Using social media to help build relationships and sales

"Before anything else and above anything else, we are relational creatures." For many years, that was a banner that hung at a church I attended. Today even in this digital era with social media driving many aspects of our lives, that phrase still holds true.

Social media has changed our perception of relationships, but have also underscored the need of all of us to connect with each other. For sales, social media offers a unique opportunity to connect with our customers, and potential customers. It is a tool that most of us are not maximizing the potential on presently.

With a small investment of time, a sales rep can end the era of the cold call. A quick Google search and a trip around LinkedIN, and you can very quickly have a wealth of information about the company and the key people you need to connect with to do business. Researching online helps that offline connection over the phone or in person more likely to pay off, by learning the basics about the organization before picking up the phone and merely asking who is in charge of marketing.

1. Find out general information about the company, including their history.
2. How digitally savvy the business is can be learned based on their digital footprint with a company website, blogs and social media.
3. Learn about their company and the industry trends.
4. The "About Us" or "Contact Us" section, if they have one, may tell you the person you need to reach for your sale. Much better to have a name in mind when you call the company instead of having to asking who the person is blindly.
5. Possibly learn how the company sets up email for its employees through their website. For instance, if they do firstname.lastname@companydomain.com for their email protocol, then you can often times determine the email address of the person you need to reach out.

Connecting with people on social media, especially LinkedIN, is about building a relationship. Amassing a large number of friends online doesn't add to your bottom line as a salesperson. Starting and building that relationship is the reason you connected with someone, especially on LinkedIN. The sales opportunity will come eventually, but it is best to not lead with that.

It's tempting, I know. You have discovered the person that can say yes to your sales pitch and you've successfully connect with them on LinkedIN. The next email or LinkedIN 'inbox' from you is a sales pitch. I've been guilty of this, and perhaps you too. I also receive a lot of these unwelcomed advances on a pretty regular basis in my LinkedIN or Twitter inbox, and all they do is act as a turn off. Sending a message is a good thing, but not a sales pitch.

The initial goal is to build a relationship, add value to the partnership and gain their trust. You do that by engaging with them when they post something on their page. You send them relevant information you found about their industry. And you post information about your industry, showing that you are an expert in your own industry. The goals and tactics of using social media for sales isn't any different than traditional sales. Only the platform for the relationship has changed. 

http://www.petevanbaalen.com/single-post/2016/12/23/Using-social-media-to-help-build-relationships-and-sales

New Nielsen study shows once again that print is not dead; evolving

http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2016/newspapers-deliver-across-the-ages.html?cid=socSprinklr-Nielsen

A lot to digest here but well worth the time, I believe. And something that people associated with the newspaper business, or media buyers who have forgotten newspapers, should pay attention to!

69% of the population in the US read a newspaper in the past 30 days according to a study from Nielsen released last Thursday. That nearly 170 million in the US.
81% of monthly newspaper readers engage with the print product, with 51% reading print exclusively.

Translated -- if you are buying print only you are missing out on a huge segment of readership.

30% of those that read read both print and digital 49% read a newspaper on at least one digital platform

Tis the season for targeted marketing messages using your digital footprint

If you share a computer with someone you're trying to buy a surprise gift for this holiday season, you might want to clear out your browser activity.

The future of advertising is about strategic use of data, and that was on display this morning for me. As I checked up on Facebook, my wife's Christmas present showed up too. You can see below.

No, I didn't get her Tom Selleck, though I don't think she would complain. But rather, that lovely Merrill shoe just below Tom. 

This is a great example of how sophisticated the collection and use of data has become. The shoe purchase was done Sunday night through my wife's Amazon account, using a different computer and different browser.

My digital profile is so well integrated with bits and pieces of data about me that some amazing algorithm at Amazon or Facebook (probably both) can track me across computers and platforms.

This truly is the future for marketing; personalize ad messages that are incredibly targeted to my wants and needs. There will still be a need for mass marketing, though it will also need to adapt and try to show the type of ROI that a marketer such as Amazon can receive through the targeted approach.

And never fear about my wife finding out about the gift. She told me the brand, style and size of the gift to buy for her at Christmas. The only surprise was where I would make the purchase. So the cat is out of the bag---I bought it through Amazon.  

http://www.petevanbaalen.com/single-post/2016/12/15/Tis-the-season-for-targeted-marketing-messages-using-your-digital-footprint

Becoming allergic to mediocrity: Lesson learned from listening to sports radio

"He's allergic to mediocrity." When asked by an ESPN host why Nick Saban is so good at his job as the University of Alabama's football coach, that is what Ryan Clark said.

I often say that what I like most about business is the opportunity to compete. I have always been competitive, and the field of battle is business since my jump shot doesn't jump and my fast ball isn't so fast any longer. 

Nick Saban is not one of my favorites, mainly because he doesn't coach Ohio State, my college football team of choice. But even his rivals have to be impressed with the caliber of teams he fields year in, year out. The conversation this morning was about whether this year's team is the greatest college football team of all time. And they might be.

How they achieve that high level goes back to that initial statement from Clark. Saban does not accept mediocrity. As a leader of a football team, a sales team or a small work unit, we all can relate. Do we accept or work for someone that accepts anything less than the highest level of performance. Today, I strive to become allergic!

