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Some information about our process is proprietary, only to be revealed when we are working for you. And our approaches can involve 3 or 4 different strategies with various tactics. But our primary approach is – to
leverage your experience. To target significant advertisers in an industry or category where you have good work to show and a record of producing results.
We start with an “Orientation & Planning” session with your agency. Let us know if you would like for us to send you a copy of our outline for that. In one or more
conference call sessions, we learn as much as we can about your agency – and we work with you to plan who we are going to target for you, how we are going about
prospecting, etc. Assuming that “leveraging your experience” in a certain category will be the first initiative, what follows here is our process for that.
- Gather information and do a mini “backgrounder” on the industry. Learn as much
as possible about what that industry is, what’s going on in it – and try to identify
the key challenges and opportunities facing companies in the industry.
- Set criteria for targeting – in terms of size of company, geographic location, etc. Target only those advertisers that meet the criteria
- Identify and try to target, primarily, the top person in charge of marketing and advertising.
(But contact other marketing, advertising and brand titles, too).
- Send an e-mailing or ground mailing to introduce the agency. We send everything
on your e-mail exchange or letterhead but over my signature, as if I am part of your agency. When we begin working for you, you give me a title and an e-mail address and a phone extension that shows that I am “with” your agency.
- Make follow-up phone calls – and keep at it until
we get through or get a firm turndown.
- Send and e-mail – and call more.
- Go back with a “special offer” – and call more.
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Key practices related to all of this are – (1) Target smartly. (2) Be friendly, non-threatening. (3) Be relentless --
never give up, never take “no” for an
answer. Keep coming back with a different observation, thought, etc. But do it in an
inoffensive, non-irritating way. (4) Be resourceful -- find ways to get around the gatekeepers, to circumvent the “vendor authorization” systems and other barriers.
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