In 2003, Cadillac was the first automotive brand to make satellite radio standard in all of its new vehicles. Oldsmobile would follow a year later.

Today, there are 117 million cars on the road with satellite radio installed. 

So, have Southwest Florida drivers ditched their favorite Fort Myers radio stations in favor of music from space?  No!

According to Nielsen,  satellite radio has had no effect on the number of people who tune-in to Fort Myers radio stations each week.  For that matter, Pandora and Spotify (now owned by Sirius/XM) have not affected local radio listening either.

Thousands of Southwest Florida small business owners depend on radio advertising to successfully market their goods and services.

Take Bob Bigelow, for instance. He and his wife Dawn opened Biggy's Place, a 164-seat Fort Myers restaurant five years ago. Their sales have grown by 600% since they started advertising on Fort Myers radio.

"Three months after we took over the restaurant, we began investing hot-and-heavy into our radio advertising," says Mr. Bigelow. "I've been involved in marketing for over 37 years, but I have never been as overwhelmed by the response to our current advertising. Almost every day a new customer will tell us they learned about us on Fort Myers radio."

Conditioned Air is a Naples-based heating, ventilation, and air conditioning company.  Theo Etzel joined the company in 1995 as President and CEO.  That was the same year the company began advertising on Fort Myers radio as part of an aggressive growth strategy.

"To accelerate our growth at the beginning, we needed a strong platform to share the company's story," recalls Mr. Etzel. "So, we invested heavily in radio advertising."  To this day, Fort Myers radio is still Conditioned Air's predominant form of advertising.

There's a right way and a wrong way for SWFL business owners to advertise on Fort Myers radio.  Fortunately, there is a free resource at AdvertiseInFortMyers.com that can help replicate the successes of Mr. Bigelow and Mr. Etzel.

Really? Did you just call the 807,219 people who tuned-in to a Fort Myers radio station last week nobodies?

Don't worry, though. You are not the first SWFL advertiser who has made that mistake.  Media expert Doug Schoen used to share the same opinion. He came clean in a Forbes article.

"You wouldn't know it from all the media coverage focused on streaming video and streaming music," says Mr. Schoen, "but recent Nielsen data shows radio actually has the most reach among American media consumers. 93% of adults listen to the radio each week as compared to 87% who watch TV, a substantive difference."

This is true in Southwest Florida, as well, where Fort Myers radio listeners far out-number the people who watch local TV; read local newspapers; or logon to a streaming audio site like Pandora and Spotify.

When an Southwest Florida small business owner advertises on a local radio station, the first words determine if consumers will pay attention. The article "Be Heard: The #1 Job of Commercials on Fort Myers Radio" discusses this topic in-depth.

When it comes time to buy, however, getting in the final word can be equally important.  Advertising on Fort Myers radio is often the last voice an SWFL customer hears before making a purchase in-store or online.

Being the last voice serves as a potent reminder to consumers that a business or product exists.  Especially since our brains make things very easy to forget. Science says it's so.

Some of the bravest people in Southwest Florida are small business owners.  These hearty entrepreneurs invest their passion, their hope, their time, and, of course, their money despite the odds.

According to the Small Business Administration (SBA), the good news is that 80% of small businesses make it through the first year. After that, though, only about half will make it to their fifth anniversary. Even fewer, 33% will keep their doors open for ten years.

CBInsights performed an analysis to determine the top ten reasons small business owners fail.  I have included the entire list. But, of particular importance, is reason #8, "poor marketing". This subject will be discussed in more detail because this is where advertising on Fort Myers radio stations can help business owners not to fail.

Let's set the record straight. You can't see the Great Wall of China from the moon. Your fingernails don't keep growing when you're dead. Shaving does not make hair grow back quicker or thicker. Chicken soup will not cure a cold. And a penny dropped from the top of the Empire State Building cannot kill a pedestrian below.

Don't believe me? Just ask Google.

Like the so-called facts above, there are also things that many SWFL  small business owners think they know about advertising on Fort Myers radio that just aren't true.

Here are the five most common misconceptions followed by the truth.

Just about every adult in SWFL spent, on average, 15 hours last week listening to the radio.  As a matter of fact, more people tuned-in to their favorite Fort Myers radio station than watched TV; read a newspaper, or logged-on to Pandora and Spotify.

"Sure," a Naples small business owner said to me. "People are still tuning-in to local radio stations, but do they switch stations when my commercial comes on?"

Not to worry. Unlike TV, which makes avoiding commercials a breeze, there is no ad-skipping technology for radio.  As a result, a study by Nielsen reveals that 93% of radio listeners stick around for the ads.

This raises the question: Consumers are not button-pushing during radio commercials, but are they paying attention to the content of the advertising? Research says YES.

In 1940, WFTM in Fort Myers signed on as the first radio station in Southwest Florida. Since then, local business owners have depended on radio advertising to successfully market their goods and service.

Using any metric, advertising on Fort Myers radio remains the most potent medium for fulfilling the marketing objectives of SWFL business owners of every size.