I love technology.
As I write this, I have a baseball game on a television, in a different city, that is being “cast” from my phone, which is getting the broadcast off my satellite dish at home. That blows my mind. And, for the most part, technology has done some great things for us in media sales.
This column, however, isn’t meant to be about technology. It’s really about something that is the exact opposite, which is what I still like to do with good ole’ pen and paper. Sometimes I just like to write out and see a good list on paper. When I have things written down on a piece of paper, that I can feel in my hands, make changes to or cross items off, it helps me dissect things and figure out next steps. I often make this suggestion to reps when they are struggling or in a slump.
I had a situation once with a rep who was very upset during an annual review of her business. She was aware of the dollars that had not returned from the previous year, but in the review, we disagreed greatly on the reasons and why the year, taken as a whole, hadn’t been great.
I realized throughout the conversation that she was using a lot of generalizations such as, “every account went the wrong way for me,” “ratings just killed my agency business,” and “nothing I did seemed to work.” So, I stopped the meeting and asked her to look over her list of billing and clients and write down the problems. I wanted to know which accounts went the wrong way, which agency business walked because of the ratings and what, exactly, she had done that didn’t work.
When she finished, the point I had been trying to make during the initial parts of the conversation, had been made but was now on paper, in black and white. First, we went through each account and eliminated the ones which we had no control over or didn’t really have a lot of impact. Secondly, there were two less agency accounts on the overall list from year to year. Lastly, there wasn’t much of anything in the “nothing I did seemed to work” column, and that was the root of everything.
Only a few really strong ideas were pitched, no noticeable change in prospecting or selling habits, and most of the successes came from growth of current clients (which is fantastic, but can’t be the only source of growth). Having the list in front of us, while discussing, proved to be one of the main factors of this particular seller seeing a little different picture than they had originally perceived.
I’m also a big believer in writing out a list when you’re feeling overwhelmed with too many things to get done. For me, the process of having that list with me wherever I go and being able to cross things off or make changes, by hand, is a big part of keeping me focused on it. I do have the habit of emailing myself lists from time to time, and to be honest, I often find myself never looking at them again because they aren’t right in front of my face.
In the end, whatever works for you to step back and take a good glimpse at the whole picture when things aren’t going your way. Really think about what isn’t going well and what might be a common theme in your answers or pay attention to what might be missing. The goal is to identify the problem so you can come up with the solution, no matter if it came from writing an old fashioned hand note or voice-texting an email.
Dave Greene is the Chief Media Officer for Barrett Media. His background includes over 25 years in media and content creation. A former sports talk host and play-by-play broadcaster, Dave transitioned to station and sales management, co-founded and created a monthly sports publication and led an ownership group as the operating partner. He has managed stations and sales teams for Townsquare Media, Cumulus Media and Audacy. Upon leaving broadcast media he co-founded Podcast Heat, a sports and entertainment podcasting network specializing in pro wrestling nostalgia. To interact, find him on Twitter @mr_podcasting. You can also reach him by email at Dave@BarrettMedia.com.
