Neutralizing your rate-cutting competitors: work to eliminate price as a dominant factor - cultivating advertisers

A stute publishers and sales managers accept that long-term client relationships are the key to continuous sales growth. But given the extraordinary amount of competition in virtually every market segment, there will always be second- or third-tier competitors wiling to cut rates to snatch away your hard-won business. And other things being equal, your clients wouldn't be human if they didn't go with the lower-priced option--or at least pressure you to match the lower price.

But there is a way to eliminate these price-cutters once and for all Ensure that other things never are equal. In short, the day a client believes you are acting in his or her interests rather than your own is the day price ceases to be the dominant factor in media-buying decisions.

Achieving such a relationship takes time and patience, but is actually not that difficult. Here are some tips:

Improve your editorial. This doesn't mean splashing on more color or doubling the number of pages. Rather, it is a matter of making sure that editorial content accurately meets the needs of your target audience. In the business press, this invariably means slicing out as much advertorial as possible and replacing it with reports on specific threats to and opportunities in each particular market. In consumer magazines, it's more a matter of staying close to your readers, and constantly brainstorming for ideas and trends that affect them.

Once you've achieved superior editorial, it's crucial to ensure that your clients understand that the better the editorial quality, the more time readers will spend studying the adjoining ads. You need to keep hammering that point home: Very few advertisers will make the connection on their own.

The long-term aim should be to create an editorial product so good that you could confidently ask advertisers to poll their major clients to find out which title they read and respect. Even if you know that most won't bother, the fact that you're prepared to issue such a challenge is sure to impress them.

Offer service, service, service

Offer service, service, service. The first marketing tip I ever reamed was the old maxim that "Success comes not from the sale, but from the re-sale." As soon as a new client's ad appears in your magazine, competitors will start swarming around in an attempt to get your client to switch the business to them--usually offering generous discounts in the process. The only way to repeat or better that first schedule at card rates is to convince the advertiser that you're not just a media rep, but a business partner as well.

Last year, for example, one of our titles picked up a new client that has subsequently become the magazine's second largest advertiser. Today this client advertises exclusively through us (in a very crowded market) because we offered their marketing managers service every step of the way In the process, we've convinced them that our fortunes are tied to theirs--which in a sense is not far from the truth.

As sales guru Tom Hopkins is fond of pointing out, clients can't realistically expect to enjoy the best quality product with the finest back-up service, yet pay the cheapest price. Convince advertisers that "price" and "value" are entirely different concepts, then provide that value through superior service.

Be pro-active. call up clients to offer possible editorial ideas for ad-related features or product surveys. Your clients may not have the time to write press releases themselves, so keep a list of reliable freelance PR writers and photographers that you can pass on when the need arises.

Obviously, it's important not to make any promises, and not to compromise the magazine's editorial credibility. But for those advertisers without their own PR strategy or agency, your thoughtfulness will definitely be appreciated.

Help clients find new business opportunities. One of my clients once mentioned that he was seeking a new distributor for a cheaper line of glue guns. By coincidence, I knew of another advertiser who wanted to extend his range of packaging products. So I introduced the two to each other.

Keep your eyes open

Keep your eyes open for these sorts of opportunities: Whether or not a deal is consummated, such assistance helps convince advertisers that you have their concerns at heart. A sales rep's industry network is often bigger than that enjoyed by his or her advertisers. Don't be afraid to use these contacts to your--and their--advantage.

Get them involved. Guide your biggest clients around your office, introduce them to production and editorial staffs, and show them how the process of putting a magazine together works. Make them feel valued, and--more important--make them feel a part of your business.

Become a friend. If necessary, even seek out other media that may help them. One of our advertisers wanted to expand his client universe beyond the particular segment our magazine serves. But because he didn't use an ad agency, he wasn't sure where to start. We advised on suitable magazines within each new sector that he wanted to attack, even when these new titles didn't fall within our stable.

Some may argue that such a strategy is counterproductive. But in this case, the client was so impressed that we'd looked beyond our own immediate self-interests that he switched his entire business for our segment to us--and out of our much less expensive competitor's magazines.

Assist with creative. Even if you have your own creative department, or the client uses an agency, don't be afraid to brainstorm ideas that you think might work. This shows clients that you understand their business and are as concerned as they are that their ad dollars are effectively spent. And don't be afraid to criticize a client's concept constructively (or even, in extreme circumstances, the agency's) if you think their advertisement will not generate the desired response.

The effect of such strategies will be to turn customers into partners, making it much harder for them to be swayed by something as "irrelevant" as price.

Obviously, this is a time-consuming process. And given the need to find new business, you can't lavish such attention on all your clients. But if you value the business of, say, your 20 largest spenders and want to make sure they maintain or increase their business at card rates, you are going to have to go that extra mile. But isn't that what characterizes the best sales reps, anyway?

James Parker publishes several business and consumer titles for Australian-based Yaffa Publishing Group.

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