SalesRants

Marrow Focus

That old housewife axiom, "The easiest way to a man's heart is through his stomach," was steeped in the tradition of the king returning to his castle, in a 50's Donna Reed sense, of course. In the modern day of world of cutthroat media sales, this phrase can be co-opted and gloriously bastardized to something along the lines of, "the easiest way to a fat man's ad budget is through his epic appetite."

A few years ago, I was working for a lifestyle publication dedicated to an unhealthy lifestyle, a title laser-focused on shortening the existence of its readers. As you may imagine, many of the book's advertisers were equally dedicated to pleasuring themselves to death (so to speak.) Lunches were liquor-soaked. Dinners were bacchanalian feasts of grilled meat with sides of grilled meat. Desserts were commonly enjoyed at any number of New York gentlemen's clubs, and involved surprisingly little sugar. Despite the fact that virtually every one of these advertisers was a reliably despicable individual, one of my most vivid memories involved something akin to a family-style dinner, with an extra dose of family.

Ralph Balboni* was the pursestring holder for a multifaceted, internet-based packaged goods company. I'd known him for about a year, but his position always fascinated me. In that year, I'd spoken with several other of his colleagues who always chose to defer to Ralph on a variety of issues. When the CEO said he'd have to get Ralph's blessing as well, my curiosity mounted. Ralph seemed to be a company oracle, more than anything else -- a shaman without whom nothing could be achieved. Or. he'd just worked his way up high enough in the crime family, to the strata where all decisions had to be run by him. One of the two.

My boss and I went to his suburban New York office to chat about some ad space on a windswept Thursday afternoon. Our plan was to dazzle him with our shiny wares, throw a piece of meat and a glass of wine down his throat, and hit the road, victorious in our conquest.

After we chatted about the benefits and pitfalls of advertising schedules, we shook hands on a deal, and decided where we would go for what had now become dinner. It would be my boss, me, and Ralph…and Ralph's wife, and Ralph's son, and Ralph's daughter-in-law, all heading to one of the finest steakhouses outside the New York city limits. Now, Ralph was obviously no Saturday soldier of the dinner table. This was a man who made sweet, yet indelicate love to every plate of food ever to find its unfortunate way beneath his nose. There's a self-affirming, if not slightly crude phrase which travels the underground network of plus-sized gentlemen everywhere: "it takes a big man to build a shed over his tools." Over the years, Ralph seemed to have constructed something of a substantial split-level ranch with a family room, wet bar, and bonus den over the garage. His generous proportions and easygoing demeanor were clear indications of his appreciation for life's bounty.

Ralph's family met us at the restaurant. A surprisingly attractive and sophisticated woman (his wife); a beady eyed, ex-con wannabe sporting a wrinkled dinner jacket (Ralph's son); and a once-pretty woman whose hobby appeared to be insomnia (the daughter-in-law), were waiting for us at the bar. This enchanting gaggle greeted us with a combination of flaccid handshakes and crooked smiles. Once seated, Ralph started regaling us with tales of meat. To call him the Socrates of Sirloin would be too strong, but he certainly knew more about steaks and fat marbling than anyone without a portable oxygen tank or who works in a kitchen should know. He knew all the different ways to "slice the flank." He knew the layered components of the proper short rib. Needless to say, we ordered steak. The porterhouse for six -- a lunch tray-sized slab of rare beef, seasoned with salt, pepper, and a generous dollop of butter -- arrived at the table. Ralph looked slightly wild-eyed. His wife subtly placed her hand on his wrist -- perhaps a loving gesture, but, more likely some sort of control mechanism.

       

No morsel of meat was too small to escape this surgeon's scalpel.

The actual dining portion of the dinner went off without a hitch. We all made pleasant conversation, and a real family atmosphere imbued the whole proceeding. The steak itself was indeed very good, and Ralph was obviously satisfied. He wore a Cheshire cat grin, albeit one with all the teeth jammed up with flecks of creamed spinach and gristle. It appeared everything was a tremendous success. Then, Ralph gave me the single greatest validation of my skill as a sales professional.

Ralph reached over and grabbed the knife and fork off his wife's plate, upended the abandoned bone, and proceeded, butcher-like, to shear it of its remaining beefy goodness. No morsel of meat was too small to escape this surgeon's scalpel. My boss and I had obviously managed to make Ralph feel at ease and we watched, both gratified and horrified, as Ralph gnawed his steak bone with reckless abandon. If there was any doubt as to Ralph's comfort level, the last shred of it was abandoned as my boss and I bore witness to the end of this digestive display: a small bit of tendon taking brief refuge in Ralph's moustache.