ESPN's Mike and Mike are entertaining most every day. But today felt like a pep talk.

http://www.petevanbaalen.com/single-post/2016/12/06/Becoming-allergic-to-mediocrity-Lesson-learned-from-listening-to-sports-radio

Don't plan a sequel for your 2017 marketing plan; innovate!

Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos are all inspiring business leaders. They are icons of the business world that have shaped, reshaped and adapted to the digital era in which we live. And yet it has been a couple of quotes from a different person from a different era that has been on my mind of late.

The life of Walt Disney is a fascinating one, and a story that has been told many times in a wide variety of ways. My first exposure to the passion of Disney might have happened during a radio broadcast of the "Rest Of The Story," a five minute story of intrigue with a twist at the end that was skillfully written and voiced by radio legend Paul Harvey. Tom Hanks portrayed Disney brilliantly in the movie "Saving Mr. Banks" in 2013. More recently, PBS did an in-depth biography of the media giant on their "AmericanExperience" series.

Disney was a smart businessman, who was laser focused on innovation. Though he passed away in 1966, his passion continues on at the company he founded along with his brother Roy. Disney was an innovator in creating customer experiences, and was very quick to put new twists on old ideas. Media companies could learn a lot from just those two Disney concepts.  

Newspapers are slow to change when it comes to special sections and promotions. Disney faced that "we've always done it that way" problem early in his career too. Disney found great success with The Silly Symphony cartoon "Three Little Pigs" and he was being urged to do more of the same. Though not a fan of sequels, he relented and Disney produced two follow up cartoon shorts, neither of which found the commercial success of the original. Disney's original response was, "You cannot top pigs with pigs" which turned out to be right.  

With the end of the year rapidly approaching, many of us have turned their focus to the 2017 calendar. The challenge is to find originality in the sales promotions and special sections that will be a part of the plan for next year. It is easy to run out the same list as last year, and simply change the deadlines and run dates to match the 2017 calendar. But too often, much like the Disney example, the commercial success turns out less than the original.

We face a lot of revenue pressure in the newspaper industry, some of which is beyond our control. But running out stale promotions and special sections and managing the decline is within our control. Simply accepting less each year by doing the same thing over and over is lazy.

Our job as marketing managers is to find new opportunities. Opportunities that make money for our company and for our advertisers. This isn't an easy task to be sure, and not one to be tackled alone. Every sales rep on your staff should be challenged on how they will work differently with accounts to innovate and expand opportunities for success for their accounts and your business.

"We keep moving forward, opening new doors, and doing new things, because we're curious and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths." That is a quote from Disney that I wish was the mantra for the media industry. 

Feed your business mind with knowledge to find business success

This time of the year in most cities and towns is when your local United Way kicks off their campaign to raise money for local charities. The United Way helps support great organizations that do all kinds of wonderful things to make a community all it can be. From helping the local homeless shelter to working with children on a reading program.

I as at a recent United Way kickoff meeting where they were talking about a reading program that they support. The volunteer commented that people are learning to read up until about the third grade. After that point, people read to learn. That statement got me to thinking. 

Too often, once someone gets out of school the reading to learn stops. For the first ten years after I got out of school, I was the same way. I still read, but it was not about building up my knowledge base. That changed when I was selected to be a part of a manager training session and the first thing we had to do before we all got together was read. Tom Peter's Re-imagine! opened up my mind to a new passion of learning and rethinking how to do business.

Since then, I've become a huge fan of Tom Peters. There are several books you can dive into yourself, or perhaps make a part of a group reading assignment for key personnel. If you just need a quick hit of energy during the work day, visit his website http://tompeters.com/. Tom is very open, sharing slides from his presentations along with biting commentary and insight on the world of business and current events.

Archie Griffin was a big name in my childhood. Growing up in a household of Ohio State football fans, Griffin was the icon of icons during the mid 1970's. To this day, Griffin holds the distinction of being the only two time winner of the Heisman Trophy, the highest honor in college football. I recently saw an interview with Archie as he talked about what it meant to win that coveted award as a college junior. Griffin talked about how legendary coach Woody Hayes said that you always had to be improving. In Griffin's case, he became driven to win that second trophy just to stay the same.

At our core, we all want to be better tomorrow than we were today. The difference between those that achieve this and those don't largely falls with their willingness they have to invest time and energy into reading and learning. That is certainly the case in business.

Reading business books isn't for everyone, I understand. While I think everyone can learn a thing or two (or 100) from Jim Collins' Good to Great, maybe it is quick bites of information that works better. That is one of the most wonderful things about the internet.

Leadership and management are entirely different, and both skills need to be sharpened as you grow personally and professionally. Getting quick hits of wisdom from websites like LinkedIN.com will help. Following some of these great business minds would be another opportunity for you to read, learn and grow:

1.       Mark Cuban -- Sure, he can be controversial. But his story is one everyone can learn from, plus he's pretty entertaining if you ask me.

2.       Richard Branson -- Yes,  he is a free spirit but still someone to take very seriously. He started his first business at age 16 and now has over 400 businesses adding to his wealth every day.

3.       Simon Sinek -- While there are tons of great pep talks available online at Ted, Sinek is my favorite. His 15 minute conversation about why people buy what they buy should be mandatory viewing for any sales person.

