Today is my youngest daughter’s, as she put it, “Last First-Day of School”. She is a Senior in college and will finish her undergrad in May.
As I have done for nearly 25 years on the first day of school with all three of our kids, I told her to have fun, study hard and learn lots! I then asked her, “What’s the family rule?” and she replied, “Be nice to everyone”. That’s my girl!
After reflecting on this, it reminded me of how we as media reps and managers approach what we do in the world of sales. This isn’t just a good rule of thumb for raising kids, (we’ve been blessed, and it’s worked out very well for our family, as it did for the teams I managed) but it’s also a GREAT practice to follow for sales and management.
If you are in sales, or you are managing people, are you Having Fun, Training Hard, and Learning Lots? And, most importantly, are you Nice to Everyone? It’s a good recipe for success!
P.S. If you would ever like to visit about how we consult and help train sales teams to generate more revenue and become better marketing professionals, click here and we can arrange a time. We guarantee it will be a “Nice” conversation!
What is the best length for ads? The correct answer is… whatever it takes – to make it a GREAT ad! The only wrong answer to this question would have been had you suggested just one of these options.
We need to first understand, believe, and realize that no one listens to your radio station for the ads. It’s our job to get them to listen with creative, compelling, well written, and well produced ads that are strategically on target. The length of the ad has very little to do with how effective it is.
If you are a proponent of 60 second ads, you can probably put up a great debate as to why 60’s are better than 30’s, and vice versa. What I can tell you is that bad 60 second ads are simply a bigger waste of money than bad 30’s.
What about 10’s or 15’s? One of the very best ad campaigns I’ve ever heard is the QUIKRETE campaign titled “Long Story Short”, created by Fitzgerald and Company. They are 10 second ads with a brilliant strategy and were executed perfectly! To hear these ads, click here. They’re great entertainment and can be used as examples when discussing length of ads with clients and in training your team to either ask better questions and/or write better ads. Yes, asking better questions always leads to better ads.
The reason for this article isn’t to debate the best length of ad. The fact remains, regardless of the length, the “better” the ad, the “better” the results. Our point is… what are you doing on a daily or weekly basis to help train your team; sellers, writers and production departments on how to write and produce better ads?
Better ads will lead to better results for your clients, AND, your station will sound better, allowing you to create more revenue with bigger and longer-term contracts.
If you would like to discuss this topic, or if you would like help in training your team on creating and writing better ads, contact us and let’s discuss how doing this can help you generate more revenue. The pay-offs can be huge!
If you’re a regular reader of our ENS on Sales, you know that one of the topics we continually write about is the importance of learning, training, and “GETTING BETTER” every day!
One of the best opportunities to learn and “GET BETTER” each year is only eight weeks away. It’s Radio Show 2018, presented by RAB/NAB. This year’s Radio Show is being held in Orlando, Florida, September 25th-28th. Not only is it a great place to learn, but a great place to mingle with our peers. If you are the outgoing type, I suspect you can learn as much in the hallways as you will in the meeting rooms.
ENS Media is excited to announce that Rick Fink has been extended an invitation to speak at the Sales Consultants Series. This session will be held on Wednesday morning, September 26th at 8:00 a.m. Rick, along with four other trainers and consultants, will offer sales and management tips that you can take back to the office and implement immediately.
We always welcome any opportunity to meet our ENS on Sales readers, so if you are planning on attending Radio Show, let us know!!! We would love to arrange a time to visit and say hello!
Hope to see you in Orlando – and in the meantime – Never STOP Learning!
If you are a sales manager, you probably started in this business as a sales rep, and it was all about the math of selling. The number of cold calls and the number of “packages” you presented became part of your success formula.
Now as a sales manager, with probably very little management training, you’re expected to train the troops. Your idea of “training” might go something like this; “When I was on the street I …”.
Stop it! No one cares how you did it “in the old days”.
You know there have been dramatic changes in the world; changing technologies, changing station ownership, changing economies, changing, changing, changing.
What is it that makes you think the marketing and sales arena is the only thing that hasn’t changed from “When I was on the street”? Let’s look at old world cold calling as an example.
How do you feel when a telemarketer interrupts your dinner to sell you something you haven’t felt a need for? How do you think your prospects feel when your reps embark upon a door to door cold-call campaign to sell them a one-size-fits-all package of the week? Most salespeople don’t like making cold calls, and certainly, most clients view these interruptions to doing business as rude! So why do we do it?
We’ve focused on cold calls because traditionally, that’s the beginning of the sales process. Every step in modern strategic selling has changed today, and sales training has changed as well. Training is no longer a manager’s “show and tell”.
Like with all other aspects of your business, you can either embrace the changing world of sales and sales training or continue doing the same thing over and over. I’m sure you’ve heard what Einstein has called doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result…that was his definition of insanity.
In the new media world, there is a better way of training and selling. It involves creating warm calls rather than cold calls, using technology to build stronger customer relationships, and it’s been proven to grow your long-term revenues.
Business guru Jack Welch says, “There is always a better way. Find it!”
Click here if you would like to discuss implementing our “better way” for 2018 and 2019.
When sales organizations are not achieving their targets, they often point their fingers at individual salespeople. The three most common criticisms these organizations default to are:
1.) Our people don’t prospect enough; not enough cold calls.
2.) They don’t know how to handle objections.
3.) They don’t know how to close.
Of course, they do need to do more prospecting, learn to handle objections and increase the number of “asks” to increase their sales.
The two most common solutions these organizations pursue to achieve these objectives are:
1.) More training for the salespeople
2.) New sales compensation plans
Seldom do these failing organizations take responsibility and take a close look at themselves.
In addition to the two basic solutions prescribed here, the most successful organizations we see, ask themselves these important questions;
1.) What are we doing to warm up those cold calls for our account executives?
2.) What can our organization do to prevent objections rather than asking our salespeople to “handle” them?
3.) What can we do to reduce the need to exert closing pressure and encourage our prospects to enthusiastically buy?
Our SoundADvice radio e-marketing system is helping stations answer all three questions;
1.) SoundADvice creates trust and credibility for account executives with new prospects every week warming up those cold calls.
2.) SoundADvice educates advertisers on how to get a higher return on their advertising investment, minimizing objections.
3.) SoundADvice invites advertisers who are ready to buy, to make an appointment with your account executives FIRST.
Are you ready to take responsibility for your organization’s sales?
Click here to arrange a free online demo to discover what SoundADvice can do for your organization.
