Digital is Not Scary: How to Help Traditional Sellers Wrap Their Heads Around Digital

I get it. It’s scary to learn a completely new product that you’re unfamiliar with and be expected to go out to your clients and pitch them another product that’s going to get their “doors-a-swingin’, and their registers-a-ringin’”. I’m here to tell you to come on in-the water is warm!

When I first started pitching digital, I thought I was never going to be able to wrap my head around all that there was to offer because there was so much information. How was I going to know the industry lingo? How would I know what products were going to be the right ones to offer? What was considered a successful campaign? Clients couldn’t possibly afford to give me more money on top of what they were already spending, right? Wrong.

First off, I never used industry jargon with most of my clients. I can’t tell you how many times I used food as analogies to explain certain products, and as soon as I did that, lightbulbs went off. Like using a chocolate chip cookie to explain mobile conquesting and geofencing. The entire cookie is your geographical location and targeting categories, and your chocolate chips are your geofences.

I also made it a point to use real life examples so that it was something the client could relate to. If you show that as a marketer you understand where your clients are coming from, they trust you and start to open up. If you gain that credibility as wanting to help them instead of just taking their money and running, you’ve done the hard work. The sales rep that can explain digital in the most understanding way wins the sale.

When we are pitching traditional media to clients, we pair them up with radio stations that fit their demographics, or TV programs that reach a certain audience. Digital is literally the same thing, just on steroids. Radio and TV allow a business to tell their story to the masses (think of a shotgun shot), and digital allows them to pinpoint specific people looking for/interested in certain products (think of a rifle shot). The moral of the story here is that there really are no wrong products to pitch to clients for digital.

“How will I know if this is working?” or “I want to see my ROI” are two phrases we come up against over and over and over again and it’s difficult because airwaves aren’t tangible. You’re still going to get those questions with digital, but now you don’t have to squirm in your seat and beat around the bush. With digital, you’re able to show engagement and interaction, you can show how many people saw an ad and then went to a location. You are able to monitor website traffic and use Google Analytics to see where people are coming from, how long they are staying on a page, and where they are going from page to page; it’s remarkable. If you can show these things to you clients, you’re establishing yourself as the marketing guru, which will lead to more sales.

The most astonishing thing I saw when I started selling digital was the willingness for business owners to open up their wallets a little bit more (no, that’s not a typo). It took me a long time to realize I wasn’t reaching into the personal pockets of business owners but instead their business pockets, and those are two very different pockets. That first time that you ask for more money and you get it, you will be hooked. If you are confident in what you are putting together and can gain the access and credibility, you’re going to have a much easier time getting those digital dollars. I always compare adding digital to your current radio/TV campaign as a “do you want fries with that?” Nine times out of 10, you want fries with that, and your clients do too.