It doesn't take a lot of time to stay engaged and learning. Those three people I recommended all offer strong commentary via Twitter, which you can roll right into your current social media feeds. This truly is a small investment which can pay off big time on down the road.  

TV's The Profit supports local newspapers as a great source for business information and knowledge

I love reality TV. Since the very first season of Survivor, I've been a huge fan. Watching how the contestants interact and strategize is fun to watch and helpful. You can watch how people react to difficult people and difficult situations, and you can adapt that to your own personal life.

But my favorite reality show is about a different kind of survival. Trying to keep small businesses afloat and in fact prosper is the focus of CNBC's The Profit. Starring Marcus Lemonis, the show is about Lemonis investing in small businesses around the country and helping to guide them into black ink.

The basic belief of Lemonis, who made his biggest mark as the CEO of Camping World, is very simple. Successful businesses focus on their people, the process and their product. Think about it for a moment; that totally makes sense. If you boil things down the basics in your business, any business, it comes down to people, processes and products. I've personally used this approach on many occasions to work on my strategy for business improvement.

I'm such a fan of Lemonis, that I've inquired with him about any books he's written because I want to learn more from him. Turns out, the answer was right under my nose everyday.

In an article on CNBC, Lemonis declared that he didn't read business books. He finds them  to be outdated. But he is a big reader, and uses that gathered intelligence to help him make decisions. But his reference book isn't a book at all. Turns out, Marcus relies on the daily newspaper.

"If you're going to make business decisions and you're going to make them today, you might as well have the most recent information," Lemonis tells CNBC. "Whether that's The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times or your local paper, I think in order to get in touch with real-time information, you've got to study real-time data."

Lemonis learns a lot from the newspaper industry. And I believe the newspaper industry could learn a lot from him too, using his approach to streamline and relaunch the local newspaper.

Major accounts make major mistakes by cutting back or cutting out newspapers from their media buys

If you’ve worked in an advertising department of a newspaper, you’ve either had this phone call or know someone that has. It’s a major account or their agency, and they are calling to discuss their preprint schedule for the coming year. These calls rarely end with a positive outcome.

Major advertisers and their agencies have been on the attack for the better part of the last decade, and the result for newspapers has been bad. Advertisers have dramatically reduced their quantities, frequency and rate.

While the financial impact for the newspaper industry has been well documented, the impact on those advertisers has been largely glossed over and rarely discussed. But not here, and not now.

The comments and the stories are out there, but they don’t gain as much traction as the negative stories. In recent memory, I can think of several major national retailers report that sales lagged at their stores after cutting newspaper insert programs. Those same retailers announce to Wall Street and their stockholders that one of their strategies to improve sales is to increase frequency of inserts in local newspapers.

The latest to make this confession was Stein Mart. Their CEO Dawn Robertson resigned amid less than expected sales results. Stein Mart’s director of investor relations, when asked about what were the missteps made by the company, stated in an article from The Florida Times-Union  “The most impactful was a change in the marketing mix. We shifted spending from newspapers to television, which didn’t have the result we wanted.”

Very bold statement, but that isn’t the first time this has been cited by major accounts in recent memory. Ad Age ran a story in May with similar tones, with major retailer Kohl’s experience some of those same issues.

Facing a nearly 4% decline in same store sales, Kohl’s decided to return to a more aggressive insert program. As many of us know, they cut back that program and their customers responded by not responding! "There are definitely some company-specific issues from a marketing perspective that we're working on rectifying, so we know that affected our first quarter," said Wesley McDonald, chief financial officer.

Long time retailer JC Penney nearly went out of business a few years ago when they ended their newspaper insert program and discounting. Penney’s eliminated newspaper advertising and focused on branding through television and direct mail. The results were horrific! In an Ad Age article after their relaunch of traditional media with about 30 newspaper inserts, they discussed what went wrong. Then CEO Ron Johnson said, "Clearly, our new marketing, our new message is getting through. We have more traffic in our stores. People are buying more, and we're encouraged by that ."

Newspapers should be encouraged by the stories of JC Penney, Kohl’s, Stein Mart and more. A consistent advertising program in newspapers still works, still drives traffic and still provides a good ROI (return on investment) for the advertiser. The beat downs from accounts have made us forget the results provided by our products.

But that next call doesn’t have to leave you on the defensive. Stand firm on the results, and maybe even site the examples discussed here. Stay firm on rate; after all not every paper in the country has the highest rate like they will suggest! And remember the role of newspapers in a media mix.

Using a newspapers as a part of your marketing and media mix triples the effectiveness of the advertising campaign. This is something we’ve all known for years, but have perhaps forgotten after all the negativity we’ve seen regarding our industry. 

Two-step sales process: providing solutions to problems and good feelings

I’ve always believed we tend to over complicate the sales process. To me, it is not a question of a 5, 7 or 10 step sales process. Ultimately, it is a two-step process for me; solutions to problems and good feelings.

We spend a lot time on the first step, and it is no doubt the weightier of the two in the process. But providing good feelings before, during and after the sale deserves its day in the sun too.

Recently, my wife and I went out to dinner at a higher end steakhouse. While we were not celebrating anything specific, it is a place known for people going to celebrate a birthday or anniversary. The food is excellent, so that is a reason I like to go to this restaurant once or twice a year. The other reason is the customer service I’ve received every time I’ve visited.

