The future of media salespeople

If you’re a salesperson or a rep company that’s lucky enough to have bagged yourself a job/contract with an internationally renowned brand then you’re probably making most of your commission for doing 'relatively' little work - All the work has been done in the previous 20-200 years.  You’re selling a huge brand, whether it’s Yahoo, Der Spiegel, or The New York Times – your parents have heard of this, your clients have heard of this, and to be honest, no media buyer is going to lose their job by booking a straight-forward campaign with you because their client knows these titles too. It also helps that you wine and dine your agency contacts and take them to the best pop concerts/festivals/football matches – perk of the job right?

Where you really earn your dough is on the ‘creative solution’. By building a highly bespoke package for a client that brings in multiple elements of what your title can offer, from native type content to online/offline cross media storytelling for the advertiser you will be really showing off the very best of what your organisation can offer as a media company.

However, the commission percentage you earn is the same regardless.....

Big brand media companies are starting to wise up to this. Programmatic Direct or Automated Guaranteed will soon be the route that publishers will take to simply manage the order taking that lazy salespeople have previously enjoyed taking the credit for, and at a far cheaper cost. What does this mean for today’s media salesperson? Gone are the days where simply using your company’s expense budget to the max and being a fun guy or gal to be with is enough to be of value for your business. You’ll need to have a creative mind, and be willing to go the extra mile to understand and push your company to fulfill extraordinary campaigns and really get under the skin of your agency contacts needs.

This shouldn’t be a shock to anyone that’s been around long enough to see how technology has been taking less creative jobs away in other sectors. It’s time for media salespeople to up their game or be prepared to lose their jobs. It’s also time for rep companies to stop relying on juicy contracts from big brand publishers and media companies and earning off the back of those brands and start really earning their livings by understanding their client’s titles and working hard on their behalf to create the big ticket, innovative media campaigns, and leave the order taking to technology that can administrate it.