SALES FORCES ARE EXPANDING – WHAT ABOUT YOURS?

AS THE ECONOMY IMPROVES, COMPANIES SEE GROWTH AHEAD, HIRE MORE SALESPEOPLE

A telltale sign that Corporate America sees an improving economy is a very strong trend toward expanding its sales forces. Salespeople should have been the last employees to be let go, since they’re the only ones who bring in the money. But many radio stations didn’t see things that way when the economy soured. Now that buyers are loosening the purse strings again, they have to ramp up their sales staffs to handle the increased business. And there’s no better time than right now.

The Alexander Group has just released a comprehensive new study it calls the 2011 Sales Compensation Trends Survey. In a nutshell, Alexander’s David Cichelli, Senior Vice-President and Survey Editor, says the results show a “sharp uptick” in sales hiring plans and loosening of previously tight-fisted controls on expenses. “Most sales departments are ready to spend money to help grow top line revenues” he said.

Hopefully, that includes radio sales departments, too.

The reason for this sudden brightening of viewpoint on sales hiring is the obvious one: companies expect to make more money this year than during the last three recession-racked years. A whopping 80.3% predict sales growth in 2011.

ALL SIGNS POINT TO REVENUE GROWTH IN 2011

Other highlights from Alexander Group’s survey that are of interest to radio station managers include:

• Increasing investment in sales departments – Nearly 72% of the companies surveyed say they plan to spend more on sales in 2011

• Putting more hot bodies on the street – Over 61% plan to hire additional salespeople this year

• Paying salespeople more – 65% of the large group surveyed said they’ll increase base sales pay over the next 12 months

• Jacking up sales incentives – Around 3% is the median rate reported by the survey subjects

The Alexander Group study covered a substantial base of companies nationwide. Results are drawn from responses by over 130 corporations employing a total of around 140,000 salespeople.

WHAT RADIO STATION MANAGERS MUST DO NOW

First: Get going. This is no time to sit tight and hope for better days.

All signs indicate the economy is coming back. Holiday spending was strong and retail, our life’s blood, is looking healthy again for the first time in recent memory. Radio needs well-trained people who come to the table already motivated on the streets, helping customers get back on the air.

Second: It’s also no time for skinflint half-measures. If you’re tempted to say, “I guess we could hire two or three people, pay ‘em straight commission, send ‘em out and see how they do”, you might as well save your time. That kind of thinking sank a lot of broadcasters even before the economy went south. It buried many more when things really got tight.

If you are seriously so beat-up by economic conditions that you can’t think of anything else to do now than the scenario I just mentioned, maybe it’s time to get out of the radio business altogether. There’s no dishonor in that. For some, it’s the only way out of situations they think they can't win.

But if you still have the spark, that Something Within that told you radio was where you needed to be in your life, the drive to get back out and start swinging again, this is the time to get going. Start looking again for quality salespeople, organized yet outside-the-box thinkers who can represent broadcast, online, and any other media you can corral.

Most of all, the Alexander Group survey tells us that the business of selling is coming back, and fast. Which means that a lot of quality salespeople who have been forced to the sidelines are going to get snapped up and put back on the street.

Which also means you’d better get to know who they are so you can grab the good ones before someone else – maybe your competition – gets there first.

I’m thrilled but not surprised by the Alexander survey’s findings. A jump start for sales forces has been long overdue. The smart managers – the ones most likely to make strong gains quickly in the improving economy – feel the sea change, too. And they’re ready to expand their sales forces to ride the crest of the new waves of prosperity that are thundering toward us right now.

NEW YEAR’S EVE RADIO IN A PARKING LOT

HOW A STRONG ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE-CLIENT RELATIONSHIP BRIGHTENED A YOUNG JOCK’S LONELY NIGHT

This is a personal story. I include it here because it shows how a top salesperson should relate not only to a strong client but to an air personality as well. It’s about a cold New Year’s Eve in a Midwest capital city. Yours truly was on the air, doing the ubiquitous end-of-year countdown show. Nothing unusual about that except for the locale: I was broadcasting from a converted camping trailer in an office building’s parking lot.

Here’s why: The station where I was night jock and weekend play-by-play announcer had been sold. It planned to move into new digs in a nice downtown office building and the remodeling had been underway for some weeks when it became clear that we would have to vacate the old building – owned by our former partner, a TV station – before the studio suite in the new place would be finished. What to do? Borrow a remote trailer from a sister station in another market, tow it up to our city, plop it into a corner of the parking lot and wire that baby up.

Welcome To Radio Siberia

The little vehicle was nothing more than a camping trailer that had been gutted and re-purposed for remote broadcasts. I think our new sister station had used it for week-long broadcasts from its state fair. The door opened into a room that housed the remote equipment rack and a counter where the newscaster did his reports.

Across the glass from him was the microscopic control room. To enter, you had to open a door, ease in, then shut it carefully. No visitors, either: there was room for exactly one person. This little studio, which was modestly soundproofed, sported a five-pot Gates Ambassador control board, two Gates turntables and an ITC three-deck cart machine.

