When I tell people part of my job as business manager of MJR is selling advertisements, they cringe.
“Ew…I hate selling ads,” one of my friends said as her lips scrunched up into her nose and she frowned more severely than my 7-year-old sister looking at a dead worm on the sidewalk. My friend sold ads for her high school newspaper, and she seems to relive those nightmarish days while I continue making calls.
I don’t tell her that I love selling advertisements for fear that she’ll look up and give me the dead-worm-on-the-sidewalk-gawk. So, instead, I compliment her hair because it looks good, and the memories of her days as a saleswoman sink back into her subconscious.
It’s not that I enjoy money, budgeting, or success—all important parts of sales and being a business manager.
Instead, it is the relationship of business that I secretly love. Advertisers support our magazine and in return we tell our readers with a bold, colorful ad that this person deserves their business. If all relationships in the world were this equal…well, fill this part in with any appropriate metaphor about love, happiness and compassion.
The best part of my job happened recently. An advertiser agreed to buy an online ad. I informed them that they could get published in our magazine for just a bit more—commonly known to others as “upselling” but I would rather use “informing.” The advertiser laughed and said, “You’re trying to upsell me!”
Now a salesperson would cringe at this comment, but I laughed right along with him because I’m myself before any business title. We settled on sticking with the original advertisement and that was perfectly fine.
Being a salesperson means making fun of yourself, your tactics and your sales pitch. In fact throw all that out the window and only keep the genuine parts. I genuinely believe in Montana Journalism Review. And I really, truly love selling ads.
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Want to advertise in this year’s publication–Montana Journalism Review’s 41st issue? We know…a shameless plug, but we had to try right?
No really, please let us know if you are interested!