This visit, I had a chance to watch the restaurant raise their game when it comes to customer service. At nearby tables, I watched the manager greet the guest as they always do. In a few instances, a person from the hostess stand returned a few minutes later and took pictures of the couple. At first, I thought it was the couple’s camera, but later I found out that it was the restaurants. She returned minutes later with a lovely card with a print of the picture taken moments ago, to commemorate the couple’s celebration at the restaurant. No charge, just a way of insuring good feelings with the customer.

It’s the little things that add up. What are you doing to provide those good feelings to your customers? Like the picture at the restaurant, it doesn’t have to be a grand gesture. Often times, the best good feelings we can create are those small things that mean so much to your customer.

Notice a good advertiser’s grandchild featured in the newspaper? Make sure you provide a tearsheet or two for their collection. You see some trash near the entry for your account? Bend over and pick it up and help maintain a proper appearance for your account. You get the point; find a way that can make a difference and you can make a connection with the account. I guarantee one of your competitors is looking for opportunities to do just that too, so don’t let them beat you.

Radio sales reps in my market seem to always have a fist full of tickets to concerts and sporting events. While I might have had a few now and then, I could never compete with the freebies the local radio station had access to. But I could compete, and in fact win when it came to developing a relationship with the customer. Often times that relationship was a direct outcome of providing good feelings.

There was one other thing that always impressed me at that restaurant we visited. Every time we’ve eaten there, we receive a thank you note in the mail. Seriously, a thank you note from our waiter / waitress a few days later. My wife and I have mused about how they possibly got our address. Perhaps through our name on the credit card, probably from the reservations we’ve made. Either way, it is impressive to get that thank you note about a week after our dinner.

I need to practice what I preach, and send more thank you notes. I don’t send enough, and I’m willing to bet you and your sales staff doesn’t either. Handwritten notes are incredibly old fashioned in this era of email and instant communication. All the more reason to do it, if you ask me.

Providing good feelings as a part of the sales process doesn’t have to be flashy. You just have to do it, and that alone helps to set you a part from the crowd in the eyes of your customer. 

Fundamental steps of sales -- is your sales team asking for the sale?

Success on the baseball diamond, especially when it comes to winning the World Series in October, relies heavily on pitchers. Starting pitchers set the tone for the team, and can keep the team in the game even if the rest of the team is struggling.

In my lifetime, the importance of a 'closer' on your pitching staff has gained importance. That strong, usually fast throwing pitcher that comes in at the end and seals the victory for the team is now an essential for any successful team.

For sales teams, the formula isn't that different from a baseball team. We need strong pitchers and powerful closers. The difference is we need each individual to possess the traits of the starting pitcher and the closer.

Too many times, our sales teams are pitching but not closing.  It is a basic fundamental of sales, but all too often overlooked; the close. If your sales rep is not asking for the sale in some way, shape or form then they are nothing more than professional conversationalist and wasting your company's money.

There are tons of websites and books devoted to how to close a sale. I don't presume to add anything new to the conversation that hasn't already been said millions of times. But bringing awareness to the issue needs to happen, and you have an opportunity to take action with your own team.

During a ride-along with a sales rep, one of the questions I will ask once we're back in the car is, "What closing technique did you use on that call?" Getting the rep to think about this specific step in the sales process starts to change their mindset on the process. Too many times, the answer is they don't know or worse, they never tried a closing technique on the sales call.

There are dozens of closing techniques available in the salesperson's bag of tricks. While some companies will teach a strict formula approach for the sales process, I tend to believe that the technique a sales rep using should be based on what they are most comfortable with using. The key is to ask for the sale. Which closing approach you used doesn't necessarily matter to me. In my case, I found myself focusing on five basic closing techniques that worked best for me.

Direct Close - Maybe the simplest technique to use, where you directly ask for the sale. The key in using this one is to be relatively sure the customer is ready to buy, as a direct approach can be perceived as a negative if the customer isn't ready to commit.

Indirect Close - Asking a question of your customer isn't as intrusive as a direct close, and many sales reps like to use this as a closing technique. "How does this proposal sound to you?" If they respond positively, you start working on ad copy. If they respond negatively, you start working on overcoming objections. Either way, you know clearly what the next step is in the process.

Assumptive Close - Assume the customer has agreed, and start to wrap up the process by saying "Just sign this agreement and I'll get this program started." Like the indirect close, you will know the next steps clearly after this step.

Alternative Close - I really like to offer a contained choice to an advertiser as a close. After presenting and laying out the options for the campaign, ask "Would you like option A or option B?" You're giving the customer a choice and thus giving them a sense of control in the process when in fact you've forced them to make a decision or offer objections.

Fear of Loss Close - This is a good option for a sponsorship, premium opportunity or anything that is in limited supply.  By telling the customer that if this is something that they are interested in, they need to decide now because others are out selling this exact package, including potentially to their competition. This is direct pressure on the customer, playing on their fear of losing out and is quite effective.

The key to closing the sale is to ask for it. Too many opportunities are lost by simply not asking for a decision. If the answer is yes, we celebrate. If the answer is no, it just shows there is still work to be done and as a sales person you start finding out and overcoming the objectives.