Everything else happened across the windy parking lot, inside the building. The newsroom was up and running. A make-shift production room was in there, too, along with executive and sales offices. And the restrooms.

We rarely received visitors in our little corner of Siberia. A news dude would trudge out once an hour and the chief engineer, a young wire-twister who didn’t trust any announcer for any  reason, peered in from time to time to see if we were still on the air. Otherwise, it was actually rather peaceful.  Except when the winter wind gusted across the open parking lot, which made the trailer rock a little. That was solved early on by anchoring it to the pavement with guys.

Now you have the picture.

The AE, The Veep and the GOOD Stuff

And so we come to this particular New Year’s Eve. I had the 8-1 shift, the top-hits-of-the-year countdown show.  The whole thing had been sold to a single sponsor, a major national convenience store chain. That in itself was a terrific idea. First, the time was hardly premium for most advertisers. Second, only the chain’s numerous metro locations would be open for New Year’s revelers to grab last-minute supplies of beer and snacks.

That’s still a great idea for a New Year’s countdown show sponsorship package.

Here’s where the really important part of this little tale occurs. I was well into the show when the trailer’s door swung open. Since it was always locked for security reasons, this had to be a station employee with a key. Sure enough, in climbed one of our top account executives – and he had a big grin on his face. I squeezed out of the little control room to say hello and he said, “Doug, I have someone I want you to meet.” And he introduced me to another smiling soul, who proved to be the Regional Vice President of the convenience store chain!

I thought it was pretty cool that the two of them, who surely had other things to do on New Year’s Eve, had taken the time to stop by and swap howdies. But then it got even better: the VP and the AE began to bring in bag after bag after bag of stuff from the sponsor's stores: chips, dip, candy, frozen pizza, toilet paper, even loaves of bread and – BEER!

It was all for the staff working on New Year’s Eve during the countdown show. Which meant one news guy and me. He and I later divvied up the goods (I managed to abscond with all the beer) and I happily went home to my apartment in the wee hours for my own little New Year’s party.

The point of this little remembrance is to illustrate how a top salesperson should work with customers. In this case, the AE could have just had some goodies delivered. (Many wouldn't have bothered even with that.) Instead, he had formed such a good relationship with the regional VP that they decided to bring the viands in person. This strengthened their already strong relationship and, of course, it meant the world to a poorly-paid 22-year-old marooned in a trailer in a windy parking lot on New Year’s Eve.

Next time there’s even a question about whether a salesperson should show up at a remote, client event or special program, pull this out as an example of how radio relationships ought to be. And have a wonderful, meaningful, joyous and profitable New Year!

MONDAY: The first Monday Sales Blast of the New Year!

IS SPORTS TALK A THROWAWAY FORMAT IN YOUR CLUSTER?

HOW TO AVOID GIVING UP ON A SIGNAL AND JUST TURNING UP THE SATELLITE FADER

It’s a familiar scenario. You run a cluster; in there somewhere is that lower-powered AM at 13-something on the dial. It’s problem? Transmitter’s on but ain’t nobody home. Its format and/or signal cannot compete for audience or revenue. So you make the decision: Flip the switch and take that sad little tea kettle all-sports. Presto: No jocks, no local hosts, maybe no program director. Just 24/7 sports yak from the network. Excellent – except that you may be throwing away a valuable radio station.

There are many more stations in most markets than can ever hope to be competitive. The audience pie is sliced thin, which makes mining for revenue tougher than ever. Radio station owners and managers feel that to survive and thrive, they must concentrate their resources on their major players: the FM music stations and, occasionally, AM talk monsters that pay the bills. What to do with the “leftovers”, the anemic little stations that were included in the deals that brought the bigger, better signals into the group?

“Niche formats” are often the answer. These include Hispanic, religion, bartered programming – and all-sports. Some broadcasters decry the all-sports format but they miss an important point: It works because it provides its listeners with EXACTLY what they want to hear: all sports and access to important guests. Some listeners can actually get on the air on these national shows, which puts them on the same footing as any other listener, regardless of market size.

The major all-sports radio networks (ESPN Radio, Sporting News Radio, Fox and the others) provide solid, big-time programming at all hours of the day and night. What they DON’T provide is the only thing that truly keeps radio local, the one thing listeners can’t find on TV sports shows and the Internet, either: LOCAL CONTENT.

Addressing The Local Content Challenge

Fine, you say, that’s why we have these two funny guys in the afternoon. One goes by his first two initials and the other is called The Coach. They talk about the local stuff after Cowherd or Patrick or Rome or the others. So. Local.

Please.

Isn’t anything other than sports going on in your market? Do you seriously believe you will build an audience of any size that will attract significant revenue by talking only about point spreads on NFL games and what LeBron could have been thinking?

Or do you just want some reason to justify the transmitter's electricity bill?

The challenge is that you jumped into all-sports in order to save money. How can you provide local content without going back to a full staff again and embarking on that vicious cycle of too-much-expense and too-little-revenue?

You already have a terrific set of resources in place to help: the other stations in your group.

