(By Chris Stonick) One of my favorite stories – of which I have many – is from my days working in Indianapolis. The station had hired a young seller who had never worked in radio before to be my point person. I was not overly optimistic at the start. But he worked hard and was very personable.
We were holding our first HR seminar and the room was packed. After the seminar, he went up to all the clients he had invited. One of them was Indianapolis Precision Technology. He went up to the representative and thanked her for attending. After that, he asked, “What did you think?”
She said she was impressed. He asked, “How much are you spending now?” “$26,000 a month, and nothing is working.” He said, “I’ll come over tomorrow and we can talk.” The next day, he showed up with a one-page contract – not a 23-page proposal – that said she could spend $26,000 a month on his stations for the year, that’s $312,000 total, and all she had to do was sign on the bottom line and they could get started.
She laughed and said she had put all of her eggs in one basket in the past and had nothing to show for it. They continued to talk. Then she said, “I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you my full budget for the next 2 months, show me what you can do.”
His first contract EVER was a $52,000, two-month deal. Guess what? IT WORKED! Six weeks in, she called him and said, “bring that other contract, this works!” His first client was a $312,000 annual. How did he get that contract? Because no one ever told him he couldn’t ask for dollars like that. Sell like you don’t know… it just might gain you the biggest contract of your carer!
For more than three decades, Chris Stonick has helped thousands of organizations across the country with recruiting and retention while generating well over $100,000,000 in billing for his client radio stations. Contact Chris at 863-397-5615 or by email. Read Chris’ Radio Ink archives here.