Newspaper accused of discriminating against Christians is a distortion of the truth

I hate when people only refer to the media as "the liberal media." Over the years, like my entire adult life, I've worked in media and run several media outlets. My political party of choice was never a part of the decision to put my in charge. Which is good, since I don't claim either political party. For the record, I tend to be on the conservative side, which makes for the label of "liberal media" seem so odd to me.

But I do agree that many people in media have a liberal slant in their views. The same could be said for cooks, construction workers, accountants and bartenders. Though I think by and large, there are more liberals in media than a typical industry.

And some of those liberals can distort the truth. And some of those conservatives can distort the truth too. Such is the case with a Fox News opinion piece posted yesterday about the newspaper in Knoxville, Tennessee.

The headline for the column definitely caught my attention, as headlines are supposed to do:  "Newspaper rejects ad over the word "Christian". The Knoxville News Sentinel, owned by Gannett rejected a classified ad that read:  "Store closing sale - Cedar Springs Christian Store - Clinton Highway location - All merchandise, fixtures, slat walls must go. Sale through August 13," and then it included their phone number.

Anyone that has worked with front end systems with classified advertising will tell you that certain words will get flagged by the system to avoid discrimination. Running an ad for a 'Christian person to work in my business' is an illegal ad, and the newspaper tries to avoid those types of ads for obvious reasons.

The fine people of Knoxville and Fox News don't seem to be buying the system failure. I can assure all of you and all of my fellow Christian friends, this is not discrimination. This is a newspaper trying to protect itself from running discriminating ads and law suits. Nothing more and nothing less.

There was a failure by the classified department to not check all ads that get flagged in their system. That was a human error, probably by some working class person with no political agenda. Just someone trying to make a living and earn some commission. No word on whether they lost their job or not, but I certainly hope not.

Newspaper advertising triples the effectiveness of a marketing campaign

I've ranted for a little while about the need for positive information in the hands of people, especially sales reps within the newspaper industry. A link to a UK story hit my in-box last night, and it holds some of the most positive research for the newspaper industry I've heard in some time.

The study shows that newspaper advertising triples the impact of a marketing campaign.The overall report can be found at http://www.thedrum.com/news/2016/07/13/study-reveals-advertising-newspapers-triples-ad-campaign-effectiveness.

The research also focuses on specific sectors of business, and concluded that newspapers as a part of campaigns for banks and finance increased by 5.7 times, travel by 3 times, retail increased by 2.8 times and my favorite, automotive up 1.7 times That is a great stat to quote next week when you visit the local car dealer who bought 100's of spots on broadcast TV this weekend! Newspapers will help that campaign!

Selling a bigger and better audience still differentiates newspaper versus radio, TV and cable

I've had a subscription to Netflix for a couple years now. This monthly service has been used primarily by my wife and son, but even I've become a binge watcher this summer. The TV show Lost has been off the air since 2010, but it has been must see TV in my home this summer.

Binge watching, according to a quick internet search, is when you watch two or three episodes of a TV show in one sitting. To watch Lost as it first appeared on the ABC Network would have been a weekly investment of 60 minutes. With the magic of Netflix, I can do two full episodes in less than 90 minutes. Ahh, the magic of no commercial interruptions.

Commercial interruptions are a reality of TV, cable and radio outlets. Just the very name of it shows that the community perceives advertising as a nuisance -- interruptions. No one likes being interrupted. I've become a fan of watching TV on Netflix due to that lack of interruption.

Yet newspapers advertising by contrast, is welcome and in many respects demanded by our readers. Advertising content in newspapers are welcomed, encouraged and in fact demanded by readership. Need proof of this?  Talk to the circulation department about calls they receive because of missing inserts from the local grocery store. People can get passionate about the need for advertising in their newspaper.

Newspaper readers actively use the advertising content. According to the Newspaper Association of America's recent survey, 57% of people used advertising in newspapers to plan shopping or make a purchase decision in the past seven days. People buy newspapers for lots of reasons, including the advertising within it. That is why so many newspapers publish on page one of their weekend edition the value of the coupons available from the inserts.

Those commercial interruptions continue to take money from advertisers. People buy radio, TV or cable for a number of reasons. Ego is a big reason, as I believe many of those advertisers love seeing their face on TV or voice on the radio. Relationships are another reason, as those account executives have done a great job of developing a great rapport with the customer that translates to ad dollars out of loyalty.

Selling against those interruptions swings back in favor to the newspaper when you discuss audience. The newspaper audience is bigger and of better quality. Newspaper readers are consumers with more money to spend. The audience a newspaper delivers is also much larger than the typical TV or radio station and cable outlet can deliver.

Thetop five cable networks for 2015 according to Nielsen were:

ESPN                   2.12 average rating

FOX News           1.84 average rating

USA Network      1.80 average rating

TBS                      1.79 average rating

Disney                   1.72 average rating

To compare audiences locally, use these ratings to estimate a local audience. How does that compare with readership of your newspaper? In the case of the market I'm in, ESPN's average audience reaches only 4% of our Sunday readership.

Thesame exercise can be done for broadcast TV. The top rated network show last season was NCIS, with a 16.6 rating. While a much bigger audience than cable networks, it is still likely to be less than the readership within your market. Newspapers still provide a bigger and better audience for commercial messages. Advertisements are welcomed by newspaper readers, and avoided by TV, cable and radio audiences.