Rallying the Reinforcements

Let’s start with local news. You do have at least one person among your “brands” covering local news, don’t you? No, not the “giggle girl” who updates us on traffic and celebrity gossip on the morning show. An actual news person. No? Then it’s time to draft a voice from your roster to take care of news on the sports station.

That’s because the predominantly male, 35+ demographic of your all-sports audience lives in the real world of housing issues, unemployment, taxes, health matters and crime. They don’t just tune in the six o’clock TV news to watch the sports segment. They watch the whole banana. Which makes it absurd to think that just because they want to whine about Brett Favre doesn’t mean they don’t care what happens at city hall or who shot a cop on the west side last night.

And no, your local sports updates don’t count as news. They’re scores. News is news and there’s somewhere to insert it, even if only in one-minute blurbs.

Also somewhere in your jolly band of jocks is a DJ who loves sports, is incredibly knowledgeable about local sports issues and would be a great addition to your lineup, even in short segments. If you’re really lucky, that person might even be one of your female personalities.

Don’t Walk Away From Your Sports Station – Jump In!

When you add local elements such as real news and participation by personalities from your other stations, you vastly increase not only the value of your all-sports station to listeners but to advertisers. That’s because your salespeople now have something to sell that’s local and involved. Which is far more attractive to advertisers’ messages than national sports blab with a few local score and story updates.

Wouldn’t it be cool if, in 2011, your sales force could get away from calling only on sports bars and car dealers and be able to walk into almost any client or prospect with compelling reasons to buy your plucky little all-sports AM?

Why yes. I believe it would.

FRIDAY: A New Year’s Eve when a radio account executive and his client made a big difference to a lonely late-night DJ.

MONDAY SALES BLAST: WHEN CLIENTS WANT TO CUT BACK

HERE’S WHAT YOUR SALESPEOPLE CAN SAY TO SKITTISH RETAILERS

With the economy still in a shambles, even stalwart retailers who kept advertising when others cut back or gave up entirely are fidgeting. Maybe with holiday advertising dealt with, they think, the first quarter might be a good time to rein in the old ad budget and hunker down until things get better. What can your salespeople say to counter this pervasive thinking? It’s all about expenses versus investments.

 I’ll give you my take in a moment; first, here’s what one of America’s great ad men has to say:

            "All great enterprises move forward in a recession

             and the weaklings move backward.

            The dumbbells cut back on advertising.

            The smart people don't."

                      -- Ed McCabe, Advertising Agency Founder

That’s one way of putting it, although I’ve never found that calling my clients dumbbells was particularly profitable. What your salespeople can say to customers and prospects who are wavering about spending money on radio advertising in the new year is this:

“There’s good news: you can entice customers to come to you and take action right now.”

“You can tell them what you want them to do and why what you have to offer is  better than that stuff your competitors try to palm off.”

“You can trumpet the many ways your customers and prospects can benefit by doing business with you – price, quality, customer service, convenience, the skill and caring you and your employees bring to work every day, your unbeatable experience and reputation.”

“No matter what economic conditions apply, you can do every one of those things every single day. You can not only survive but thrive. You can, as the song says, live, love, laugh and be happy.”

Unless you cut your advertising budget.

That’s the key: eliminate expenses. Don’t eliminate investments.

EXPENSES vs. INVESTMENTS

Investments can be defined as “money that is invested with the expectation of a profit”. Based on that sound logic, it’s easy for your customers to determine the checks they write that will never, except in the loosest definition, bring any financial return.

When the economy belches, however, they may have to lay off unproductive or excess personnel, close branch locations or tighten inventory.

All of those items are expenses.

Make sure your salespeople engage their customers about the items in their accounts payable lists that count as investments, items that are absolutely necessary for their businesses to survive and thrive. These include:

·        their primary business location

·        inventory  that is attractive and will definitely sell

·        furnishings that make the business function

·        valuable, productive employees – and

·        ADVERTISING

None of the other four ingredients works if no one knows who your clients

are, where to find them, what they provide better than anyone else or what’s compelling and newsworthy about their businesses.

That’s what advertising is for.

There has never been a more compelling moment for radio salespeople to reinforce the idea that advertising is an important business investment. As you send your warriors out during this busy pre-Christmas week, make sure they’re focused on first and second quarter business but also on keeping your customers zeroed in on advertising as an investment.

TUESDAY:  Continuing this vital end-of-year topic, I’ll reveal Five Compelling Reasons Why Your Retail Customers Should Keep Advertising.

EARLY CHRISTMAS FROM ARBITRON: RADIO AUDIENCE IS UP

MORE DIVERSITY, AFFLUENCE, EDUCATION – AND TEENS!

The Greek Chorus of naysayers that has been intoning the erosion of radio will get a collective muzzling next week from Arbitron. Its soon-to-be-released RADAR 107 National Radio Listening Report not only shows that radio listening is actually up – 3,300,000 more overall weekly listeners 12+ than last year – but that, far from deserting radio, younger listeners are turning to it in large numbers.

And for those who sell radio advertising, there’s money all the way through the new nationwide listening survey.

