Distinctive, Passionate & Meaningful

If I ask you the question, why should I buy advertising on your company? What would your answer be? Do you have an answer?

Would you sound convincing, confident, and unrehearsed? Would you?

If you want to be successful at selling advertising (at selling anything) you’ll need to have an answer for this question already developed and fully formed, ready to drop from your lips at any moment.

So what would your answer be?

“We have the strongest signal strength in the market”.

“We have more white-collar females aged 20 to 24 listening to us than anyone else”.

“We have Bill Bucky and the Breakfast Zoo every morning, they’re hilarious! Whoo!”

“We’re a full-service Radio station”, or perhaps “Because radio is intimate and local”.

I hope and pray you’re not using any of these because you haven’t really answered the prospects question at all have you? Yet these are common responses aren’t they? I see them on media profiles and I hear them every time I’m with advertising sales teams all around the world.

I think we can all agree ‘media’ is moving into a new era of competition and fragmentation, and it has been for a while now. Advertisers are being presented with new media products, platforms and new reasons to buy other things all the time. So what is our answer to this question?

One of the best ways to formulate your answer to this question is to take a good long hard look at your media company. Try and isolate a specific aspect that makes you stand out from the rest. Try to be empathetic during the process. Come from the buyer’s viewpoint and ask “What’s in it for me?”

If you were a business person would you buy your advertising offerings? Is what your company does important to the prospect? Will it cut through their promotional challenges; will it increase or decrease their profits; will it open them to new markets; or is it a waste of money? What distinct value do you really offer to your advertisers?

If advertisers can’t easily identify why they should buy you amongst a progressively increasing and confusing number of advertising options, is it any wonder they begin to focus on price? And that’s not good for any of us is it? Make sure you create an answer that is important to your customers and prospects (that’s also important to you). An answer that’s distinctive, passionate, and meaningful.

We spend so much time and money telling our listeners why they should use us, yet you don’t need to be a marketing guru to work out that our audiences and our advertisers are two different animals, and require two different messages.

By effectively developing and promoting the right answer to the question “why should I buy you?”, you are giving prospects and even existing advertisers a reason to identify and remember you, you’re helping them to think of you first and in the end that promotes your survival.

Michael Tate: Sales Director International – NRS Media 

A foundation employee during its initial five year start-up phase Michael Tate has returned to NRS Media after 15 years of working internationally to take up tenure as the company’s Sales Director in its International office.

Michael has a vast knowledge of effective media use, advertising and advertising sales management built over the last 25 years working with some of the world’s largest TV and radio groups. Based in San Francisco for over 10 years, he also worked ‘client-side’ in a National Media appointment for the Toyota Motor Corporation in Australia; coordinating all the media buying decisions for the auto giant helping Toyota become the No.1 seller of motor vehicles.

Over the last decade Michael has advised all types of companies around the world on best effect advertising via over 3500 workshops attended by over 45,000 business owners and managers, generating over $60,000,000 in direct sales advertising revenue.

He is a highly sought after key-note speaker and advertising sales trainer at major industry bodies like the Radio Advertising Bureau, the Texas Broadcasters Association, and the Oregon Association of Broadcasters. Tate has successfully worked with advertising sales managers, their staff and clients in 12 countries including the USA, UK, Canada, Ireland, Norway, Malaysia, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Philippines and Australia.

You can find out more about NRS Media here or view Michael’s Linked In profile here.

Michael Tate has joined the team of Radio Today with weekly insights.

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