And for the record, I'm not quite done watching Lost yet. So don't spoil the ending, please!

Confidence in newspapers continues to sink, but opportunities are plentiful for the sales rep that builds strong customer relationships

In the post-Watergate era of the mid 1970's, a Gallup poll of Americans stated that 51% of those surveyed had a lot or a great deal of confidence in newspapers. That survey would have been right around the time the movie "All The President's Men" with Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford was entertaining us in the theatre, telling the tale of how two newspaper reporters brought down the Nixon Presidency.  

The movie "Spotlight", which showcased the newspaper industry to a brand new generation this past year did not have the same impact on the confidence of American's in the newspaper industry. Gallup'sannual poll released June 13 reported that same survey dropped to an all time low of only 20% of responses showing a lot or a great confidence in newspapers.

Even more alarming was the record high 36% of responses from people with a low confidence level in the industry. While both stats are very unfavorable, I believe there is still a silver lining. Add in the 42% of U. S. adults saying that they have some confidence, and the majority of the public has at least some respect in the newspaper industry.

It is easy to fall victim to reading our own headlines and stories about our industry. I receive a steady stream of emails from industry experts and publications, and daily I can almost always find a stat that makes me want to crawl into the fetal position. That is why I believe so strongly that we have to do a better job of telling our story as an industry, with the positive research that still shows the importance and value of advertising in a community newspaper.

Unfortunately the daily emails don't offer the positive stats as frequent as the negative ones. I guess the click through rates aren't as good, as even that bad news has better readership than positive news. The best book for positive and yet reliable information on newspaper readership is the Newspaper Association of America's annual plan book.

Planning out sales training for your staff but not sure what do to or what information to give them? The plan book offers all the information you might need in one spot. Have a brand new rep and want to give them good, reliable information to build up their knowledge base of the business? From a top 10 reasons to advertise, to quick research on how / why American's buy products and services, to basic ad design and a whole lot more, the NAA plan book offers quick-bits of information to help seasoned sales reps, and can be a great introduction to the business for new sales reps.

While confidence in the industry might have shown a slight decline, a salesperson can still overcome that mindset if they have built the right type of relationship with the customer. Many things have changed in the sales process over the years, but being a trusted and valued resource still holds a high importance.

Sales reps, especially new ones need to demonstrate that they have interest in their customer, their customer's customer and in marketing. It is the responsibility of the sales rep to do their homework prior to making the sales pitch, insuring that they are bringing something to that relationship with each customer.

The NAA plan book should be a essential part of that homework. 

Telling the audience story correctly for newspapers is critical to future success

It started with a post on Facebook from the parody newspaper The Onion.  The humor was evident in the headline, which read:  Report:  Majority of Newspapers Now Purchased by Kidnappers to Prove Date.

 It was a good natured poke by the newspaper that has made me laugh for years. And newspapers weren’t the only media targeted in the post, stating that magazines still have purpose as “kidnappers still find them useful for making cut-and-paste ransom letters and death threats.”

 A few days after seeing that on Facebook, I was riding along with a sales rep who was struggling to defend the newspaper industry’s audience decline. It didn’t take long to realize that the rep had bought into the negative headlines and didn’t have enough data to help show the power of the printed word. And that power goes well beyond just proving the date for kidnappers! I’m not ignoring some alarming trends. As an industry, we have some work ahead of us as things continue to fragment and decline. Here are some real concerns the media world is facing: 

·                  Youth are consuming less traditional media
·                  Media outlet owners are worried about the move to digital
·                  Online consumption of content has doubled since 2010

 The irony of those three headlines is that they were not for the newspaper industry. In order, those articles were from broadcast TV, cable TV and radio. The concerns we face are shared by other media platforms, but my sense is we are defeated reading our own headlines instead of trying to tell our good story and fight the good fight.

 The best digital content on the web comes from legitimate news organizations. Our newsrooms and our content is our frontline defense for the transition to digital. The online audience we have is the envy of the TV, cable and radio industries.

 During my ride along with the sales rep, we discussed readership of the print product. She commented that our numbers had dropped over the previous six months. I asked her what that number was and she was vague. She knew the distribution number and stated that as readership. But there is a big difference.

 There has been a debate on how many readers a newspaper has per copy. The pass around number has varied during my career from 1.9 readers to as high as 3.2 depending on the study you choose to use. For me, I’ve always used 2.5 readers per copy. An entry on the Media Genius Blog quotes a NAA phone survey from 2013 that put the readership at 2.48 people per copy.  There are some newspapers that are higher, and some lower but using 2.5 is still a reasonable number to quote when talking about total audience. 

The key is to put that math to work in your market. While the audience has changed and declined in print, the total print audience most newspapers delivers is still the biggest and best audience in the market. Your total audience versus the local radio station? Your total audience versus the best rated broadcast or cable channel? The newspaper audience is a slam-dunk winner nearly every time.

 Many newspapers are not telling this great story. And you know what? That story gets even better. Pew Research Center has determined that 56% of a newspaper’s audience consumes it exclusively in print. Thus the large numbers of unique visitors to your website expands your audience even more with unduplicated reach. 

Our concerns for the industry cannot be ignored, and I’m not suggesting we should. But there are still some great stories to be told in all of our markets. Better training of what our audience is locally versus our competitors is a good place to start. 

