Salespeople: Don’t Be Quitters

(By Lisa Thal) Exceeding budget every month can be a daunting task. We all face account attrition, local business going national, rating dips, and roadblocks to new accounts. My advice to you is: don’t quit now.

In a recent sales meeting, we discussed those words, “don’t quit now.” I asked the team what those words meant to them. The following are some of the thoughts they shared:

Keep fighting for the appointment by finding new ways to get in front of the decision-maker.

Don’t quit sharing the power of radio with advertising agencies and direct accounts.

If you’re falling short of budget for the year, don’t give up on your year.

Don’t stop prospecting for new business.

Don’t stop providing solutions to your clients’ needs!

Do you find yourself or your team giving up too soon? When you look at the words “don’t quit now,” you may also see: “DOn’t quIT NOW.” We need to DO IT NOW! What needs to be done right now to move your business forward? Start removing all the excuses for why you’re missing revenue goals and start doing what needs to get done to achieve budget now.

Here are three principles you can apply to do it now:

1. Make a list of 10 new accounts you can target. Create a substantial business reason why they should put you on their calendar. What idea or solution have you discovered that could improve their bottom line? Is there a recruitment opportunity the company needs, or perhaps a new product or service line for which they need to create awareness for the consumer?

2. Make the call now! If you don’t make the call, you’re opening the door for your competitor to meet with them first. Once you have identified these essential targets, you need to schedule time on your calendar each day to make the call to schedule a meeting. I recommend you develop a plan you can implement with various touchpoints every two days until you book the appointment. You can look for LinkedIn connections for an introduction. Call, e-mail, or send a letter to the client explaining why you want to meet, or create a short video showcasing how you can help. We have so many creative avenues we can implement to earn the appointment with the customer.

3. Let go of the accounts on your list that you’re certain will not have the budget to use your media effectively. It has been my experience that the smaller accounts end up stealing the most time. So shift your thinking into investing your time with larger accounts that can achieve better success using radio to reach their current customers or bring awareness to new customers.

The following is an instance in which we applied the principles and achieved success:

Traditionally, insurance companies have used television, print, direct mail, and very little radio. If they add radio to their marketing campaign, it tends to be on an AM format. I manage a station that is hugely successful in targeting women 25-54. The business opportunity for the insurance company is to reach busy working women who own a home, have disposable income and a family, or who own a business. These women can be targeted effectively by using radio. We discovered that the insurance company we were targeting had a women’s initiative. After meeting the decision-makers and learning more about their needs, we created a marketing campaign using an influencer activation with our on-air talent, social media, and a podcast to help tell their story.

Radio can tell an advertiser’s story, with emotion, better than any other media. That is the strategy we created for their campaigns. We had the talent share their personal stories of why insurance is important to them and their families. They touched on the resources available to plan for their children’s future and how to prepare for retirement. We wanted women to feel more empowered by understanding a category that can be overwhelming. We shared these stories via Facebook as well.

Finally, we created informational podcasts, as we realized that we needed an outlet for women to listen to educational content when they had the time to do so. We approached this client with a “don’t quit now” mentality, and it was a process worth pursuing!

Lisa Thal is the general sales manager for Hubbard Interactive Cincinnati. She’s also the author of Three-Word Meetings: A Simple Strategy to Engage, Inspire and Empower Your Team. Get it on Amazon.com.