Volume 4 • Issue 4 • April 2013

HCGazette“One of America’s Finest Small Market Radio Broadcasting Companies”

909 North Railroad StreetEagle River, WI 54521

(715) 479-4451

All Heartland Vice President and Gen-eral Managers are scheduled to meetat the Eagle River corporate head-

quarters on Thursday, May 2, 2013. Accordingto Heartland CEO Jim Coursolle the meetinghas been rescheduled from April 30th to May2nd due to a scheduling conflict.

Heartland CEO Jim Coursolle said the meet-ing agenda is focused on “The Recruitment,Advertising, Screening, Identifying, Interview-ing and Training of Sales People Who WillSucceed.” He said, “Selecting and retainingsuccess-minded reputable individuals who canand will sell radio and digital advertising willbe the focus of this All-Company Manager’sMeeting. Hiring people who have not been re-tained, has cost Heartland literally hundreds ofthousands of dollars in the past years. Thishurts every Heartland employee, big time. We

are going to set our sights on doing a much bet-ter job of hiring sales people who succeed foryears to come. We are also going to do what wecan afford, to support the successful salespeo-ple who are currently serving Heartland. It isonly by increased Heartland sales that everyoneat Heartland will earn more money… there isno other way.”

Great efforts will be used going forward, too.Not only reference checks, but also backgroundchecks, utilizing public state records and otherinvestigative means to determine the characterof individuals applying for a sales position, orfor that matter, any position with Heartland.According to Coursolle, “Heartland has an ex-cellent team of employees and when hiring, wewant to make sure that whomever we are hir-ing, will be accepted by the current Heartlandstaff.”

The Advantage Systemsales program continuedto produce record re-

sults in 2013. Signed annualradio advertising, marketing,web sales and social media salesagreements continued to breakall Heartland records in the Ad-vantage System March 2013marketing campaign. Since theAdvantage System programbegan in 2010, Advantage Sys-tem sales have increased duringthe four year period by 98%.

According to Frank Kulbertis,Advantage System Vice Presi-dent of Sales, this was our bestyear ever with the Advantageprogram in the Heartland mar-kets. Sales were up 17% over lastyear. A large part of our growthcame from new advertisers. Wehad 30 new accounts buy an Ad-vantage Plan with the stations.Maybe even more importantly,

many dozens of other businesseslearned about the stations -- andlearned about the right ways toadvertise -- and many of themwill also become advertisers withthe stations in the weeks andmonths to come.”

This was the fourth consecu-tive year that Heartland joinedwith Advantage Systems to bringNorthwoods and UP businessesan excellent free marketing andadvertising seminar.

See Web, Page 2

Sales Hiring Practices to be Discussed

www.heartlandcomm.com

Frank Kulbertis presenting an Advantage System Marketing Seminarin Eagle River.

ADVANTAGE SYSTEMS:

“BEST YEAR EVER”Advantage System sales up 98% over four years

HCGazette

Page 2 . . .Corporate Address

Page 3 . . .Ashland News

Page 4 . . .Eagle River News

Page 5 . . .Iron River News

Page 6 . . .Park Falls News

Jim Coursolle, CRMCPresident and CEO

Deb Josephs, CPACorporate CFO

Wendi Ell, newsletter designer and publisher

InThisIssue

Heartland Mobile App tobe Available

in May

“You will be able to listen onyour Smartphone begin-ning in May,” said Skip

Hunter, Heartland Director of Engineer-ing and IT. “Our Mobile App will beavailable for both iPhone and Android(Droid) operating systems,” according toHunter.

See App, Page 2

Page 2 Volume 4 • Issue 4 • April 2013

Birthday “Broadcasts”

April9th – Tom Johnson – Park Falls

12th – John Berg – Ashland

15th – Lynn Weiland – Corporate

20th – Maggy Isham – Park Falls

20th – Kelsie Lampson – Ashland

23rd – Joel Karnick – Park Falls

29th – Jeff Bonno – Iron River

29th – Lori Mahnke – Ashland

MAy7th – William Hawn – Park Falls

24th – Bruce Marcus – Eagle River

Market Managers

Dan Wheeler ................................$22,757

Scott Jaeger ................................$16,258

Darla Isham ................................$11,539

Sales Reps

John Warren................................$25,853

Trish Keeley ................................$15,044

Sandy Berg ..................................$10,050

Kris Gaffney ..................................$7,778

Tim Zier ........................................$6,991

February Top Sellers

Corporate AddressCorporate AddressApp, from Page 1

Wendi Ell, owner of Elle-font Designs and the wifeof Heartland Corporate Di-rector of ProgrammingMike Wolf, designed theHeartland Mobile App but-ton that will be availablefor download from theGoogle Android “PlayStore” or iPhone App Store(Apple Store) in May. Ms.Ell also is the Designer andPublisher of Heartland’smonthly newsletter, the“HCGazette.”

