Hi Damon,
I am in an extremely small market on an island in Alaska. We are rated every other year by Eastlan. I found that those small regional reps did nothing for us except for to have us raise our rates to accommodate their increased commission! So I did the research myself and looked up agencies in the State in which I live and in the nearest state to me and got all their contact info including who was responsible for radio buys in the State of Alaska. Then I sent them all a media packet tailored to them that also included a note from me giving them the unique reasons why they should spend their clients dollars here. It worked! We went from having 5 agencies buying from us to having over 75. Cultivate the relationship just like you would with a regular client. We found that even though these small reps claimed they could deliver clients to us that we didn't have on the air, that it simply wasn't true. Once people got to know us and that we were small and did everything ourselves, they were willing to deal directly with us and we gave them the standard industry rate of 15% discount instead of paying these other media reps a 25-30% discount.
Best Wishes!
Julie Slanaker
Thanks Julie,
I have had success with agencies in the State. Past experience with regional reps also has been poor. Our market is smaller than extremely small LOL (about 8600 people).
Hello everyone, in the spirit of complete disclosure, I work for Regional Reps (this is Shayna).
This thread is obviously of particular interest to us. Since the company's founding in 1956, we've done our best to bring regional and national business to Radio stations in small and medium markets all over the country. If you have questions, complaints, constructive criticism and even kudos, I would love to hear it and share it with our team.
I'll keep checking this thread for responses, or you can email me directly at [email protected]. Check out our website, read the newsletter, see what we've been up to! If you're going to be at the Radio Show next week, drop me a line if you have a few minutes to chat.
I'm looking forward to hearing what everyone has to say!
Correction: I didn't mean the firm with the name in my post. I meant reps (in general) we have used in the past.
