The secret of getting agencies’ permission to call on their clients is to keep the agencies involved all along the way and to go over your proposals with them so they will be assured you are not going to make them look bad.
Numbers and data are a security blanket.
As mentioned previously, agency selling is numbers‐ and‐data‐oriented selling, as opposed to direct selling, which is usually results oriented. Since an agency’s performance is difficult to measure, anything that has a number associated with it is eagerly grasped as a measurement device. In broadcasting and cable, ratings are used as a tool to evaluate an agency’s media‐buying performance. Online, impressions are currently the quantitative criteria, and in print magazines and newspapers, circulation is generally the quantitative criterion.
If a buyer can bring in a campaign on budget for the desired audience or impressions level, the agency and the buyer have a way of quantifying their performance to their clients. The agency and their clients feel secure with the numbers because they are tangible evidence of the fact that the agency performed its service and exercised good buying judgment. Therefore, do not expect agencies and their clients to give up their security blankets. You have to play the game using their rules, and their rules place emphasis on numbers and data, not on results.
Still, if agencies and their clients take refuge in the security of numbers and make their media buys based on ratings, impressions, and circulation, you might well ask how a salesperson makes a difference. It is because numbers are so absolute and finite that salespeople can make a difference. In fact, in a numbers‐oriented selling situation, salespeople are the only difference, because a 10 rating is a 10 rating is a 10 rating and 1,000 impressions are 1,000 impressions are 1,000 impressions. Buyers continually need reassurance that what they are buying will turn out to be what they hoped for. In their hearts, they know that numbers do not walk through doors and buy products, but that people do. Buyers know that ultimately they will be judged by their clients on the overall effectiveness of their advertising campaigns. If buyers buy very efficiently in media that have the wrong demographics or to which no one pays attention, then their campaigns will not be successful. So, agency buyers depend on media salespeople to help them by keeping them thoroughly informed about the various media: demographics, attentiveness and engagement levels, programming and content changes, demographic changes, and anything that will help them evaluate the media better and make better buys. In other words, agencies want excellent, helpful, and responsive service.
Communication skills.
The International Radio and Television Society (IRTS) conducted a survey among important agency media buyers in New York City several years ago. The buyers were asked to name and rank the characteristics they thought were most important for a salesperson to have. The following list resulted from the study:
1 Communication skills – clarity and conciseness, not oral skills or flamboyance, were ranked as most important
2 Empathy – insight and sensitivity
3 Knowledge of product, industry, and market
4 Problem‐solving ability – using imagination in presentations and packaging
5 Respect
6 Service.
7 Personal responsibility for results
8 Not knocking the competition
Summary
Personal selling for a media company is a fascinating and worthy craft that involves dealing with people, who are complex and basically trustworthy. Even though the media are often under attack, selling for a media outlet often gives salespeople access to high‐level executives who appreciate the media’s ability to grab their customers’ attention.
Virtually all media selling involves digital advertising in some manner, and digital advertising is highly complex and requires new approaches for the digital era. The serving‐the‐customer, focus‐on‐customer‐success, and selling‐as‐educating approaches require teaching prospects about your product and the complexities of digital advertising, tailoring your offers to customers’ individual needs, and taking control of the conversation. Exhibit 2.2 summarizes the new assumptions, new approaches, and trends that have been brought on by the Internet, the increase of digital advertising, and the growth of automation and artificial intelligence (AI) that will be covered in more detail in later chapters.
Exhibit 2.2 Assumptions, approaches, and trends
| New assumptions | New approaches | Trends |
| The Internet caused a fragmentation of the media.The Internet increased the opportunity to target customers.Programmatic disintermediated buying and selling.The Internet caused an explosion of complexity in the advertising ecosystem.Internet advertising is under attack. | A teaching, tailoring, and taking‐control approachA serving, partnership approachA selling‐as‐educating approachAlgorithms‐as‐the‐competition approach | The customer burden of solutionsThe rise of the consensus saleIncreased risk aversionGreater demand for customizationAI is changing all steps of selling |
Because media selling today requires focusing on a customer’s success, a salesperson’s number one objective is to get results for customers. Other objectives are to develop new business, to retain and increase current business, and to delight customers. The numberone sales strategy to accomplish these objectives is to create value for your product. Other strategies are to research and develop insights into prospects’ and customers’ problems, challenges, pain points, and competitive positioning. Key tactics are to create a differential competitive advantage, to build relationships, and to solve problems, and functions related to the key tactics are to monitor the marketplace, to recommend tactics, and to cooperate.
Much of the remainder of this book will be spent helping you develop the attitudes, emotional intelligence, skills, knowledge, opportunities, preparation, and persistence necessary to become a salesperson who can help both direct buyers and agency buyers make effective and efficient media investments.
Test Yourself
1 What are the three old and four new assumptions that this book makes about media selling?
2 What are the elements in the AESKOPP approach to selling?
3 What are the four approaches for the digital era?
4 What is the difference between tangible and intangible products?
5 What is the mission of a sales organization?
6 What are the four objectives of a sales organization?
7 What are the five strategies, three key tactics, and three related functions of a media salesperson?
8 What is the difference between missionary and service selling?
9 What are the two types of customers, and what are the differences between them?
10 What are the main differences between what direct clients and agency buyers want?
Project