RADAR 107, a year-long measuring stick of network radio listening, covers 54 individual radio networks and calls itself “the standard currency for national network radio ratings”. Since so many stations now rely on networks like Westwood One, Dial Global, American Urban Radio, Premiere and the rest for all or part of their daily programming, this is an important – and uplifting – study.

Let’s jump into the advance numbers. Don’t worry, the water’s fine. Really fine.

The Kids Are More Than Alright

Particularly gratifying to those of us who never bought the argument that radio has become too un-hip for younger listeners in the iPod Era is this little gem from the Report:

            Teens aged 12 to 17 continue to embrace radio broadcasts with

            an average weekly increase of 365,000 versus last year’s report.

There’s also great news for stations that want to embrace young Hispanics:

            More Hispanic Teens aged 12 to 17 are tuning in to radio versus

            the same period a year ago. This demographic group increased

            (by) 177,000 average...listeners a week, year over year.

The growing number of Hispanic Teens in the radio universe can only be a strong signal that radio continues to offer something for everyone.

Strength in the 12-17 demo is far more important than it used to be. Where even an enormous teen audience was once thought fit only to be sold acne medication and Coca-Cola, that bunch is now far more affluent. And, of course, the habit of regularly listening to radio continues after the teen years.

Diversity Continues Strong

I’ve seen the advance numbers and they’re impressive. RADAR 107, which will be released December 13^th, shows radio’s array of formats appeals to a strongly diverse spectrum of Black and Hispanic listeners.

The categories of Black and Hispanic Adults 18-49 produced the most impressive gains against last year’s numbers, up 165,000 Black listeners and a whopping 834,000 Hispanic listeners.

Overall, the RADAR Report says that radio reaches 93 percent of Black and 95% of Hispanic listeners 12+ on a weekly basis.

Radio Reaches Educated, Upscale Adults

Radio’s favorite “money demographics” are healthy, too. Consider what the new Arbitron report says about these advertiser must-haves:

• College grads 18-49:  radio delivers 96 percent

• Adults 18+ with household incomes of $75,000 per year or better: radio reaches 95 percent

• And radio reaches, on an average week, a supremely bankable 96 percent of 25-54 adults who are college graduates and have household incomes of at least $50,000

RADAR (Radio’s All Dimension Audience Research) 107 includes data from 40 Arbitron PPM markets on a September-to-September year.

Here’s the bottom line we should all take from numbers like these:

Radio’s audience is not only growing – it’s doing so hand-in-hand with new technology.

Stop worrying. Go sell something!

MONDAY SALES BLAST: REAL-WORLD SALES GOALS

UNREALISTIC SALES GOALS LEAD TO SALES FORCE TURNOVER

We’re at that time when sales projections are being put together for the next month, quarter and calendar year. These numbers can cause all kinds of problems and misunderstandings between station ownership, management and the sales force so I’d like to share some information from my new book, The Zero Turnover Sales Force: How To Increase Revenue By Keeping Your Sales Force Intact. (Available at your local Barnes & Noble and Borders or, if they’re sold out, from Amazon in hard cover or Kindle versions.)

(End of cheap plug. I thank you.)

Sales budget numbers come from somewhere but sales people are often mystified as to where this might be. The source doesn’t always seem to reside within our solar system. So much frustration and unhappiness are created by wildly unrealistic monthly and quarterly sales budgets that some sales executives say it’s a significant cause of turnover.

Here’s the truth about unrealistic sales goals: they’re not goals, they’re wishes.

They’re the numbers that corporate wishes would come flying onto its books. They’re the numbers that their lenders and stockholders and partners wish would happen. If you look up synonyms for wish you’ll find entries such as dream, desire, crave and pine for.

Nowhere will you find doable.

           

You have to stand your ground on sales goals. It’s unfair of the higher-ups to foist unrealistic numbers on you and it’s wrong for you to hammer your sales people to attain them. That will only lead to complaining, frustration – and resignations.

Or to the ultimate indignity: being fired for not hitting numbers that are completely unrealistic in the first place.

Sure, be aggressive with your projections when it makes sense. But tell your bosses in no uncertain terms that you and your sales force know the market, you know what you’re doing and what you’re capable of. One job of a radio station manager in a corporate environment is to be a bulwark between the insatiable appetites of directors, shareholders and financial partners and your revenue producers.

To build a Zero Turnover Sales Force, the numbers have to come from this planet.

When you talk numbers with your sales people, be explicit about what you expect. Some sales executives like to use percentages and ratios to create sales goals. This often leads to misunderstandings. For instance, you might want a new sales person to write fifteen percent more new business each of the next three months. Fifteen percent of what? The current billing on that account? The budget for that sales person? The total number of accounts? The amount of new business contacts? The fillings in your teeth – what?

Better to specify a monetary figure. Translate that fifteen percent into a figure, write it down and have your sales person sign off on it. Now there’s no question about whether that goal gets hit: the numbers will be there or they won’t.

Every business needs sales goals. But make sure they’re attainable, mutually understood, real-world goals and not just another wish on Santa’s list.

