"The spectacle has changed, but our eyes are the same." Joseph Joubert

"The surest - also the quickest - way to awake the sense of wonder in ourselves is to look intently, undeterred, at a single object. Suddenly, miraculously, it will reveal itself as something we have never seen before." Cesare Pavese

"Don't let your people fall into a rut. Keep leading them along new paths, blazing new trails. Give them a sense of adventurous pioneering." David Ogilvy

Today's image: in vino veritas by Fred Winston. Outstanding! Thanks for sharing.

Here's a look at the Chicago 07 radio revenues in relation to audience. The revenue per listener (rpl) calc is simple arithmetic, weekly 12+ cume divided into revenue.

2007 RPL Rank, (06 rpl rank), Station, Rev per listener 07 (rpl 06), 07 cume rank, [07 rev rank] - top twenty stations. Stations in bold improved rank and rpl year over year.

1. (2) WSCR - $52.03 ($47.30) #22 [#8]

2. (1) WGN - $45.66 ($55.31) #5, [#2]
3. (5) WXRT - $42.46 ($45.19) #20 [#11]
4. (7) WLEY - $40.89 ($41.92) #21 [#15]
5. (4) WTMX - $40.88 ($45.53) #6, [#3]
6. (3) WOJO - $40.68 ($47.14) #16 [#7]
7. (8) WUSN - $40.18 ($40.16) #10, [#5]

8. (9) WBBM-AM - $37.83 ($37.53) #1, [#1]
9. (11) WLS - $36.61 ($35.13) #19 [#12]
10. (10) WVAZ - $32.96 ($36.64) #11 [#9]
11. (13) WMVP - $32.60 ($29.24) #23 [#18]
12. (14) WGCI - $30.71 ($29.23) #4 [#4]
13. (12) WLIT - $30.45 ($29.96) #8 [#6]

14. (15) WDRV - $26.30 ($28.23) #9 [#14]
15. (17) WLUP - $23.99 ($23.18) #13 [#16]
16. (19) WKQX - $23.20 ($22.33) #18 [#19]
17. (6) WCFS - $22.33 ($44.85)

18. (22) WBBM-FM - $19.08 ($17.23) #3 [#10]
19. (21) WNUA - $18.40 ($19.86) #7 [#17]
20. (18) WJMK - $18.39 ($22.97) #14 [#20]
21. (20) WILV - $17.88 ($20.48)
22. (23) WKSC - $15.67 ($13.26) #2 [#13]
23. (24) WZZN - $9.56 ($10.17)

What's on your dashboard?

To manage it you have to measure it. What are you measuring?

Revenue per associate, revenue per seller, revenue per sq foot, revenue per, well, everything. What is critical here is that you are tracking stuff. Metrics, measures, gotta have them...

Daily

The most effective measurement approach is to adopt a retail mindset, think daily metrics.

What did we do today?

Start a track of daily sales, daily collections, daily DSO, daily pending, daily interviews of applicants for jobs posted, daily inventory loads, daily visitors and page views at your sites, daily thank you notes mailed, daily everything.

The world and your business works minute-by-minute. Daily measures will keep you in touch with what's happening and what's not happening in your enterprise. Daily provides you the information needed to take action while you can still influence what's happening. Over time you will develop a sense for how things are going, you will be able to see through the numbers and benefit from a richer understanding.

Closed circuit to Radio CEOs - Part two of a series

Thank You

How many dead tree, hand-written, to be delivered by uniformed federal employees (USPS) thank you notes did you send yesterday? To corp staff? To the field (the new hire, the seller that closed that big order, the talent that did that killer remote, the traffic director that came in on a holiday weekend)? To customers (the first timer, the loyal no matter the ranker buyer)? To business partners (the national rep that got you on that buy, the web hosting service that kept you live 99.9% of last month)? To the press? To your state association CEOs? How many did your market managers send? Your department heads? Your sellers?

Dan Kelley, the guy who covers Classic Rock radio programming and promotion the way Willie Mays used to cover centerfield, adds Your airstaff? - Wonderful, YES! Notes to listeners (and notes to clients which are always a big surprise). Thanks Dan.

My thought is you and your team are only as good as the number of thank you notes you're sending daily.

If you are not sending thank you notes you are not doing the things that are important, the work that matters.

Thank you notes. Dead tree, hand-written. Emails don't count, phone calls don't count. Hand-written thank you notes count.

Daily.

Yeah, I know, nobody does this.

That is why it is dramatically different, it helps to set you and your team apart, that's why it works 100% of the time.

Put it on your dashboard and watch it, daily.

Congrats & cheers: Randy Michaels reinvents the employee handbook. Rule #1: Use your best judgment. Rule #2: See Rule #1. Common sense - what a concept. Just what Tribune needed. Dial up the fun. Bravos, Randy! Molly Selvin writes up Randy and Sam via LAT here.

Let the games begin: Gawker to Cruise and the Church of Scientology - Drop dead.

Marshall Kirkpatrick offers up Perspective: Myspace Still Kicking Facebook's Ass in Traffic via ReadWriteWeb here. Data chart by Hitwise.