Prospecting for Additional Sales

Whether advertising revenues have been weak or strong every paper needs to be working consistently to develop new business. Your sales staff has to working to develop new business just to remain even. If you plan to grow revenue, your staff is going to have to work even harder at prospecting for new business.

Following are some tips for prospecting that your salespeople can use to keep the revenue stream flowing.

• Ask for referrals – This is a powerful tool. Prospects welcome salespeople who have been referred by a fellow businessperson. The sales are easier to close because it takes less convincing that you represent an effective advertising source.

• Advertise in business magazines – Reaching beyond the boundary of your regular readers, these products typically reach the targeted market you are after.

• Track advertising in competitive media – Measure the advertising your competitors are selling. In print, get the ruler out and measure the results of their sales effort by what appears in their papers. Who is advertising in this paper and not with your paper? Are advertisers buying larger ads with them than they do with you? Post a list of radio stations and TV stations that your staff can choose to monitor. Have them make a list of local advertisers from their assigned station. Make an accurate list and then begin a strong effort to solicit these advertisers.

• Use customer testimonials – This still is one of the most effective types of advertising. These testimonials of local businesses help send the message that advertising in your paper brings results.

• Find the market leader – Make a list of the various types of businesses in your area, and then identify the top one or two market segment leaders in each industry. If you are the primary advertising source for the top selling car dealer, real estate, lumberyard or pizza others will follow their lead.

• Develop partnerships – Develop great working relationships with other media. When a sales rep from a radio or TV station believes you are best choice for print advertising, they may recommend your paper to their customers. Encourage advertisers to refer to the ad in your paper for details of the sale offered in their radio and TV advertising.

• Look within your strong market segments – If car dealers are having success with their advertising in your paper, look for other car dealers who are not advertising with your paper and encourage them to experience the same success.

• Look at weak market segments – If you have market segments that do not use your paper, discuss the reasons they don’t use your paper with a leader in that market segment. They may not clearly understand your circulation, reader demographics, pricing or what you bring to the party. They may explain a legitimate reason they do not use your paper that you can do something about.

• Look outside of your local area – Are there markets close by that can draw business from your local area. Begin by sending a salesperson into the market. Install visible distribution racks within that market.

Baragrey is a business consultant and sales trainer for Publishers-Edge. He can be reached at dbaragrey@Publishers-Edge.com.

Ad Spending Continues Decline in 2002

Retail advertising in the fourth quarter fell 6.2 percent to $5.9 billion, national advertising was down 10.7 percent to $1.7 billion, and classified advertising slid 18.5 percent to $4.7 billion. For the full year 2001, retail advertising was down 3.4 percent to $20.7 billion, national advertising declined 8.5 percent to $7 billion, and classified dropped 15.2 percent to $16.6 billion.

Within the classified category in the fourth quarter, real estate continued to show strength, gaining 6.3 percent to $1.1 billion. Automotive was up 2.4 percent to $1.6 billion, recruitment sank 46.5 percent to $1.3 billion, and all other classified ads were down 5.4 percent to $728 million.

For the full year 2001, real estate increased 10.9 percent to $3.5 billion, automotive declined 2.7 percent to $4.9 billion, recruitment dropped 34.5 percent to $5.7 billion, and all other classified ads slipped 6.9 percent to $2.5 billion.

"The economy shed over 900,000 jobs in the fourth quarter and that drove down performance in the recruitment category, while a strong housing market helped secure gains in real estate advertising," explained NAA Vice President of Market and Business Analysis Jim Conaghan.