CEO Jim Coursolle said,“Skip has done a great jobin procuring a viable andsatisfactory agreement with

Abacast to put the newHeartland Mobile App intooperation. Heartland, andits six FM stations, willtake another step into the‘Digital Age’ and be avail-able to listeners around theworld. It will be interestingto hear and see where ournew Smartphone listenerswill come from.”

Web, from Page 1

Free marketing seminars were done in Ashland, Iron-wood, Park Falls, Eagle River and Minocqua, Wisconsinand in Iron River and Iron Mountain, Michigan. The semi-nars were attended by 201 businesses.

Heartland CEO Jim Coursolle told the HCGazette he was proud of FrankKulbertis and theHeartland managementand sales teams forbreaking yet anotherHeartland AdvantageSystems record.

IT NoTes...

Global warming?

Winter has been hardon all of us andrather long, too. In

my 30 plus years working herein the Ashland market this springis the first time I can rememberhaving to clean snow out of theBrewers satellite dish to get sig-nal and put the game on the air.

I have seen many towers cov-ered in ice before, but I neverhad to dodge falling ice from atower until this year when MikeWolf and I were visiting theWRJO site for a maintenencecheck. I actually still have somepretty good moves and speed fora fat guy!

When the snow finally decidesto go away (maybe in July) engi-neering is going to start makingrounds to repair signage, fencesand check ventilation before thesummer heat hits. (Maybe itwon’t get too warm this summer).

As for IT... THE MOBILEAPPS ARE COMING! TheiPhone app should be releasedmid to late May and the Androidapps just prior to that. Currently

I am trying to get the developeraccount at Apple for the iPhoneapp. It takes some time forApple to de-cide if theywant you asa developerso it’s awaitinggame fornow.

Hopefullyafter thislast snowstorm onApril 19th(what a wayto start the Ashland HomeShow), programming can all gettogether and get the redesign ofthe FM websites started. In-cluded in the redesign is makingall of our FM websites mobilefriendly. Meaning they will re-size to fit the mobile device in-stead of shrinking the whole sitedown to fit.

So that’s all I have to reportthis month. Time to head out forthe Home Show... but before Ido that, I think I hear a shoveland broom calling my name toget the dish cleaned out beforetonight’s Brewer game. No restfor the wicked!

Skip HunterCorporate IT, Engineer

2320 Ellis Avenue. P.O. Box 613, Ashland, Wisconsin 54806

GM NoTes...By Scott Jaeger, GMWBSZ/WNXR/WJJH/WATW

Well, March came andwent! The Advantageplan in Ashland was a

HUGE success! We had a great re-newal percentage, plus we sold a lotof new plans. Overall, Ashlandended up with $111,540 in totalsales!! Thanks to the staff for a greatjob this year! Now we will be on theprowl for the Post Advantage PlanContest! The Ashland Staff says‘BRING IT ON!’

Our Spring Home Yard and SportShow in Ironwood March 22nd-24thwas another big success! We had aton of people come through and justabout every vendor said it was oneof the better shows they have at-tended in a few years! It’s nice tosee the public willing to spendmoney…that’s a positive sign.

The Ashland Spring Home Showwas more like a Winter Home Show.Set up was Thursday and FridayApril 18th and 19th. Thursday wasgreat. Friday turned into a nightmareas we got annihilated by a snowstorm. Ashland received almost 18inches of snow and Ironwood/Hur-ley got pummeled with almost 30inches. 8 vendor couldn’t travel overon Friday night, but made it Satur-day morning for the remainder of theshow. The show overall was a hugesuccess! Friday was busier than weexpected, but Saturday and Sundaywere great!

The Vendors did very well. Wehad about 103 booths and 78 differ-ent vendors involved! And of coursewe had a blast with vendors at ourHome Show Party on Saturday nightat the AmericInn. Thanks to theBreakwater Catering, the AmericInnand JD Bass Entertainment for greatfood, and super venue and outstand-ing music!

After that, we can take a littlebreather on shows…although the let-ters went out this week for our Sen-ior Expo hosted in August. We had arecord-setting year for booth saleslast year, we’ll see if we can matchthat again this year.

Now it’s time to start planningfor the summer months. We areclose to starting up our ABC RaceNight program. Skip Hunter broad-casts live every Saturday from theABC Raceway in Ashland beginningMay 11th. May 4th is the big kickoff and car show at Fastlane Motor-sports in Ashland. Skip airs a 2 hourlive broadcast with drivers, ABCRaceway members and more!