Some may have taken Ralph's final pass at our table's entrée as an act of overbearing gluttony. What it was, though, was a satisfied gastronome who felt comfortable enough to up-end a steak bone and hack at it like he lived in a jungle. As to whether or not Ralph would have been as comfortable working the leftovers with any dinner companions, who's to say? But, I do know this:

Screw the sizzle -- it's the steak that sells.

*Names have been changed to protect the... you be the judge.

The Three Martini Lunch

Life can be incredibly cruel. You are violently birthed, thrust from your mother's womb into an insecure world, passed through the meat grinder of primary and secondary school education, flung into puberty, tossed into college, and then unleashed—utterly naïve and likely scarred from years spent pursuing an ultimately useless degree—into the world of business. Once your parents kiss you off, you face the unappealing and scary business of marriage and, eventually, rearing children who will eventually face the same daunting journey described above.

The sickest part of it all is that, during the prime of your life, you will devote approximately 40 years of thankless labor to an uncaring corporation just so you can pay your mortgage and eat meat once in a while. Your wife will constantly nag you, as will your kids, once they reach about seven years old. Sure, you may take up a hobby such as golf or stamp-collecting to ease the tension, but you and I both know it: You are statistically bound to live a boring, stressful and annoying life.

"No, no, Secret Salesman," you may protest. "Surely, life is what you make of it. Life is beautiful—there is love, art, writing, sex!"

Silly, silly media person. You do not hear the truth when it is shouted in your ear, but hear only your own fantastical whispers of hope. Except now—in a modern world where there is a pill to numb every discomfort and a self-help book to aid any perceived ailment—your nonsensical attitude can prevail. But life is a brutal endeavor. Even in this great country, families are starving, people are ravaged by untreatable disease and—worse yet—magazine employees continue to be underpaid and underappreciated. Such is the nature of this modern existence.

But, sit back, while I spin you a tale. There was a time not too long ago, a Golden Era, if you will, when life was better for the media salesman. We call it the 1980s. [I cannot speak of the 70's or 60's because, lamentably, I wasn't in this line of work back then]. Back in the 80's, there was a tonic—a soothing panacea—for the fear and ennui engendered by modern life.

They called it the Three-Martini Lunch.

You may have heard of it. Back in those Golden Days of media sales, there existed the time-honored tradition of the Three-Martini Lunch (or, as we practitioners like to call it, the TML). An oddly styled and peculiar ceremony, the TML was long heralded as one of the most effective tools in the intrepid media salesman's bag. Suitable for use on new prospects and haggard clients alike, the TML was a way to spend quality time with a customer and talk a bit of business—all while idling away a good 50 percent of your actual workday. Should a return visit to the office be required after the TML, one was inebriated enough by that point to tolerate the rest of the afternoon. Although labeled with a somewhat misleading moniker—since the cocktail of choice didn't have to be martinis, nor were participants limited to three of them, for that matter—the TML persisted as a serious business tool from the inception of print media until roughly 1988, when Reagan left office. Setting aside its restorative benefits to the media sales employee, the TML was, and remains, a potent tool for developing business relationships. What you don't know, however, is that the TML was never merely about drinking.

Back in the very early days of the media (think beleaguered Bewitched ad exec Darren Stevens) there was no such thing as the Three-Martini Lunch. It was just lunch. Because men were involved and, incidentally, happened to run the universe at that time (or at least they thought they did), they had the freedom to order what they wanted—be it a glass of tomato juice, a refreshing lager, or an 8-ounce gin martini. Lunch was a time to get together with a trusted colleague or old client, ask him how his family was doing—and really mean it. It was just a couple of guys both facing roughly the same situation and able to commiserate about their jobs, college tuition, the wife, and just about everything else under the sun. It's what men have done since the dawn of time: They gather over large hunks of blackened meat, knock a few back, and share something deeper and more profound than last night's Yankees result.

Then when it came time to follow up with a post-lunch phone call, when you went through your Rolodex (since replaced by ACT, Goldmine, or some other equally annoying "CRM" application tool), you didn't have to check your notes to remember that your client's wife was named Sally, and he had two boys, a baby girl, and an affinity for power tools. TMLs gave you time to get to know your client—hell, maybe even like him—and share that most intimate of manly moments: an extended workday lunch.

