Managing Your Territory Introduction Go where the money is Those running elsewhere Prospecting sp. sections Time mgt. mistakes A little each day More on special sections The fastest way to increase sales! Participate in this award-winning, newspaper-specific ad sales course on-site or in a Webinar.  • Get past upfront stalls and objections without any pushing  • Make the account believe he really needs you  • Get better information from your prosepct  • Develop quick ad strategies that work the very first time  • Eliminate size, frequency, content, cost and most other objections before they ever arise  • Get dramatic responses for all kinds of advertisers  • Never have to push an advertiser to run again click here

Again, special sections can throw a huge wrench into the efficient management of your territory. Within a few weeks of working at your newspaper, your manger will almost certainly hold a sales meeting where he reminds the staff that a special section's advertising deadline is fast approaching and there are hardly any ads sold yet.

Now as a salesperson, you'll not only get a goal that you have to reach each week and/or month, usually in the form of total inches, lines or revenue, but you will most likely get separate goals for special sections. Usually all goals are based on what happened the same month a year earlier plus a 10% or 20% increase. For special sections, you'll probably just need to sell a little more than what was sold into last year's section.

But even though you might not have a very high special section goal, if you miss it you may have a very unhappy manager. That's because special sections are profitable for a newspaper and everyone above you is counting on you making your goals.

What usually happens after one of these sales meetings where everyone's reminded how soon the section closes and how much they haven't yet sold, is that everyone panics, rightly so, and spends the next few days dropping everything else and selling only special sections. No prospecting and no servicing existing customers. And when that crisis finally ends, the manager has another meeting and reminds the staff that now there's another one due in a few days and it starts all over again.

Most salespeople never figure out how to avoid this insanity, and spend all of their time doing last minute selling. So as I mentioned before, if you're selling special sections like many salespeople do, primarily on the day or two before the section is due, you can't sell as well.

If you have to do some last minute selling to new accounts for a section, constantly remind them that the sections are merely supplements to a good advertising campaign, and the newspaper itself is a great place to advertise. Get the account to agree that after the ad goes into the special section that you should really talk about running in ROP.

Again, as with almost all the problems and stress associated with territory management, if you sell far in advance, and are constantly cold calling and creating spec ads, you'll reach your goals, get a better response for your advertisers, make some money, keep your stress down to a minimum, and enjoy your job more.

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