I have to admit that one of the things I do miss about not working for a radio station is not getting to host sales meetings. Yes, I am sick like that. Many managers hate doing them and most sellers (all sellers?) hate attending them. I like to think mine were better than average as I always tried to keep people engaged and have them leave with at least one thing they could go and sell immediately. However, this Seller to Seller piece is not about your regular weekly sales meeting.
In fact, this meeting could and probably should be hosted by the Market Manager and the head of sales together. This is an all-staff meeting, and if you have not had this meeting with your building, schedule it for as soon as possible, and make the meeting mandatory.
Yes, you need all of programming to attend, and I suggest you tell them it starts 30 minutes earlier than it really does so they are not late. Yep, tell the traffic team to stop yelling at everyone and get to the big conference room. Business office, get in here. Marketing people those prize boxes can get set up later, let’s go. Everyone. Every single person that works for the company locally should be in this meeting.
When I have held this meeting before, I start by saying, “I have big news. Everyone in the room now has a bigger role in the company! Congratulations, you have ALL been added to the sales team, the marketing team and the recruitment team.” I always thought about bringing champagne to the meeting as a way to celebrate everyone’s new position, but never did.
Now, anytime anyone gets more responsibility they are always expecting to get paid more. The good news is, at least if you worked for me, you CAN earn more compensation in your new role. That one always gets folks interested.
You have to stress to your team that success in this business comes from generating revenue. Ratings are great, too, but if you aren’t winning in the sales department, you are out of business and your ratings won’t matter.
Of all the positions at the station, the sellers have by far the most challenging position, and it takes help from everyone in the meeting in order for the sales team to succeed. Every single person in the meeting knows other people. They know people who own businesses and make advertising decisions. They know managers who run businesses and have influence over advertising decisions. And at the very least, they frequent places that could be advertisers.
The station needs more leads and today we are rolling out new ways you can make money by helping us reach more prospective advertisers. Now, some companies may have a problem with this, why I don’t know, but even if it is trade to restaurants or tickets to games, give your staff something for turning in a lead that turns into business. Get the entire team on board with always keeping their eyes and ears open for new business opportunities.
At one of my stops as a Market Manager, I asked the company if I could pay full commission to someone who brought me a lead which led to business. I said I would work with them to close the deal and service the accounts. They obliged and I had an on-air talent become one of my top billers when I totaled up the amount of revenue we brought in from his leads.
If you have the ability to do so, open it up to everyone. If Midge, the lady who sits at the front desk and deals with prize winners, has a lead which can lead to a customer, why not spiff Midge? Whatever you can come up with, find a way to get the people who are working in the building to be prospecting for your sales department. Let them know how important it is to their job.
In the meeting, go through the basics of what the target audience of the station is, who some of the main clients are currently having success and the types of businesses that would make sense to advertise on the station. Explain who normally makes the decisions about advertising so they know who to get contact information for if possible. Arm everyone in the building with just enough information to feel like they could have a conversation about what you offer local businesses.
Make a game out of it, challenge everyone to bring at least one lead to the table, highlight those that have given leads and then find a way to reward them when that deal closes. It is the simplest thing and yet it is one of those things that if you don’t have a meeting to talk about it, hardly anyone will do it as they won’t think it is their job or responsibility to do.
The same thing goes for the marketing of a station. Nothing would bother me more as a manager than to have air talent who wouldn’t help promote station events or other things going on at the station. If they had a good lasagna for dinner, they posted it to Instagram, but they can’t promote the place they work? I used to ask my staff all the time, “If we aren’t going to promote what we are doing, who else is?”
And lastly, recruitment. Especially for the sales team. Most companies have an incentive for employee referrals. Think about what a good salesperson is worth to your bottom line? Would a small incentive to an employee who brought that lead to you be worth it? Of course it would. Make sure your team knows it is everyone’s responsibility to help find more great people to come work in the building.
In addition to getting some new leads, there was also two ulterior motives in having this meeting. One, your sales team doesn’t want anyone else finding any leads, so perhaps they get a little hop in their step knowing you just recruited a ton more people to prospect. Secondly, it allows you to see which employees are willing to step up and perhaps get a little out of their comfort zone, put in a little extra effort for the good of the team.
Media sales and driving revenue is hard. Let everyone in the office know, it is partially their responsibility to make it all a little easier.
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.
