Business was booming in Southwest Florida. Then it was not.

Before the chaos brought on by Coronavirus, it had been predicted, based on estimates from the National Retail Federation, SWFL consumers would spend 4.1% more in 2020 than they did in 2019. On April 3, however, when Florida's Governor shut down the state, the expectations of growth for many small business owners were replaced with fights for survival.

As the state prepares to reopen, Fort Myers-Naples area small businesses will learn that turning the lights back on and hanging out the welcome sign might not be enough to bring even the most loyal customers back.

Some customers will not return because of personal safety concerns. Other customers may have discovered alternative sources to purchase goods and services.

More likely, though, customers will not come back because a business has lost a valued parcel of real estate: the position at the top of a customer's mind. This is the place where purchase decisions are made.

There is a way to regain top-of-mind status. First, though, it's important to understand why a business can be forgotten so quickly. 

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.

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.

"When my partners and I purchased the company 24 years ago, we had 25 employees and $2.5-million in annual sales," says Mr. Etzel. "Today we employ 375 people and generate north of $50-million a year in sales throughout Southwest Florida."

"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.