(By Jeffrey Wolinsky) What if I told you the purpose of a corporation isn’t only to maximize profits? You would probably say it’s not much of a corporation at all. However, in August of last year, that is exactly what a group of the most powerful CEOs from corporations across the U.S. said.
The Business Roundtable founded its philosophy on “The Purpose of a Corporation,”
and started issuing statements in 1997 saying, “The paramount duty of management
and of boards of directors is to the corporation’s stockholders.”
However, 2019 was a new year. While the purpose still includes (as it should) delivering value for shareholders, it incorporates several more pillars: 1) delivering value to customers, 2) investing in employees, 3) dealing fairly and ethically with suppliers, and 4) supporting the communities in which corporations do business.
Why these specific additions now, and why do they seemingly have no direct connection to revenue?
Well, it is safe to assume there is some impact from the social and generational
factors we see in the current age of 24/7 news cycles and the ability of opinion-based
movements to make waves on social media.
The Business Roundtable’s change of tone can also be attributed to the speed of
information and change, and how it affects all businesses. Those who don’t adapt,
who won’t evolve their opinions, processes, or purpose to fully align with the market, will inevitably get left behind. The advertising industry understands disruption and pace of change. Google and Facebook, the two largest ad revenue companies, did not exist in 1997.
Consider now the purpose of a salesperson specifically for our industry. It’s common to hear sales managers describe salespeople as “running their own small businesses within the department,” because the role is commission-based and the legacy structure had the salesperson be a client’s single point of contact for everything. Unlike the Business Roundtable, we as an industry don’t have an overarching statement that describes our sales purpose, even though most radio companies have virtually the same structure for their sales teams.
If you think back to the previous generation of radio sales, the vast majority of stations defined a salesperson’s purpose as working with ad agencies to field avails and provide their station with the highest possible share of these transactions. But should we really define working avails as sales? That seems to be more of a negotiation or account management function than a true act of selling. Many sales teams also included retail sales staffs, meaning the least experienced salespeople did the hardest and most important work — adding new companies to the client lists.
In those times, our industry’s health was a predictive indicator of the economy as a whole, based on clients increasing budgets and agencies allocating us those funds. Rather than selling, we were pricing and negotiating to get a certain share of each buy. But “selling,” in its truest sense, happens when we meet a marketing need for an advertiser and collaborate with them as a marketing partner, rather than having them buy from us in a transaction as a vendor.
Today, when we look at the growing role of the salesperson and the vital part he or
she plays in the health of our business as a whole, there are three main functions to
consider:
• Renewing business from our current clients
• Growing relationships with those clients who have already invested with us
• Finding new companies that want to work with us to grow their business
We have to redefine what success looks like for the thousands of individuals who represent the industry and work face-to-face with the clients who invest in us every
day. Those expectations drive our purpose and set the path for our salespeople to grow revenue by providing marketing consultation rather than transactions — even
if that connection may not seem immediately evident.
My belief is that the industry should consider that the purpose of a salesperson is having a relationship with the advertisers themselves — regardless of agency involvement — so they can provide holistic marketing expertise. The salesperson needs to help the advertiser take advantage of the radio, digital, video, social, and in-person opportunities their media organization has created to deliver the audience that matches their target and serves as a real catalyst to achieve their goals.
As we approach the 100th anniversary of our nation’s first commercial broadcast, our business must look at the purpose of the salesperson — and all roles that deliver value to our operation — and make the commitment to rethink and redefine it. The future success of our companies, our communities, and (most importantly) our people, depends on it.
Jeffrey Wolinsky is the director of federal and national sales for Hubbard-owned WTOP and Federal News Network. Contact him at [email protected] or 202.895.5018.