MONDAY SALES BLAST: EFFECTIVE RIDE-ALONGS

TURNING A MORNING WITH A SALESPERSON INTO A

MUTUALLY PROFITABLE EVENT

You do go out on calls with your salespeople from time to time—don’t you? I ask because in a time of dwindling staffs and overworked managers, time to accompany salespeople one-on-one seems to be a fading commodity. Whether you have a sales staff of twenty or two you’ll never get a true feel for how your station is being represented unless you hit the streets with individual salespeople. That’s the first trick to ride-alongs: simply doing them. The second is to make them worthwhile, which is where many managers miss some golden opportunities.

Contrary to widely-held belief, the purpose of a radio station manager's ride-along is not to check up on the salesperson. The numbers will tell you whether a person is really making the calls he claims to be making or seeing the decision-makers she should be seeing.

The real value lies in educating the manager about every client who's on the station.

It’s important not to make that ride-along call too early in the sales relationship, too. Certainly not on the first Client Needs Analysis visit. Probably not on the follow-up call when a proposal is first presented. Somewhere in the vicinity of call number three or four, when the relationship is maturing but still fresh enough to identify opportunities or issues, is perfect.

In this Monday Sales Blast, I’ll reveal three reasons why you should block out a few hours every few months to make calls with each person on your sales staff—and one temptation to avoid at all costs.

1.  Meet new customers/put a face to a name

You score major points with new clients when you accompany your salesperson on an early visit. Bringing “the boss” along just to say hello and show an interest in the business says two critical things to a new customer”:

• Your business is important enough to the station that the manager is taking the time to meet you in person
• Here’s the person who runs the station—you can take any problems straight to the top if you have to

There’s plenty of value to you as the radio station manager in getting to know your customers personally. When account lists are reduced to printouts of who-spent-what and how long it took them to pay, you take yourself out of the sales loop in a meaningful way. Look at your lists: Would you know some of these people if you ran into (or over) them today? Would you know any of them? What their place of business looks like?  What vehicle they drive?

If not, you need to get out of the station.

2.  Catch things your salesperson might not notice

You probably have been in the business a lot longer than most of your salespeople. Which means that your eye may observe opportunities or potential issues that your salesperson will miss. Things on the upside such as expansion of the customer’s physical plant or display space, which signals new products and more need to advertise.

Potential issues you might uncover include age and condition of inventory and fixtures that may speak to cash flow problems. And what about the training and attitudes of the customer’s employees: could they create customer service issues that even the best advertising campaigns can’t resolve?

3.  Provide an extra push in closing a sale—when appropriate

If your salesperson is having a problem getting a new client to “yes” or is unsure about how to handle a problem, your presence can make all the difference. Simply by showing up, you add an air of authority to the proceedings: you‘re the boss, you know the most and you can solve issues, perhaps even on the spot.

You also cared enough to make the effort. How many other stations can say that?

One thing you should NEVER do on a ride-along

Another way you can pitch in is to present a specific part of an advertising idea or proposal.

Warning, however: You are NOT there to take over the sales call!

If you’re going to be part of a presentation, you and your salesperson should work out in advance exactly when you’ll enter the discussion, what you’ll contribute—make it brief yet significant—and when you’ll step aside.

The salesperson needs to handle the presentation, not be stepped all over by you. You’re extra ammunition. Aim, fire, then step back.

A valuable manager ride-along boils down to three things:

1. Taking the time and making a number of calls
2. Orchestrating the involvement you’ll have in each call
3. Doing your part—then stepping back and listening

Lift your eyes from those sales call sheets and account aging lists and go out with your salespeople.

Oh, and if you carry a list yourself and think you’re so damn good—have them ride along with you sometimes, too!

MONDAY SALES BLAST: THE ONLY WAY TO FIRST-CALL CLOSE

A CLIENT NEEDS ANALYSIS CAN ALSO RESULT IN AN IMMEDIATE SALE—IF IT’S DONE RIGHT

What’s the first thing we always tell rookie salespeople when they’ve dug up a brand new client? Don’t try to sell anything on the first call! Do a Client Needs Analysis (CNA). Then return for a second call at which you’ll present a thoughtful, well-prepared and attractive advertising proposal. And that’s exactly what they should be doing. But what if—in the course of that CNA—your salesperson could actually set up a close for that very call? There’s one way to do it

Remembering A Cardinal Rule of Interviewing

Before I reveal how to bring home business after only one sales call, let me first establish an important ground rule: Your salespeople must never create a situation in which the client can say “no”.

I can’t think of anything less productive than going through the trouble of finding, approaching, meeting and conducting a CNA with a new client—then hearing “no” before that first face-to-face encounter is over. At all times, your sales team should keep in mind something that radio interviewers have known for decades: Never ask a question that can be answered YES or NO.

How do we avoid this unpleasant response? We construct a simple yet effective fill-in-the-blanks question instead.

The One Question That Can Produce A Sale The First Time Out

The first-call trial close I suggest belongs only one place: at the very end of the CNA. Ask every other question, clarify every fact, first. Then, as the last thing in the face-to-face fact-finding, ask The Question. Nowhere else!

Here’s The Question:

“If you were to go on the radio right now—today—what would you want to say?”