These days, the TML is a thing of the past. On the odd occasion that you do have the time to sit down over a meal with a client or prospect, there are many things to be considered. First, there's a 50 percent chance that your client/ prospect will be female. This can be beneficial if both you and your client are women, as you're then likelier to have things in common. However, this puts the male salesman at a disadvantage. One potential wrinkle: Your client may be hot, which puts you immediately in the uncomfortable position of being in a somewhat intimate setting (a nice restaurant), and makes your ham-handed attempts at smalltalk seem (at least in your own mind) like the verbal fumbling of a first date. Due to the discomfort this spawns, talk tends to immediately shift to business, meaning that any chance of developing a strong personal rapport are sunk. There's no opportunity to bitch about the wife or job (since don't want to seem bitter or lame), and there's less of a chance you'll chat about sports, the conversational glue that holds male friendship together.

If (as a male) you're fortunate enough to have a lunch meeting with a male colleague, the chance to bond and create a meaningful personal relationship remains exists, but it is still remote. The first moment of brutal, searing discomfort starts when the drink order is taken. As the host, you are obligated to glance at Jim, your client, and say, "What are you having Jim?" Jim, clearly pained, orders a Pellegrino with lime—or, worse yet, a Diet Coke (God forbid he go regular). The drink order takes a lap around the table and results in another sparkling water, and a "water's fine, thanks." So you, sitting at one of Manhattan's better restaurants and about to order a steak that practically screams for a hearty Cabernet or Bordeaux, are stuck. The meal is already ruined.

Then, food ordering commences. Likely, you are sitting with two or three other men, all of whom are dying to have the steak, veal parmigiana, or some other extremely tasty and unhealthy dish (because Lord only knows what's awaiting you at home tonight). Instead, Customer #1 orders a salad. Not even a Cobb, for Chrissakes. He orders something that, when it finally arrives at the table after 20 intolerable minutes of business conversation, looks like the weeds from my backyard with a Zabar's gift basket spilled over them.

Be a man and order what you want. You wife is not here and, judging from the looks of you, this could be the first salad you've ever ordered in your life.

Come on! Be a man and order what you want. You wife is not here and, judging from the looks of you, this could be the first salad you've ever ordered in your life. Face it: You ordered the salad because you are a fat fuck, and you are too embarrassed to order the ribeye smothered in Gruyere. And, you know you want a beer. Yes, you do. How about you buck up, and have two of them? That way we can relax, and everyone doesn't have to pretend that they are so indispensable that a few mugs of suds could steer the beloved Company off course when you return to your cubicle. Trust me on this—the stock price isn't taking a hit because some mid-level marketing manager "let his hair down" at lunch and banged a few back with his rep.

You've been there, so you know exactly what I'm talking about. It's like the Blackberry phenomena—these days, your identity and self-worth is so tied up in your work, that to be human for a minute may tip someone off to the fact that you're not the next Jack Welch. Well, you're not. So relax, order a beer and a big plate of pasta, and forget about work for a few minutes. There's plenty of time for that when we get back to the office—you know I'm going to be calling you for an ad in a few days, anyway. So for now, why don't we try being friends, have some red wine over a nice, thick steak, and bitch about our home remodeling projects or the price of gas a little bit—anything but work. That way, when I call you up, it's a lot less like someone trying to sell you an ad, and a lot more like two guys who happen to work in the trenches together doing a little business.

Waiter, a martini, please—and keep 'em coming!

Rod, the World's Most Amiable Sales Director

I am sitting with Rod, the World's Most Amiable Sales Director, at an Italian restaurant in the West 20s. We are having our monthly lunch with Tad Tramanto, one of our smaller, but more regular advertisers. Rod is wearing his uniform: a crisply pressed Brooks Brothers striped button-down under a handsome blue blazer, a pair of dressy blue jeans, and some expensive English bench made lace-ups. Maintaining "office casual" attire is something Rod does extremely well, unlike many of our colleagues at Big Publishing Company.

Rod is top boy at No. 1 Industry Mag, and has been bringing in close to $2 million annually for the past several years—a Herculean sales effort for a niche book like ours—and one that brings Rod a respectable, but not extravagant, salary that edges just above the six-figure mark. Along with his salary, Rod receives a healthy benefits package, a decent T&E account, a laptop computer, 20-odd vacation and personal days, and the promise that Big Publishing Company'll clink the retirement jar to the tune of a 5 percent matching contribution. It's not a king's ransom by any stretch of the imagination, but it has afforded Rod a decent lifestyle and, not to be discounted, a sense of stability and predictability not easy to find in New York's volatile job market.

