My Work Week As An Advertising Sales Rep

What Does An Advertising Sales Rep Do?

An Advertising Sales Rep is responsible for presenting, organizing, maintaining, and following through with their clients’ advertising/marketing needs. In other words, an Advertising Sales Rep helps businesses grow by attracting new/existing customers.

Although the definition is pretty straightforward there is a lot more to the job than you might think. This article is to give insight into the planning and executing the many responsibilities an Advertising Sales Rep has to service his/her clients.

**Disclaimer Alert – My work week as an Advertising Sales Rep has one goal…To Help!! While this article may be titled “My Work Week As An Advertising Sales Rep”, my work week can be loaded with surprises that I didn’t see coming and some needs take priority over others. That being said, I do my best at predicting these surprises and helping my clients through them before they become problems.

Monday – Research new (or existing) marketing opportunities and understand the ins and outs of how it works. This includes (but is not limited to) how many people the opportunity reaches, the demographics/geographics of people that the opportunity will influence, what the deliverables are (print, digital, physical assets), deadlines, cost, production schedules, images, video, and/or messaging the advertiser will use to gain the most attention from the audience. All these questions need to be answered before an Advertising Sales Rep can even think of presenting it to potential clients.

Tuesday – Prospect clients based on what was discovered on Monday. Create a prospecting list with clients’ names, phone numbers, and emails. A more detailed Advertising Sales Rep will include why it’s a good opportunity for the client and clearly define the ROI (return on investment). The goal here is to take what you know about the client’s goals and apply it to a specific opportunity.

For example, a new restaurant is having a grand opening celebration and has a goal to fill 30 tables with people who live in the area on opening night. An Advertising Sales Rep will take note of this goal and apply it to a number of opportunities that will aid in surpassing that goal. It’s not about pitching every opportunity, it’s about pitching the right opportunity that aligns with the stated goal.

Wednesday – Pick up the phone, write emails, create social posts, visit physical locations, and/or send texts. Contact everyone on the prospecting list and inform them about the opportunity. This includes all the questions that you answered for yourself on Monday and all others the prospects are asking. The Advertising Sales Rep needs to be an expert in not only the advertising opportunity but how it fits into their clients’ overall marketing strategy. Above all Advertising Sales Reps should be LISTENING. While they listen they should be cueing in on prospects’ pain points, goals, upcoming events, new releases, etc.

Thursday – By now an Advertising Sales Rep has gone through their first list of contacts that would be a good fit for an advertising/marketing opportunity. It’s time to refine the delivery of your message and continue picking up the phone, making meetings, texting, emailing, and going to networking events. It’s time to think outside the box and stretch your reach by thinking of new prospects that weren’t thought of on the first prospecting list.

By now an Advertising Sales Rep has gotten some orders and is ready to start collecting assets (images, video, and/or messaging) for all their clients’ upcoming campaigns. All other conversations with prospects will include answering questions and outlining the upcoming campaign in more detail.

Friday – The most exciting day…trafficking day!! This is when the rubber meets the road and the campaign goes live or is set to go live. All assets are submitted, target markets are defined, and proofs are received. This is when the public gets to see the work. Up until now, it was all behind the scenes. Once a campaign goes live an Advertising Sales Rep must make sure that the targets and messaging are correct and that they’re setting their clients up for success.

Saturday – Yes, we work on Saturdays. This is a good time to analyze data and see that campaigns are showing good numbers. If something looks off tweak the campaign to deliver the best results based on a client’s goals. Saturdays are also a good time to get outside, go to your local downtown shopping area, attend an event and get more ideas to start thinking about on Monday.

Defining my work week as an Advertising Sales Rep is very tough. The topics mentioned in this article are the tasks that need to be done week after week in order for my clients to remain successful. However, something to note is while I would love to close deals in just a week, sometimes the sales process can take months or even years. The trick to being successful is having constant and open communication with clients, continuing to adapt, learning from the data that is presented, and tweaking campaigns to spend advertising dollars in the most effective ways.

There’s no doubt that other Advertising Sales Reps are reading this article and they might agree with some of the weekly responsibilities, but they may have vast differences in what they find most important in their work week. All in all, the goal remains the same for every Advertising Sales Rep. To HELP grow business!!

If you found something in this article that you need assistance with please feel free to reach out via email at dotzeromedia@gmail.com or give us a call at 970-401-3044

Thanks For Reading!

DZM