We are also working on the BayArea Battle of the Bands, which wehold in conjunction with the AshlandChamber of Commerce over the BayDays Festival in July. That is turninginto a really great event! How didwe just go from saying good bye toMarch all the way into July and Au-gust!?

I am writing this a bit early thismonth, as My Wife and I will beheading on vacation. We both needsome down time. We will be spend-ing 7 days in the Caribbean on acruise (NO NOT CARNIVAL!!Thought I will clear that up rightaway). We will be visiting Barbados,St. Lucia, St. Johns, St. Maarten andSt. Thomas. The cruise departs fromPuerto Rico on Saturday, April 6th!So with that…BON VOYAGE!

AshlandAshland

Skip HunterAshland Program Director

Scott JaegerAshland VP and GeneralManager

www.wbszfm.com

www.wnxrfm.com

www.wjjhfm.com

Volume 4 • Issue 4 • April 2013 Page 3

2013 Spring Home Yard and Sport Show in Ironwood, March 22nd to 24th.

Jim HodgesEagle River VP and GeneralManager

www.wrjo.com

Mike WolfCorporate Program Director

909 N. Railroad Street, P.O. Box 309, Eagle River, Wisconsin 54521

April 20th WRJO Grocery Grab Giveaway – winners were

Tim Adams ($250), Dee Sadawski ($500), and Theresa Heck

($250).

Eagle RiverEagle RiverPage 4 Volume 4 • Issue 4 • April 2013

GM NoTes...By Jim Hodges, GMWRJO/WERL

It’s April 12th and I’m look-ing out my office windowat another two inches of

snow that fell last night, plus moreexpected today. The groundhog,who predicted an early spring, hasgone into hiding after being ar-rested on charges of fraud. His re-sponse? “I’m a rodent, not ameteorologist!” A year ago at thistime, we were golfing. This year?We’re still shoveling. Now we’resimply hoping the annual ice outoccurs before the state fishingopener in early May. What’s thatold saying? If you don’t like theweather in Wisconsin, wait 24hours and it will change. But, weare hearty Wisconsinites and wewill carry on.

As broadcasters, we striveeveryday to give our audience aquality product as evidenced bythe 11 awards. WRJO and WERLare in contention for at the May4th Wisconsin Broadcasters Asso-ciation’s annual “Awards For Ex-cellence” competition. We’ve wona first, second and third placehonor in a variety of categories in-cluding, Feature News Story, BestNewscast, Best Use of Audio InNews, Live On Scene Reporting,Best Interview, Best Sports Play-

By-Play, Election Coverage, Pub-lic Service Announcement andBest Commercial. It’s a testamentto the great job done by News Di-rector, Bruce Marcus, Program Di-rector and Sports Announcer, MikeWolf and Morning Air Talent andPSA Director, Amy Linnett.

I had the privilege of joiningother Wisconsin Broadcasters onthe annual trip to Capitol Hill lastmonth. Each year, our associationsends one of the largest contin-gents of broadcasters to meet withour state Senators and Congress-men to discuss issues that affectour business and share our con-cerns and needs. One of the high-lights of the trip was aCongressional reception at theNewseum, a contemporary mu-seum telling the story of news re-porting in America (pictured atright). 

We have a new front desk re-ceptionist! Her name is WendySchulta. Wendy takes over theday-to-day duties answering thephones, greeting the public andassisting the staff. Her predeces-sor, Peggy Kaczkowski, betterknown as “Crackowitz,” has “re-tired,” but will remain with us fill-ing in from time to time.

Our sales staff did a great jobof getting people to attend our an-nual Advantage Systems market-ing seminar in late March. Nearly80% of people who said they’d at-

tend did. The downside is we did-n’t have enough decision makersin the room. Our sales totals wereabout the same as the previousyear. The main message? Adver-tising your business should be justlike an exercise program – youhave to be consistent to see re-sults.

I’ll cut things off here. It’ssnowing. I have to shovel….again.

Dan WheelerIron River VP and GeneralManager

www.wikb.com

Brad ZimaIron River Program Director

Good MorNING,TelephoNe TIMe

As the old saying goes, “Home iswhere the heart is,”and, with TelephoneTime, the longestrunning radio talkshow in UpperMichigan, it is only a

telephone call (or internet stream) away!!Calls come in from all around the coun-try… Texas, Chicago, Las Vegas,Florida, Kewaunee, Green Bay, just toname a few!! The following is just asampling of what we “get” to hear everyday:

…Coffin for sale; with a motor in-side!

…Needed: Bee keeping supplies.