Throw it out there and shut up. There’s no way to answer “no” to The Question. So just sit there attentively and make the client answer.

If what comes back is “I don’t know”, your salesperson should run back through some of the key information gleaned in the just-completed CNA. This clarification can prove invaluable for the next call.

ON THE OTHER HAND: If the client responds with something specific like, “Our service department is the biggest in the area and they’re all factory-certified” – Bingo! Your salesperson just set up the client to set up his own sale.

Respond by repeating and emphasizing the words the client just spoke:

• So they’re all factory-certified?

• And nobody has the size service department that you do.

• That’s pretty important, isn’t it?

• You know, I was going to get back to you in a few days with some ideas but what you’ve just told me—why don’t I get something written and email it to you this afternoon? On the air tomorrow.

The client’s next response will probably be “How much?”. To keep the momentum rolling, your salesperson can respond with: “I’ll write up two or three different plans and we can talk about them. Right now, let’s just get going on the message you want people to hear.”

At the very least, your salesperson has a motivated client and a quick turnaround.

And if the client is so excited that he wants to do a deal right then, whip out the appropriate form and sign him up! But don’t just take the order and run. That’s the kiss of death and the cause of an enormous amount of client and salesperson turnover. Make it clear that this order will just get him started with a well-planned schedule of radio advertising.

Even though that new client gets on the air right away your salesperson should augment that first-call close with the same well-crafted, CNA-based follow-up that would have happened even if he or she hadn’t been so clever on day one.

TUESDAY: DON'T BE SHY ABOUT ASKING FOR CREDIT APPS OR PAYMENT IN ADVANCE.

MONDAY SALES BLAST: WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR SALES MEETING?

This week's Monday Sales Blast is all about that good old standard,
the Monday morning sales meeting. How relevant are those meetings,
anyway? And what do your salespeople really think of them?

For some stations, a regular sales meeting is a valuable event that
leaves everyone rarin' to hit the streets. At many others, however, the
weekly sales meeting is a mind-numbing waste of time.

In this Sales Blast. I'd like to take the liberty of quoting from...myself.
The following is an excerpt from my new book, The Zero Turnover Sales
Force: How To Maximize Revenue By Keeping Your Sales Team Intact
(details follow this article).

And I quote...

WHY SALES PEOPLE REALLY HATE SALES MEETINGSNothing was ever sold at a sales meeting. Why then do so many of them blotch the agendas of the people who should be the most productive in the organization? And why do sales people hate them with such virulence?

When I talk to sales people (as opposed to sales managers) about sales meetings, here’s the opinion I almost universally receive: they’re a waste of time. Why? The reasons are many and varied. Take a look at this list of common gripes about sales meetings. Have you been part of a meeting any time recently where none of these occurred? If so, you are lucky, indeed:

Schedule hassles – “The meetings always seem to happen just when a hot prospect wants to see me”

Disorganization – “Why does it take an hour to cover something that’s worth maybe ten minutes?”

Irrelevance – “This has nothing to do with the reality of what I’m doing.”

Rambling – “The boss goes off on every tangent imaginable or gets into involved discussions with one or two people that have no bearing on the rest of us, who just sit there.”

The last three of which combine to form:

Preparation – “Did he know he was running a meeting this morning? If he has to shuffle through his papers or ask someone to go to his office to find something he forgot one more time, I’m outta here.”

And…

Importance – “If these meetings are so !@#$%^& important, why doesn’t she seem to have the time to put them together right?”

Interruptions – “Cell phones, texting, people interrupting other people and trying to dominate the meeting.”

Rah-rah sales meetings – “Don’t try to motivate me, help me sell more. I was motivated when I came here. Now, I’m just tired.”

And its companion…

Phony baloney fun and games – “Really, do grownups need to play these little ‘fun’ games to get motivated? The boss seems to think we do. Wrong.”

The Humor Factor 1 – “The sales manager thinks she’s funny. She isn’t. Boring.”

The Humor Factor 2 – “The sales manager is a too-serious, self-important dweeb. Lighten up!”

Why not just tape a target on my butt? – “They make everyone talk about their individual sales totals, which inevitably puts the spotlight on those who are struggling or
just going through a soft spell. Humiliation in front of my peers isn’t much of an incentive.”

Thank you, Mr./Ms Negative – “All we hear are complaints. You’d think the whole sales staff was a bunch of slackers. What a great way to start the week!”

And one of the most inexcusable management failures:

Time limit? Oh, THAT – “Bad enough that we have to carve out an hour every week for this drivel, now we’re way past that. I have calls to make and people to see!”

Unquote.

Think hard about your weekly sales meetings and how they're run. And if you come from sales, remember what you thought of sales meetings when you were working the streets.

My book, The Zero Turnover Sales Force: How To Maximize Revenue By Keeping Your Sales Team Intact is available in hard cover from AMACOM, the publishing wing of The American Management Association. It's at most Barnes & Noble and Borders locations. If they're sold out, you can find a copy (including for Kindle) at www.amazon.com.

