November 9, 2009

Last Friday's column was part one of asking you if your team is a "Make-It-Happen" or "Watch-It-Happen" team.

We looked at the agency/transactional angle. Today, it's all about direct.

If ever there was a place to make it happen, it's direct. Best first step, and I hate to overstate the basics, but all too often we either get too busy or just forget. Monitors.

They're easy to get. I even pay my daughter five cents for every ad she takes from the Sunday paper and puts it into a Word doc, so I can give them to my sellers on Monday. Same with lifestyle papers and community/city mags. Get Media Monitors if you can. It's a spot a day and extremely valuable. They even pull cable and newspaper for you.

The Marketing Architect people do their own and you can get access.

These people are spending money now. Just in the wrong place. Not with you.

Lead with an idea. Lead with a spec spot. Tell your folks to get them on the phone, simply introduce themselves and say, "I have an unbelievable idea for you and thought of you first. Can I come by for just 10 minutes and show you?"

Pique their curiosity. Tell a story. Funny how it's not "I'm Sally Sinclair and I want to talk to you about your advertising and let me tell you about my station." "No thanks Sally. I don't care."

Now you're MAKING IT HAPPEN ... and watch your closing ratios go way up.