Radio Sales Café

We are a five station cluster looking at revamping our rate card significantly. Currently, the three FM's all sell for the same price and the two AM's sell for the same price. We frequently tell retailers that expanding your product offerings and hours may help increase sales. Do we need to follow our own advice and price all five stations at different price points?

 

We were set to do this but are, frankly getting a little gun shy. For some reason, it appears buyers think of radio sales people like they do car sales people making negotiating price a requirement for a sale to occur.

 

Also, does anyone offer BTA rates anymore?

 

Jack

We have a 5 station cluster in Terre Haute, IN. (The city that just got dropped by the little airline that was supposed to fly to Branson...ah well) Our two AM's are sold as one, since they simulcast ESPN Radio + other sports. Our FM's sell at different rates, because our AC is a 50kw station, and our other two FM's are Class A's. You can take a look at our media kit through a link at www.radioworksforme.com. We've also had great success in selling annual plans we call "The President's Club. Advertiser gets 25 30-second or 20 60-second commercials for $499 per month on the station of choice. If he/she buys 2 of our stations, it's $649, and $1149 for all stations. The kicker on this, though, as that they also get a share of our "unsold" inventory DAILY, which usually amounts to an additional 2-3 spots a day. We have about 45 PC advertisers on air right now. If you start out with just a few, you'd want to schedule the "fills," so you don't run too many ads for your advertiser. Contact me if you'd like additional details. We've also found that rate cards are kind of meaningless these days, but what we have is pretty simple.

We made it really simple and put all of our 6 station cluster on one rate card grid. It's an excel file with the time frames on the left, stations at the top and the :30 and :60 rates listed below each station for each requested time slot. E-mail me at lynnlambrecht@amfmradio.biz and I'll send it to you. Makes it really easy to show them all our stations and let them pick their time slot and their rate.

I suggest something that could help you, and by the way it is FREE. Go to http://www.smartrategold.com. This is a free on line contract writer that will allow you to do different rates for all of your stations while giving the people selling the advantage of selling into lower demand dayparts for less, or lower demand days for less. This may all sound complicated, but it is the lite version of one of our software suites and is free... yep not kidding... free. by the way, I am not a software company... I am a radio station manager and we created this for our own stations. Look it over and if you'd like to try it out, call me and I'll help you set it up.

Jack, in general we've seen the more sophisticated the rate card, the more revenue generated. Pricing individual stations, individual dayparts, even differnt rates on different days helps you balance inventory and maximize yield... much the way airlines practice yield managment. We're seeing that BTA is still out there, but not much. Advertisers want to know exactly what they are going to get in this era of accountability.

Going to the NAB Show next week? RAB's Mark Levy is presenting a session Tuesday on pricing strategies called "Raising Radio Rates." John

The Prez Club is an interesting concept. Is that 25 30's a month 6a-mid?

Sounds very good. Do you have an example of this that you could post or email to me at jackwalker@krzk.com?

Thanks Lynn. I have emailed you as requested.

The reason why Radio Sales People = Used Car sales People is because The Radio Industry is now run by non-broadcasters.

Yes, to make each station have their own rate card if they buy is one station. If the buy is all 3 FM's, then you may have a common rate (an average of the three). The same with the 2 AM's.

Have your sales people sell ideas, not rate, or AQH or CPP.

Get your sales people to act professionally and watch the sales climb.

Alan Rock
Orlando, FL

Couldn't agree more with all you said. One of the most astounding things I've ever heard is, "don't let the rate get in the way of a sale." Sometimes you just need to walk away. Act like a beggar - treated like a beggar.

If you would, give me some specific examples of what you mean by "act professionally."