A VISIT TO A TOP TELEMARKETER: WHAT RADIO CAN LEARN ABOUT PHONE SALES

WHAT RADIO MANAGERS CAN LEARN FROM A GOOD TELEMARKETER

I spent part of the day recently in the sales office of a local telemarketer. The object was to see what a successful group of telephone sales professionals could teach radio station managers about making money on the phone. You probably have a stereotyped view of these operations and, for the most part, your conception would be accurate. Not in this case, though.

The reasons why give us valuable insight (and reinforcement) into how radio can be sold by phone.

This wasn’t the kind of boiler room operation where a hundred headset-wearing automatons pound the phones relentlessly cold-calling strangers who don’t want to talk to them. Those companies are a dime a dozen and virtually invented sales force turnover simply by their business models. Burnout comes fast and furious along with the caffeine drinks and blasting rock music.

This operation began with a basic way to avoid cold-calling that I’ve championed for years: create circumstances that compel customers to call you, rather than the other way around. I won’t go into exact details about this company but suffice to say they sell a reputable e-commerce service that attracts customers from English-speaking countries around the globe.

The way they attract those customers is through Facebook and Google ads. In the case of local radio, the same thing could be done with flyers, one-sheets, postcards, ads on local websites and, of course, on our own air.

The point is: in not one case did a telemarketer call a customer cold. In every case, the call went out in response to an individual who had first seen the ad, then clicked on the company’s website—and from there had purchased a very inexpensive (as little as $5.00) web template with a credit card. That prospect then immediately became a customer. And that customer agreed to take a call from the company to get set up to use that little website template.

That’s it.

Their customer will now speak with two people.

The “Pre-Qual” or Pre-Qualifier

This individual, in a very friendly and conversational way (even though the conversation is entirely scripted) asks for personal financial information: what credit cards the customer uses, what their credit limits are, what balances they’re carrying, whether they own a home or rent, any outstanding auto or student loans and so on.

Prospects willingly provide all that information, too.

Why? Because they really want the service. And remember, they’re already customers, even at the five dollar level.

If the customer has too much outstanding debt or little room on credit cards, he or she is told that perhaps when they’re in better financial shape they might like to subscribe to the packages of services being offered. Then the call is politely ended whenever that can be comfortably done.

In most cases, sufficient funds are available to make a business pitch worthwhile.

That’s where the second person comes into the conversation:

The “Closer”

For this company, three packages of services are pitched:       

• $6,000
• $4,000 and
• $2,000

In other words, about the size of modest-to-good radio advertising packages.

Before price is ever mentioned, however, the closer asks numerous questions about the customer’s dreams for that website, what they would like to sell, what their likes and dislikes are, perhaps something about their family if that seems appropriate.

Every answer gives the closer an opportunity to point out how his service uniquely and excitingly (without those hard-sell words) fulfills those needs and desires.

It’s only after many minutes of this (the pitch can take an hour at times, depending on how chatty the customer is—no one is ever hurried along) that the packages are offered, large to small. From there it’s a matter of dealing with price objections and questions, as with any sales proposal.

Rising Above the Pitch-Close Cycle

Radio salespeople are too often trapped in the pitch-close-pitch-close cycle, often preceded by endless days of cold-calling. My hours with these telemarketers convinced me of the wisdom of farming for customers rather than beating them over the head with cold calls.

And of being patient, establishing relationships and then making the money pitch. Top salespeople and managers already know this, of course.

Should your station make a serious stab at telemarketing? Depends on your market area. If you have a large, spread-out business community and a small sales staff, a well-thought-out and managed telephone sales effort could pay big dividends.

And no, this does NOT include phone blitzes with classics like “Back To School Safety Reminders”. Come on. Let’s sell meaningful dollars to clients who would like to speak with us again and again. That’s relationship selling. And we’ve now witnessed how it can be done with the right approach to selling by phone.

SALUTE A VET TODAY. IT’S VETERANS DAY IN THE U.S. AND REMEMBRANCE DAY IN CANADA AND GREAT BRITAIN. WE’RE  FREE BECAUSE THEY PUT IT ALL ON THE LINE FOR US.

IGNITING LOCAL HOLIDAY RETAIL ADVERTISING

CREATE AD-HOC MARKETING GROUPS OF LOCAL RETAILERS

FOR HOLIDAY SALES SUCCESS

The fourth quarter is well along and, in many markets, the traditional big bump in holiday sales is looking more like an ant hill. Fortunately, heavy campaign spending—almost all cash in advance—is helping Q4 look better than last year. But what can you do when local retail advertising lags and the holidays draw near? Create your own local groups of advertisers, that’s what. This gives more businesses the opportunity to reach holiday customers and drives up spending by retailers who might otherwise skip (again) holiday radio advertising.

Here’ how to create your own groups of retail advertisers right now:

1.  Pick a geographical area or trade group

The easiest groups to organize in a hurry are located in the same area. They could be located along a particular street, within a specific neighborhood or area of town, or in a known, easily-identifiable area.

Alternatively, you could organize all the hair stylists you can grab into a holiday retail marketing group. It could be gas stations, muffler shops, women’s clothing stores,  a diverse group of family restaurants, whatever. They become a group because they have a type of business in common.

