Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

John Wanamaker is credited with saying, "Half of my advertising is wasted: I just don't know which half."

Whether or not this is true, we know that successful advertising campaigns contain three elements:

1. Enough repetition weekly so that half of your audience hears the message a minimum of three times.

2. Enough consistency (read:long...

Do It Today! Ever heard that bit of wisdom, "Never put off till tomorrow, what you can do today"?  

One of the attributes of great sales people is a trait we call "urgency".  They want it done yesterday...or now at the latest.  They never put things off.

As sales people, we keep many plates spinning wildly at all times.  We need to be able to multi-task, and, we need to get things done.  Today is better than tomorrow.

Sometimes,...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

Last newsletter we talked about selling long-term. Part of the process of selling long-term is managing our clients' expectations by teaching them what advertising CAN and CANNOT do at the time we sell them.  If we wait until later, when they don't see immediate response and want to cancel, it sounds as though we are making excuses.  

Explaining the results UP FRONT puts us in the position of...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

In an earlier newsletter, we talked about how to deal with Mr. Not-So-Big if we could not get to Mr. Big. To continue that discussion, there are some steps we can take to move our prospects through the Marketing Channel to a positive conclusion for us. One of those steps is to send a letter of confirmation to our prospects between...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

Many of us will have already done our revenue projections for the New Year. But, just in case you haven't, let's talk about some guidelines for coming up with challenging, but realistic, goals. 

You might start with how much you wish to earn next year. The amount you wish to earn, divided by your commission rate, will tell you how much you need to bill. You can divide that by 12...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

Zipf's Law. Ever heard of it? This natural phenomena is important to anyone who is selling a product.  Mr. Zipf found that "the", the most- used English word, occurred about twice as often as "of", the second most- used word, and about three times as often as "and", the third most used.

Zipf's Law also applies to the brand preference...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

We don't sell radio, newspaper or TV. We sell marketing solutions.  Our clients will be glad to see us if they view us as unpaid staff members.  We know we've arrived when our clients call us to help them plan their marketing.

Our advertising is only one piece of the marketing puzzle...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

Why do our prospects buy from us?  As we move prospects through the stages of a sale, we know that the buying process can be complicated.  Much of the time, we are dealing with more than one decision maker.  We are always dealing with complex emotions (remember, people buy emotionally and justify it with logic...

Selling Radio Direct with Pat Bryson

Well, I got another letter from Les. Remember him? He's the buying service for radio and TV that spends millions each year with broadcast.  He's also been a friend of mine for some years. Even though I no longer do battle with him over rates and schedules, we still keep in touch. When Les speaks, we should listen. And...