…Caller wanting to know why Col-orado is making a law preventing thedocking of cow tails. Don’t they haveanything better to do??!

…Selling a “Wanda the WalkingDoll”.

…Maple syruping taps for sale.…Bunnies for sale! Also, a pure-

white, lionhead rabbit for sale. Needs tobe pampered.

809 West Genesee Street, Iron River, Michigan 49935

Iron RiverIron RiverVolume 4 • Issue 4 • April 2013 Page 5

GM NoTes...By Dan Wheeler, GM WIKB/WFER

Snow storms, rain, even flood-ing were all part of what hasbeen happening here in Iron

River. The snow keeps on coming. Itwas nice in March because it gave aboost to the local ski hills, bars, hotels,and restuarants. But now in Aprileveryone just wants it to go away. Re-ally this winter was not to far off fromnormal, but the real problem was whatwe experienced last year. A caller toTelephone Time on March 4th saidthat a year ago they had their dock inthe water. In the first week of April itwas reported that most lakes still haveover 30 inches of ice.

The 2013 Home, Business & Out-door Expo was held Saturday, March30th. WIKB provided major supportof this event with the Iron CountyChamber. WIKB’s Brad Zima did liveinterviews and updates from the show.

2013 Home, Business & Outdoor Expo was held Saturday, March 30th at theWest Iron County High School. Here is WIKB friend and Iron County ChamberDirector Bob Black presiding over the expo.

In March Brad hosted a three hour radio-a-thonfor the Iron County Cancer Care unit that raisedover $5,000. All the money stays right here in IronCounty. This is a cake that was sent to WIKB tosay thank you. It was delicious.

Welcome

Darla IshamPark Falls VP and GeneralManager

www.wcqm.com

Joel KarnickPark Falls Program Director

GM NoTes...By Darla Isham, GM WCQM/WPFP

The first annual 98Q Country & WPFP Home andRecreation Show was a huge success April 6th & 7th.Last fall, the Park Falls Area Chamber of Commerce

handed off to us a show that had been called the Spring Expo for10 years. The Board of Directors for the Chamber decided theycould not manage this show any longer. Even though it was lu-crative for them, they asked us if we would take it over andmaybe revive it so the community would not lose something thatcould become larger. Our first task was to change the date to amore suitable time of year, like in April, and then we decided tomove the venue from a very cold, unheated hockey rink to a nicewarm high school gym. Hats off to the station staff who spent theentire weekend, from set up on Friday to take down on Sunday,accommodating vendors and consumers, making sure traffic wasgreeted with a warm friendly welcome and vendors were com-fortable and had everything they needed to expose their businessto the community in a friendly and professional atmosphere.

According to a survey that we asked every vendor to fill outbefore they packed up on Sunday, it told us that vendors wereoverjoyed and thrilled with the outcome of the entire weekendshow. Vendors expressed that the traffic was a nice with consis-tent flow so they could spend quality time with consumers inter-ested in their products. One tractor vendor said they sold a tractorwithin 20 minutes of the show doors opening. A blacktop com-pany said they booked 10 appointments on Saturday and 5 moreon Sunday. A tie-in to the show was a local Ford dealership whopartnered with the high school girls basketball program in a“Drive for a School” program. Every test drive that was taken,$20.00 was donated by the Ford Motor Company and the dealer-ship to go towards the school program. Well, talk about a successstory, through the power of radio, over 200 folks test drove vehi-cles at the show and a little over $4,000.00 was raised for thebasketball program, going towards new basketballs and uniforms.Vendors raved about the professionalism and how impressed theywere with the radio station staff.

I think we are off to a good start at creating a home and recre-ation show, that in years to come, will have a waiting list of ven-dors.

One last note on the success of our show, ironically on theThursday before the show I started getting phone calls that folkscould not find our show ad in 3 of the local newspapers, when Icalled the editor to find out if this was true, they tell me theymissed us on the manifest to print our ads. They missed us andforgot to print our time-sensitive show! This means the total suc-cess of the Home and Recreation Show can be attributed toRADIO! If you ever had any doubts or you have clients whohave doubts about the power of radio, take this section of thenewsletter and use it as a testimonial. Radio gets the job done,time and time again, don’t ever doubt the power of our product.

We took very good care of our Park Falls Chamber of Com-merce regarding the show with a complimentary booth because,honestly, I believe we were handed a gift, and I am very gratefuland appreciative of their kind gesture.

Enjoy the pictures and Happy Spring!

1329 4th Avenue South, P.O. Box 309, Park Falls, Wisconsin 54552

Page 6 Volume 4 • Issue 4 • April 2013

Park FallsPark Falls