In our capitalist world, prices of inventory are simply the result of the mysterious workings of supply and demand. The massive growth of the supply of inventory isn’t within the control of publishers. But they can and should develop a genuine plan to drive up demand for their inventory. How do you drive demand?
You don’t have to be a television company to synchronize a campaign with a TV media-buy. Will your sales team know how to propose how to tie-in ads on the tablet-delivered site tie in with the TV ads on the screen across the room? If not you’ll be missing an opportunity.
If you view advertising sales as a purely transactional business, you won’t be building competitive advantage. When you invest in the three practices above your competitive advantage will build – one customer and one individual relationship at a time. Then, over time, your sales team will notice that they are more likely to get calls and emails returned and you win the close calls on business that might have gone to your competitor. You’ll win more renewal-business, meaning your new business wins can build the business rather than put you on a treadmill of win-lose-win-lose.
When I read the story in the Harvard Business Review about the need to approach selling differently when selling to women, I was very curious. Is this an issue I need to understand better? Do I need to learn about nuances of selling to women versus men to teach advertising sales training at the highest level?
Sales people must seek out the objections, starting with the price objection, to make sure the prospective understands your value proposition. If your customer has a hidden price objection, thinking there are less expensive ways to accomplish what your medium offers, it is often because they don’t properly value the media you are selling. So it is critical that your sales people are trained to probe for objections and to handle objections with all the skill you can help them develop.
Everywhere I turn recently I hear more about the abject story of the serial-harasser and generally thuggish Richie Incognito of the Miami Dolphins. As you most likely have heard he so hassled and threatened his teammate, Jonathan Martin, that Martin left his team and multimillion dollar salary. Apparently Incognitos activity was tolerated and quite possibly encouraged […]
The objective for the 10-minute sales call should be clear; to get the client to agree that there is enough interest to schedule more time. You’ll either get the extra time on the spot or get another meeting scheduled with proper time.
Consider the a famous scene from Jerry Magurie when Renee Zellweger said: “You had me at hello.” Tom Cruise had the opening right when he said “Hello, I’m looking for my wife.”
I can say with confidence that in today’s sales environment, opening your sales conversation with a show of care; preparation and knowledge of the prospects situation is what wins attention. Without attention you can’t close the sale.
RTB will not kill all the advertising sales people, just change their job. The old role of advertising sales people, to provide the price to the buyer, will be ceded to the RTB media exchange. Sales people will, instead deliver value with understanding of the market and how it is changing, and help their clients by showing them how to configure packages of media for the best results much like a former stock broker, now called a financial planner, makes recommendations for investments but no longer sets or communicates the price.
The very best major account advertising sales people know 5 Secrets of selling more; Getting more high level appointments, bringing more ‘value’ to the sales conversation, achieving easy and early agreement to situation and needs before pushing their property, seeking and handling objections and closing on the ‘possible’ not the impossible.
