Monthly Archives: December 2011

Alternate Choice Closes

 

Alternate Choice Closes
 
          My wife asked me to pick up some cream at the store the other day. Have you been there lately? There was low-fat cream, table cream, light cream, whipping cream , no-fat cream and a host of other creams from which to choose. By the way, isn’t ‘no-fat cream’ just milk?
          I was confused which one to choose!
          Your clients today are confused by all of the media choices they have; daily deal sites, coupon envelopes, bus backs, radio, TV, social media, email, search engine optimisers, newspapers….you know the list, it goes on and on. There are way too many choices.
          Busy multi-tasking business owners are looking for media consultants like you to help them make their choice easy. But if you play salesperson instead of consultant, you’ll lose them!
          Salespeople don’t care what the advertisers buy, as long as they buy. So they stoop to old ‘alternate choice closes’, giving the prospect a number of solutions to choose from. The alternate choice close simply sends the signal you are there to sell, not to help. You don’t care which choice they buy, you just want them to buy.
          The consultant, on the other hand, transfers confidence to the advertiser by having the conviction to recommend one solid solution based upon their research, knowledge and expertise.
          Often they have alternate solutions as a back-up in the event their proposal is rejected, but they never present a laundry list of solutions in the hope that the client chooses one.
          In a world of too many media choices, advertisers are looking for a trusted advisor to recommend a solution that is specifically designed for their situation, rather than picking a generic solution from a laundry list of choices.
 
Click here if you would like to discover how our SoundADvice radio e-marketing system can help you present more customer-focused solutions. 
 

Really?

Really?

 

            I was approached by a small radio group recently that had concluded “training” would solve their high failure rate of entry level salespeople. As a consultant, training has always been part of my bag of success tricks so I listened.

One of their managers said, “Our turnover rate is killing us. Our new recruits seldom succeed because they aren’t trained properly.”

            “Really?” I asked.

I asked about their hiring process, new recruit remuneration packages and their training, and while I’m pro-training, quickly discovered training wouldn’t be the miracle cure for their problem.

            Basically, their recruiting process consisted of the old mirror test…… they put a mirror under the candidates nose and if it fogged up, they got the job.

            But even worse, was their remuneration package. “We want self-starters,” one manager proclaimed. “We give them a 90 day guarantee and no account list. After that they eat what they kill.” And the management team concluded the reason most didn’t make it past the 90-day mark was because they lacked confidence in themselves or didn’t have the right training.

            My first job was as an apprentice carpenter (don’t ask how I got into ad sales, it’s a long story).  It takes four years and lots of night school to complete a carpenter’s apprenticeship. Having done ad sales and carpentry, I can tell you both take a lot of skill and learning.  What makes anyone think we can be accomplished ad salespeople after 90 days with any amount of training?

            And then we compound the problem by asking new recruits to sell while their knees are knocking because they need the sale to put bread on the table. We’ve all seen these ‘failed’ recruits move on to successful selling careers in other fields. It’s time we gave them a chance in media.

            While training is part of the success equation, pre-qualified recruitment, a realistic investment in start-up salaries, leadership and mentoring also play dominant roles in a ‘rookie’s’ success.

 

 

Grow Your Sales

Grow Your Sales; Fire Your Retail Sales Manager!

     &mmp;nbsp;      In one of our revenue development workshops we begin the conversation by suggesting, “If you want to increase sales, fire your retail sales manager and your entire retail sales force.” It’s a great way to wake up all of the retail salespeople in the room.

            We follow up with, “Then rehire your retail sales manager as a local sales manager and lose the word ’retail’ on your account executives business cards.”

            The reality is that Main Street is shrinking in every market. Markets that had eight or nine retailers selling home electronics a few years ago, for example, now have two or three, and they’re probably big box stores where your ‘retail’ salespeople can’t connect with the decision-maker.

            Look around your market. The growth is not in local retail establishments. The largest and fastest growing sector of your economy is the service sector; services like law firms, plumbers, financial advisors, electricians etc.

            Not only is the number of retail prospects in your market shrinking, more importantly, online shopping, smart phones, a global economy and big box stores, are dramatically squeezing retail profit margins, which in turn, puts the squeeze on ad budgets.

            Why should we be pursuing the service sector?

·        Margins are excellent! Once the dentist’s first few customers have covered their fixed costs (chair, rent, equipment and receptionist) the profit on the additional two patients you attract for them is nearly 100%!  Service sector doesn’t have to buy what they sell. If a retailer sells 200 units his cost is twice as high as selling one hundred units because she has to buy everything she sells.

·        Services Don’t Need Volume  One roofing job for a local roofer can pay for a sizable campaign on your station and a cosmetic surgeon doesn’t need to line patients up around the block to make a huge buck.

