14. 07. 2012
Salesmanship Begins When the Customer Says No
A few years ago I sent a letter to an Armenian station answering a question and realized that the answer to the question may help everyone. The question was common. After airing ads for one month advertisers are not willing to continue. This is not related to the quality of the ads. But after one month of successful outcomes, the advertisers say they no longer need the ads.
This is a common problem. In Albania it went like this. Star FM gave select businesses free ads. (I never think this is a good idea, but they did.) The ads worked. Star went back to the business owners, who thanked them, and told the salesman that business was so good they no longer needed to advertise on Star FM. In about two months, when business was down again, Star went back. The advertiser admitted business was down. It was down so far that the advertiser couldn’t afford new ads. Star FM had trouble convincing the advertiser that when business was down, they could make it better with ads and when business was up we could use ads to keep it that way.
Sometimes when an advertiser has a successful campaign on your station he feels you’ve done him all the good for him that you can. He believes he no longer needs advertising, so he drops his campaign. This is normal, especially with new advertisers. My best advice is to keep in contact with the advertisers who no longer advertise. In the long run they are your best future prospects. Ask them what about the advertising that they ran worked, what did not, and note that for future proposals. Keep up with their business. Often advertisers who stop advertising will pick up again in 6 months or a year when their business starts to slow down. Sometimes advertising will come and go in rhythm with the client’s business cycle. You need to learn that business cycle. Watch the business and after some time you will be able to pick up a pattern and know when it is best contact the advertiser again. You can set up a schedule for your own sales people and ultimately for the advertiser. At our stations some of our advertisers are with us only a couple of times a year, for instance at times of year when they have too much inventory and need to convert it to cash or before holidays. It is my job to get to know these cycles and know when to make the approach and how I can help them with their problems. By becoming familiar with the clients’ business cycles I can plan a promotion or package to work for the advertiser.
There is one hamburger shop in Anchorage that advertises a couple of times a year. I went there about once a week for some ice cream and to talk with the owner. At one point he noted business was down. We talked about it and I was able to help him with a promotion that could bring people into his shop. The key is to keep contact, keep your eyes and ears open, be concerned about the advertiser, not your station and periodically make an approach.
One way to make that approach is to find some special program or promotion that the advertiser will be interested in. In this case I was able to talk to the hamburger man about sponsoring some fall baseball sports play-offs. I was appealing to both his personal interest in baseball (one of the reason to stop by each week is to learn what he was personally interested in) and to learn the interests of his customers.
Promotions packages and program sponsorships work. Sometimes a business wants to be associated with a program and it becomes part of the company’s identity in the community. We had an attorney who sponsored a program called “Democracy Now!” The program had a small but absolutely loyal listenership. But those are exactly the listeners the attorney wanted to impress so he keept exclusive sponsorship of the program. It is part of his identity in the community. It’s the same with some of our local sports advertisers. They want to be associated with “the team.” The Radio Spitak in Armenia had created that kind of program-sponsor relationship between a war veteran’s tribute program and an advertiser.
One other thing you may want to look at is pricing your ads. You may also want to set up seasonal rates, with higher rates just before holidays and somewhat lower rates to attract advertisers during your slow times. (allowing loyal advertisers to keep the lower rate through holidays.) You don’t want to undermine the ads you currently have by cutting prices to get new ads or to draw back lapsed advertisers.
Finally you should document successes you do have. If an advertiser believes you have been so successful that he no longer needs to advertise, get that success story written down or, better yet, recorded. Get pictures if there is an event, and create a portfolio of case studies that you can use with other potential advertisers and go back to that same advertiser in a few months to remind him how successful you were for him in the past, to remind him what you can do for him. If he sponsored an event with the station take along some pictures and reminisce about the good time everyone had. And don’t forget to tell your advertising success stories on your own air. At our stations we have a few advertisers who are willing to make spots with us telling other potential advertisers about their success. That serves two purposes. It gets the successful advertiser some free airtime and it does more to convince your listeners, who may be potential advertisers, to consider radio advertising.
One important thing to remember is to keep records of each contact with an advertiser or potential advertiser. Keep records of the outcome of campaigns on your station. Records can be your roadmap. Review those records before making a call and think of new approaches based on past history. Look for patterns and exploit them. And remember the slogan on the coffee mug of one of my most successful sales people. “Salesmanship begins when the customer says no.”
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Rich McClear is a broadcaster from Alaska who has worked for almost 20 years helping stations develop in emerging markets. He was Director of the Serbian Media Assistance Program from 2008-2011.