Week of June 16, 2008

Friday 6/20, 2008

Did your station studio or transmitter survive the hot weather or flooding in parts of the country this week? Don't wait for the AC to fail. Have your chief inspect the equipment to avoid a meltdown and a disaster. Have a good weekend!

Thursday 6/19, 2008

Better salespeople ... how do you get them? The guy across the street who is doing a 40 share in the Miller Kaplan has a talent roster on a spreadsheet that he updates each week. He knows all the players and has created a talent matrix so he can hire for fit and relationship when the need arises. He has leverage because of the great working environment he has created; senior managers who are tough but fair, and they have great systems and structure.

Wednesday 6/18, 2008

As you head into the thick of summer, have you had your sales managers do a comprehensive account list review? I bet there are accounts on everybody's list that have not been called on in months. Is everybody's list around 35 accounts and all broken up into Strategic Account Management categories: Keys, Secondaries, Targets and Extras? Strategic account management is a powerful tool that lets you hold people accountable for growing their existing accounts and developing new ones. By effectively managing your account lists, you won't have to listen to excuses from your sales mangers that there are not enough accounts to hire additional sellers.

Tuesday 6/17, 2008

You just received your revised June revenue forecast from your GSMs and it shows the cluster is only going to finish at 90% of budget. The shortfall is on your two low-power AMs that you jacked up the budget on because your FMs are at mature growth. You have some proprietary programming on these stations, but can't get them sold. You will probably find that the reason you are not hitting budget is not price-related, it is focus-related. These stations tend to be the toughest stations to sell because the sell is "conceptual" and not ratings-based. Ask to see all the new proposals and calls that have been made on these specific stations. It might be time to hire three or four dedicated sellers for these stations and not rely on the combo sell.

Monday 6/16, 2008

It's the middle of the month. But it's also the end of the quarter. How did you do? Did you make the revenue goals? How about expenses? If you're short in the revenue department, but "on" in the expense line, you are missing Q2. Let's discuss how we are going to "make up" in Q3.