2.  Give your marketing group a unique name

It could be creative or corny. Anything from “West Side of the Square Radio Marketers” to “Home Cooking For the Holidays Restaurant Group”. It doesn’t

matter what you call it as long as the name says something about what or where the group is located and is not used by any other entity in town.

3.  Create 3 Competitive Advertising Packages

I normally don’t like packages. The consultative sell with spot schedules geared to specific customer needs is almost always preferable. BUT: we’re on short notice here and time won’t permit us to do specific needs analyses for every business in each of our new holiday retail marketing groups. SO...we create three ways for our customers to advertise:

Good, Better and Best.

You can name these packages as creatively as you wish. The tried-and-true Silver/Gold/ Platinum. Or Christmas-oriented monikers such as Santa’s Helpers/Mrs. Claus/Jolly Old Elf. Silly is okay for this one. You can name your packages to conform to your format, too: Blue Christmas/White Christmas/Jingle Bell Rock. Or Christmas classics: Sleighride/I’ll Be Home For Christmas/Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire. You get the idea. Have fun and be creative.

4.  Price aggressively but don’t give anything away

You want to create a one-call close if you can so don’t go in at the top of your rate card. Don’t give away the farm, either. And whatever you do, remember what makes radio advertising work: repetition over a short time span.

No two-spots-a-day-for-a-week plans. No sponsorships. And no individual bonus spots! Make sure everyone is on at least three to five times a day for three weeks. More often if you can. You not only want these packages to work right now but to give you good reasons for going back to those customers for Q1 business.

5.  Create a group benefit

Make your custom-named and special-priced group even more unique by doing things for all its members together.

Examples include:

• Airing as many spots as possible promoting the group. Who they are, where they are, why they’re unique, why customers should come in right now

• Remotes from the group’s geographical area, up to and including the morning show, coffee-with-the-coaches show or other high-visibility programs that really put the spotlight on your special group.,

• Giveaways or contests that only include the retailers in your groups.I don’t normally like “Register Here To Win” promotions, either, but when many retailers in a specific area contribute and participate, it really works. It also makes those who choose not to participate wish they had!

• Help organize a holiday-themed kiddie parade or similar activity for kids that’s just in your group’s geographical area—something that will compel adults to come to the area and shop

6.  Print up a one-sheet and get it out there

Make sure one or more are in every retail establishment in the area for which you

want to create your holiday marketing group. Then hit the phones. As you know,

I’m no fan of Old School cold calling but this is the exception to the rule.

Make your offer irresistible—and start closing.

Organizing ad-hoc retail advertising groups for the holidays shows local businesses that you understand the realities of retail in the current economic climate and that you’re going the extra mile to help them accomplish what radio advertising does best: bring customers through their doors.

This idea is not only great for flagging Q4 sales, it also creates a solid base of happy clients that you can call on again—right away—to pump up Q1!

MONDAY SALES BLAST: IT'S 8:30 AM -- WHERE'S YOUR SALES TEAM?

IN RADIO SELLING, EARLY IS ON-TIME

When does your station open its business office for the day?

For most, it’s at either 8:00 or 8:30 AM, the same time the business world in general unlocks the front door. In most markets, retailers are rolling by 9:00. These are accepted opening hours for businesses that expect customers to come to them. In radio, starting general business activities at 8:00 or 8:30 is fine -- the receptionist, traffic director and bookkeeper.

But not for sales.

Some of the most-productive, cohesive and stable radio sales staffs I've had the pleasure to work with routinely hold their sales meetings at 7:00 AM. Whether it's sales meeting day or not, several of those salespeople routinely meet for breakfast at 6:00 AM, then head into the station. By 7:15 each weekday morning every single salesperson is in the station, including the sales manager.

And by 8:30 AM, those sales offices are empty. Their sales teams are all headed out to make sales calls—or are already there.

There are many benefits when every salesperson hits the job early, even socializes over breakfast before the workday officially begins:

• A strong “community” bond is built among the sales team
• Many opportunities and problems are hashed out and dealt with informally before they even hit the office.
• In radio more than any other industry, early is on time. When copy notes, paperwork, calendar updates and similar activities are taken care of first thing in the morning, the entire rest of the day is available for selling and servicing
• Many businesspeople—especially retailers and professionals such as lawyers, doctors and so on—have full days from the moment their businesses open up in the morning. They appreciate the value of being able to meet to discuss advertising before they are immersed in the day
• By the same token, salespeople can create more selling opportunities when they’re already out of the office and making calls at a time when most of their competitors are just staggering through the front doors of their stations, zigzagging toward the coffee pot.

Seriously, though: can you require salespeople to start their days at 7:00 instead of 8:30?

You sure can. Whether they elect to meet for breakfast beforehand is up to them. If it happens, you’ll know a lot about their esprit de corps.

During the hiring process, I hope you specify that radio sales is not an iron-clad 40-hour week. You expect your salespeople to be present at remotes and other functions, even on weekends.

Making it clear that the selling day starts early is another way to get everyone focused and to maximize every minute of every business day.