The need for a free and independent news source is greater than ever

Two days ago marked Friday the 13th. This is a fact that I didn't need to have checked. My wife, quoting a Facebook post a few days before Friday informed me it was Friday the 13th and a full moon. And I believed her! I should have checked the facts.

In fact, the next full moon is coming up this coming Saturday, May 21st. But a snazzy mime and enough social media likes and shares, and presto an error is being treated and repeated as a fact. Welcome to the new world of social media as a news source.

Clearly when the next full moon is not major error, at least in my world. But the propetuation of inaccurate information is happening more and more, and at an alarming rate through social media. People are using things like Facebook as a trusted source of information, which it is not. This unfounded trust of the Internet is causing a dumbing down of society.

I'm not talking about the breaking news posts I get every few weeks mourning the the loss of Joe Cocker. He actually died in December 2014. In the midst of the presidential election in the US currently, both sides are blurring facts and fiction courtesy of social media.

In the past few weeks, there have been reports that Facebook is purposely suppressing stories that favor the Republican Party. Mark Zuckerberg has told the media that they are investigating into those claims.   I'm not here suggesting that they did, or did not. I do believe it is very possible for an unchecked, non-journalistic outlet could start to manipulate content. It certainly wouldn't be the first time.

There has been a lot written about this topic. For me, the best take I've read has come from Anurag Harsh through a blog post on LinkedIN titled "Is Facebook biased or are its users?  He writes:

"Social media already allows us to tune out everything we dislike and create an echo chamber for what we love. We don't need help entrenching ourselves in our limited world views. Selection biases abound. If Facebook wants to help create a more educated citizenry, then they shouldn't got down this road."

The best political views are the ones that are challenged by others who offer thoughtful opposing views. Hearing only what you want to hear might seem nice, but in the end will actually weaken your intellect and your political values.

Using comedy to create great advertising messages

For whatever reason, I never watched a Seinfeld episode while the classic NBC comedy was new. I'm sure I've seen every episode now, thanks to syndication and specifically cable network TBS.

Comedy in advertising is always risky, especially on a local level. National commercials have as big a production as a network sitcom, including comedy writers if you choose to go down that path. Locally, not as sophisticated and too many times epic failures.

I helped a local candy shop set up a photo shoot for a Forrest Gump parody. I was nervous about how the audience would receive it. The popularity of the movie was big at the time, and the ad actually won awards.




The Floor Trader billboard is a good comedy example. It works as a standard billboard with a simple message. But the parody is there if you know the episode from Seinfeld.

I'm not sure this parody was as strong as that Gump reference from the 1990's. But I still thought it was funny, even if Seinfeld signed off of first run in 1998. The episode in question, where George's nude photo was actually 20 years ago. And it still makes me laugh....

Find the right sales team and the revenue will follow

Most advertising directors will tell you that their primary job focus is hitting revenue targets.  It’s hard to deny that is a very important element, but I might make a case that it is not the top priority.

Certainly, I’m not diminishing the importance of exceeding goals. The stress I have in my work life is largely centered on how my team and I are performing financially. But you cannot obtain revenue goals without having the right people on your team, and having them do the right thing.

“Of all the decisions an executive makes, none are as important as the decisions about people because they determine the performance capacity of the organization. Such decisions reveal how competent management is, what its values are, and whether it takes its job seriously.” That is a pretty famous quote from business guru Peter Drucker. While he wasn’t talking about media companies when he said that, it is very applicable to the situation we find ourselves in as an industry.

As times have gotten tougher, some people have lost their focus on trying to attract the best talent. Finding the right talent has been replaced by finding a warm body in some instances. That is why recruitment for sales people is such an important aspect of our job. It used to be easy to find high performing people, who were looking for a career at the local newspaper. Today, we have to make it a priority to be on the hunt.  And we need to know exactly what it is we are searching for in a quality sales person.

Developing a pool of sales prospects should be a regular part of every advertising manager’s job performance. Just like sales reps have a sales funnel, ad managers should have a prospect funnel for future ad reps. And just like a sales funnel, not every prospect makes it to the end of the funnel to complete the process, so you must continue to adding prospects into the process.

The Center for Sales Strategy offers in-depth training on finding the best media sales people. I was fortunate enough to get to complete their “Talent Focused Management” training program to help me recognize the necessary skills they have uncovered for high performing media sales people.  CSS developed eight targeted themes based on interviews and business performance analysis after reviewing 15,000 cases.

A part of the process is interviewing the candidates. To ensure a valuable interview, you ,must plan ahead insightful questions to learn the qualities of a prospective sales rep. Ask questions that will help you learn about the eight themes.

The eight primary themes of successful media sales reps are:

1.       Work Intensity

2.       Discipline

3.       Positivity

4.       Interpersonal Skills

5.       Command of Situations

6.       Problem Solver

7.       Enterpriser

8.       Ambition

Richard Branson wanted to be a magazine editor or a journalist. While he didn’t quite get that goal achieved, he’s achieved plenty as a leading entrepreneur. His philosophy on who comes first in an organization is a constant reminder to me on how to manage the team I’ve assembled.  "Clients do not come first. Employees come first. If you take care of your employees, they will take care of the clients.”