·        No Global Competition.  When you have a tooth ache or a leaky faucet, you don’t go online to look for service from Hong Kong or Pakistan. The service must be performed locally and the decision-maker lives in your market.

·        Less Haggling.  Retailers, by definition, buy low and sell high.  Most local professionals or service providers have never seen a radio account executive, and seldom do they know what your competitor’s rates are.  With higher profits per sale, rate is not as important and usually one or two new sales make them happy advertisers.

We don’t have time in your short weekly ENS on Sales to explore all of the reasons the stations we consult are capturing huge increases from service sector clients, but I think you get the point;  your most lucrative growth opportunities in 2012 and beyond, are in the services and professions.  So as you plan for a ‘Happy New Year’, plan to fire your retail people in favor of training a local marketing team.

      One final word:  You can’t sell services or professionals if you are still speaking retail. Lawyers, for example, don’t want and can’t handle ‘traffic’….they want ‘billable hours.’

Click here if you would like to arrange a no-obligation demo of our, Selling the Service Sector, workshops.

 

The 80/20 Rule in 2012

 

The 80/20 Rule in 2012
 
 
          You are about to hear and read a lot of predictions for 2012. Predictions about the future are entertaining, but seldom accurate.
          I recall attending a cable convention in the late 1970s where it was ‘predicted’ that supermarkets would not exist past 1990. The keynote speaker suggested we would be shopping virtually on our TVs as robotic cameras scanned the grocery warehouse aisles and we clicked on desired items for home delivery.
          I once archived a tape of a speech from ‘futurist’ Faith Popcorn (what a great promotional name!) only to check back on it ten years later and discover that less than 5% of her forecasts became reality.
          I’d like to entertain you with my predictions for 2012. No rocket science here, as these wheels are already in motion so my ‘predictions’ are pretty safe;
 
1.) Everything will fragment. And I mean ‘everything’; from media to the number of business competitors in every field; from technologies to audiences; and from political parties to arts and entertainment. The subsequent difference between number one and number two in a cluttered more-competitive world will be insignificant. Having the best salespeople will trump any minor product differences.
2.) Mass audiences will be replaced by smaller tribes or gangs as marketers’ targets. The account executives who learn how to capture the highest per capita results from smaller audiences will be the winners.
3.) Big box stores, online shopping, mobile technology, social media and daily deal sites will put downward pressure on profit margins and subsequently reduce advertising’s share of marketing budgets.
4.) Faced with more choices and tighter budgets, consumers and business decision-makers will resist being ‘sold’ anything. Instead, they will seek tools, resources and salespeople who help them learn to buy more intelligently.
5.) Advertisers will gradually change their accountability frames-of-reference, as campaigns like the Pepsi Refresh social media effort create a lot of online ‘noise’ but fail to increase market share. Measuring hits, page views, likes, responses and click-throughs, will be replaced with targeting profitable sales increases. 
6.) Some discounters will discount themselves into bankruptcy.
7.) The focus on CSR (corporate social responsibility) as a competitive tie-breaker will grow. Successful marketers will pay more than lip service to being socially responsible and will engage in measurably improving the environment, the economies, and the general health and welfare of the communities they serve.
8.) Cherishing values and experiences will become more prominent than cherishing ownership and consumption.
9.) The 80/20 rule will hit all salespeople. Eighty percent of salespeople will see their incomes stagnate or shrink or they will switch careers. All of the growth and lucrative incomes will go to the twenty percent who learn how to strategically target in the new world I’ve predicted.
10.)     Radio and TV will be ‘old news’ and all of the ‘new’ media will continue to take the spot light at advertisers’ trade conferences, in their trade publications and in the business news they hear and read. Decision-makers overwhelmed by ever-increasing choices will favor account executives who can help them sort through the new media/traditional media mix.
11.)    Media sales ‘relationships’ and ‘value added’ won’t win in a highly fragmented, competitive world cluttered with critical and bewildering choices. In 2012 and beyond, selling will be teaching. The wins will go to knowledgeable marketing and communications professionals who understand and can teach advertisers why their particular media deserve a strategic place in advertisers’ 2013 marketing plans. (Yes, I said ‘2013’…the horse is almost out of the barn for 2012.)
12.)    Regardless what happens to the economy, the brightest and hardest- working among us will have our best year ever.
 
Are you committed to being in the top twenty percent to benefit from teaching your clients why your stations are a perfect strategic fit with their plans for 2012 and beyond?
 
Click here to arrange a free online demo of how our SoundADvice and Guided Discovery Selling can help your salespeople master the eight core elements of teaching as selling in 2012.