Hailing from South America by way of London, Rod is an extremely handsome black man of refinement and culture, well-spoken, and possessed of real charm. He is, in a word, amiable—the perfect salesman.

I have personally seen him close $20,000 worth of business within 20 minutes to get himself out of a tight spot.

Rod's sales history and account list reveals his ability to attract—and, more importantly, keep—advertising clients. Rod rarely gets a new one, but when he does, they usually stick around for a while. Rod's client base is like a thriving garden, one which he tends and nurtures on a daily basis. Because of his well-tended client base, Rod's one of a select breed of salespeople who can pull in favors when they're needed, and I have personally seen him close $20,000 worth of business within 20 minutes to get himself out of a tight spot.

When you are competing against 10 other magazines, a big part of whether you get the business comes down to relationships. Rod's specialty is creating and nurturing those relationships to the point where he's not just a salesperson, but a trusted confidant, adviser, and—more often than not—friend. This is something that cannot be trained into a salesperson: either you've got it or you don't. Every magazine needs a Rod—preferably two or three of them.

*Names have been changed.

Small Ball

Do you sell ads? Then you know this hoary old chestnut as well as the next space representative: "There is no bigger pain in the ass than the small advertiser." Yes, it's true. You'll sell a $500,000 program (large, even by No. 1 Industry Mag standards) in a week to Grey Advertising or OMD, and never hear from them again until the next quarter. But, dare to sell an 1/8-page B&W vertical to Small Company, and they will call incessantly at all hours of the night. You can count on this more than the fact that I am going to start my day with a Camel Filter and a cup of coffee (black and sweet, just like World's Most Amiable Sales Director Rod).

The small company can't really afford the ad in the first place (which is why they pay up front); is actually genuinely counting on the ad to bring them business (now they call it "ROI"); and is counting on glorious No. 1 Industry Mag to partner with them to raise their fortunes in the business. By the time the negotiations are over and you factor in all the long-distance phone calls, time spent, and the occasional T&E, you have generally lost money on the ad. The kicker? If Small Company doesn't sell a dozen widgets or whatever (which they track mercilessly using "ad codes" and the like), then you will never hear from them again—they'll be in No. 3 Industry Mag, where the 1/8-pages are selling briskly at $250 each, rather than the $1,850 a pop you command.

How about not selling them at all? I'm trying this now, based on this book about "firing your customers." Perversely, once you tell clients that you don't need their business, they stop negotiating and buy something. The old reverse psychology never fails, does it? Now, if I can only figure out how to make the bastards stop calling Rod.

Big Marketing Man

Big Marketing Man
Eric Blumstein* is staring at me over the top of his Diet Coke (no fruit) and telling me in no uncertain terms how important he is. With me is Rod, the World's Most Amiable Sales Director, and I'm not exactly sure he's getting just how big a prick Blumstein is being.

Having just put in his first year, Blumstein's about the fourth man down the marketing totem pole at Big Electronics Company. His boss' timely promotion has left him holding the keys to a fairly sizable marketing budget, a portion of which is responsible for 5 percent of our total annual gross revenue. Bottom line? Without Blumstein's complete enthusiasm for the majority of our elaborate, big-money sponsorships and programs, we're in serious trouble. Therefore, we must acknowledge Blumstein's marketing wisdom and let him dot all the "i's" and cross all the "t's" he wants to. So far, Blumstein seems determined to do a whole lot of crossin' and dottin' before the fall media-buying season.

Sporting a wannabe-hipster goatee and carefully arranged hair meant to simulate bedhead, Blumstein takes a measured sip of his diet soda and brushes an errant piece of tuna tartar from his chin. I am deep into my second scotch-and-soda of this casual meeting and trying to let Rod, Blumstein's direct sales rep, absorb most of his blather. At one point, Blumstein actually says "Everything goes through me." Wow. This bastard is cocky as hell. However, it could be a reaction to our selling a sizable sponsorship behind his back to his ad agency.

As Blumstein goes on, it is hard not to think about the fact that my assistant probably outearns him, and I chastise myself for such a base notion. Later on, I think of this when I start the 90-slide PowerPoint presentation that will be the price of admission into Blumstein's marketing party. God, this is no way to live.

*Names have been changed to protect my account.