Spending the necessary time to find talent in your market is a vital part of your job every week. While it is tougher than in the past, there are still talented individuals in your market that can be successful for your organization. It is just harder to find them. Once you’ve found the prospects, determine which of the eight traits they have naturally and which ones you can nurture and teach. Don’t forget to match the prospective sales rep’s talents with the needs of the open position you have.

Finding the right people doing the right thing is the best way to put focus on a customer. The best employees know how to take care of your best customers. 

ESPN's Dan Le Batard places spotlight on the newspaper industry's problem

Newspapers continue to have an image problem. Many of the bad rumors being spread around are false, or as the old saying goes "The rumors of my death are greatly over exaggerated."

But as another old saying goes "Where there's smoke, there's fire." I think the radio in my car was fully engulfed in flames this past Tuesday listening to ESPN's Dan Le Batard.

Le Batard is a nationally syndicated talk show host and Miami Herald columnist who likes to stir the pot, to say the least. A few years ago, it was Le Batard that tried to take out full page ads in the Akron Beacon Journal and Cleveland Plain Dealer bashing LeBron James when James decided to return to Cleveland to play professional basketball. But this past Tuesday, the pointed stick he was jabbing at the newspaper industry pointed to a real issue newspapers face. Today! Now!

Le Batard told the story of a little kid who was visiting a friend at another house and saw the father reading a newspaper. The little kid asked what he was doing. He had never seen this activity before. Puzzled, he asked how it got to their house. Astonished by that answer, the little kid was in total  disbelief that such a thing as a daily newspaper could be produced and  then delivered in the middle of the night to the family's front porch full of the latest news and information.

Clearly the industry has lost out on the child in this story as a future reader. The concern is how many (millions) more are out there that would be just as lost, just as astonished at the basic concepts of an industry that has been around hundreds of years.

Websites continue to expand as the appetite for news continues to grow. But the print newspaper, still the main revenue generator  for many media companies, and still an extremely important franchise in hundreds of cities and towns remains on an unhealthy decline.

Reading programs and NIE projects are not creating awareness or habits to the youth. While there are some good examples of these types of initiatives, most across the country are weak and do nothing more than help provide hollow circulation numbers.

I'm not professing to have the answers to this problem. I wish I did! I also wish Le Batard wasn't laughing about this on his program. The problem is, I can't even call him out on it because he's right.

Creating a culture of learning and fun is key to long term sales success

As hard as I try, I just can’t avoid sports analogies when I talk about business. Since I’m such a big baseball fan, those metaphors tend to be based upon actions on the diamond.

Every spring I head to Florida to catch some sun, a few beers and as many spring training baseball games I can squeeze in over a few days off. This year I also had the opportunity to catch a practice session of my favorite team, the Boston Red Sox.

I watched multi-million dollar players working on their assigned drills. These highly developed, skilled professionals spent hours working on fundamentals. Their time was spent on details of their swing, how to run the bases and throw the baseball properly. High level, detailed strategy is no doubt also discussed but clearly the focus on their training was on the basics.

This is a lesson we can and put in place for our sales teams. It is a good investment to discuss high level marketing strategy with your sales team, but don’t forget to stress the basics. As much as you (and surely your staff) hate to do roll-plays of a sales call, those basics are necessary to your team’s success in the field. I would much prefer that the Red Sox make their mistakes in Florida at spring training than when they are back in Boston and playing games that count during the regular season.

Isn’t that also the case for your sales team? Better to make those mistakes in the sales meeting on Monday than in front of an account that you were hoping to gain $20,000 in new business.

Sales meetings are often overlooked parts of our lives. I’m just as guilty as the next person, but short of field time with your reps this might be the most important part of the work week. If you are walking into the meeting and “winging it” then perhaps it is time to reconsider things.

Have an agenda. I personally never shared the agenda with my team, but I created one for me to follow so that I didn’t forget things. And I didn’t work on it in the minutes leading up to the meeting or the night before. It was a document I kept on my desktop that I added to as the week went along. Some things stayed on the agenda, the additions I added throughout the week helped keep things fresh.  By adding things throughout the week, the items covered were more complete and didn’t really add additional time to prepare for the meeting.

Have a training element. It can be a product introduction if you’re launching something new. But I like the idea of including those role plays to keep people sharp. Make things fun as you’re training. People learn more and retain better if they are also entertained a little too. There are tons of books and countless websites that can help you in this area.

Creating a culture of learning and fun is very important. I’m currently reading a book that addresses this head on, and I highly recommend it for you if you’re working on building your team and culture. "You Win In The Locker Room First: The 7 C's To Build A Winning Team In Business, Sports And Life” is written by former NFL coach Mike Smith and Jon Gordon. They go in-depth on the importance of culture for successful teams.

They suggest that every successful team is built on these seven basic principles:

--Have fun, work hard, and enjoy the journey. 

--Show respect to all associated with your business 

--Put the team first

--Do your job but be prepared for it to change

--Be the same person every day. Do not get too high in victory or too low in defeat.

--Understand that all organizational decisions aim to make the team better

--Have a positive attitude

Developing your team and your culture is one of the keys for long term success. Getting the right people doing the right thing and the right time, and then making them feel good about who they are doing it for will help create a stable, winning sales team for your organization.