRecruiter is not advertising to attract job seekers to its website.  Rather, the company's goal is to convince local business owners to buy help wanted ads from them.

So, why has ZipRecruiter chosen Fort Myers radio as a business-to-business (B2B) advertising resource?  The first reason is revealed in the first line of their commercial.

"According to research," says the announcer, "82% of people remember radio ads."