The Case For Selling Multi-Platform Media

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The way Leslie Laredo sees it, media sales forces need to make sweeping changes in the way they approach, sell and create advertising opportunities. Otherwise, she said, they simply may no longer be up to the job.

“Being successful is really about learning how to deal with the change going on in media,” Laredo, president of Laredo Group, said Monday at BIA/Kelsey’s Digital Strategies for Broadcasting conference in Jersey City, N.J.

“Media consumptions have changed dramatically and advertisers want to be part of this world,” said Laredo, an industry pioneer in interactive and Internet advertising who trains media professionals on how to buy and sell interactive media.

Gone are the days, she said, when television, radio or newspaper sales teams would be responsible for simply selling spots.

Today, Laredo said, sales teams needs to be well versed in a variety of platforms – as well as how best they can serve an advertiser’s needs. It’s also essential for sales teams to truly understand a media’s brand – the brand that goes beyond programming – to sell it right, she said.

Advertisers today, she said, want to take advantage of the array of platforms and technologies to reach targeted communities.

“They get it,” she said. “They want to connect with their consumers, they want to be part of conversations.”

In creating opportunities for advertisers to do just that, media sales forces also have to understand the creative end to advertising – as in, what works and what doesn’t – and the technical side to online advertising, so that merchants understand that the success of online ads cannot always be measured by the number of individuals clicking on them.

None of the above, however, can be accomplished unless company individuals from the top down understands and supports a multi-platform approach to advertising and ways to use it.

“The entire organization needs to get digital,” Laredo said. “If your whole team isn’t going to support it, then your sales team is going to wonder why they are still out there pounding the streets.”

Part of that is taking a holistic approach to media assets and outlets so that a media company’s assets are properly leveraged, she said. That’s key to maximizing opportunity for advertisers, some of which may be better suited for one platform then another, she said.

“We don’t want to have the same dollars, we want to have the more dollars,” Laredo said.

Earning those, however, means packaging the good ideas that reach crowds.

“Be flexible, nimble and innovative,” Laredo said.