In today’s ever-changing ways of radio, you have to be one step ahead. Beasley Broadcasting consistently showcases their tenacity when it comes to embracing technology.
Beasley Media Group CEO, Caroline Beasley, is updating the way ads can be purchased with an innovative idea. Now, it’s incredibly easy to purchase something within a matter of literal seconds. Get out the ol’ credit card, enter in your info, and bada bing, you have something to look forward to. This is how Beasley plans to change the ad purchasing game.
According to Borrell Associates’ Local Marketing Trends podcast, Caroline stated “I don’t know of any radio company that offers you the ability to go online and buy advertising online. We’ll, we’re working on that product today.” The plan is to start with digital, then shoot for over-the-air inventory.
How incredible would that be? You’re a small business, you know what you want. You go online: morning show, 30 second spot, you opt to come in and voice, set the date to do so, done.
The reason for this, Beasley noticed digital wasn’t selling as well as on-air. Either the sales team isn’t tackling digital like they should, or the want isn’t prevalent. She’s even stated they’ve let some of the sales team go, due in part to not putting effort towards selling digital. Some, Beasley said, saw the company was gearing towards digital and the employee wasn’t comfortable with it; so they walked. More training was implemented as well as a new mindset of digital first.
Because of these changes, Beasley reported 25% of its second quarter revenue came from digital sales. Whatever Caroline Beasley is doing, is working.
Sales teams, this doesn’t mean this new sales product is aiming for your career. It will help, not take away the personal touch a sales rep has. Businesses can log into the portal and check out what’s available. After this, I’m sure they’ll have questions. Guess who they’ll reach out to? You! Just like AI, it can be scary at first. If you can put that aside and look at the bigger picture of how this can be completely beneficial, you may open a door to a whole new world in sales. Something that can make it easier for you AND help your company in the long run.
According to Caroline, she sees the future of radio going more digital, stating she believes broadcasters won’t need the large buildings anymore due to the cloud and internet based programs. Radio is forever changing. You may as well change along with it.