December 2015 Jokes

What did the baby shark do when it got lost?
It whaled!

Why was the bird wearing a wig?
Because it was a bald eagle!

Where do young fish go every morning?
To their school!

Why do pigs write a lot of letters to each other?
Because they are Pen pals!

Why was the elephant mad at the hotel bellhop?
Because he dropped his trunk!

A policeman saw a woman walking down the street with a hippo.
He said to the woman, "Ma'am you need to take that hippo to the zoo.
The next day the policeman saw the woman again walking the hipppo.
He told her, "Ma'am I thought I told you yesterday to take that hippo to the zoo.?!"
The woman said, "I did take him to the zoo and today we're going to the movies!"

Happy New Year!
Ev
A Heck of A Nice Guy

Bert and Ernie's "Gift of the Magi"

Happy Holidays Everyone!

Enjoy and remember that it is our family and loved ones we always need to take care of.

Bert and Ernie's "Gift of the Magi"

Thank you for everything you've done for me!
Ev

A Heck of A Nice Guy 

Ev's Recruitment Answers: Why I Write this Blog

This is my 500th blog article.

It is also the 15th anniversary of my monthly client newsletter that started as an email and now morphed into this blog.

I've written before on why I think you should read this blog:

why-read-this-blog

and why I write this blog:

why-i-write-this-blog 

However those of you with good memories have noticed that the name of the blog went from "Ev's Recruitment Answers" back to the original name of "Ev's Sales Answers."

I changed back to the original name because I've always tried to continuously define who I'm writing this for. There are two target audiences.The first is obvious...you. My clients, prospects, and thanks to the digital age- readers and fans who find me through the search engines.

I always try to keep you informed of changes in the industry, ideas that can help your business, and remind you that I'm a resource for you for networking, advice, or resources. Plus I like to voice my opinion on subjects and like to hear yours. The digital age allows all of us to have a voice and I appreciate you reading and listening to mine.

The second reason is that sales is a career I've never shied away from and has been a part of my life since I sold the first fund raiser items for cub scouts in second grade.

Sales has been a part of every job I've had and I've been fortunate to experience and learn things that I want to pass on to you and to my family.

I started selling Kirby Vacuum cleaners in 1991. It was my first professional sales job.

Our daily sales meeting started at 8am and

I averaged 4-5 demonstrations each day. 

It was not uncommon that my day would end at 10 or 11pm.

Every night my dad would wait up for me.

He was a great salesman.

He would ask how my day went and would go though each appointment and my conversations with the clients and he would explain what I did right and wrong. 

It was during these talks that I got to know my Dad and he me. These conversations and early sales experiences taught me many of my core beliefs on selling and customer service.

There isn't a day that goes by in my sales career that I don't think of his advice and lessons.

Many of them I've talked about in this blog, and with you over the years.

I write these blogs not only to help you and others, but to pass along my Dad's lessons to my son. Even if he doesn't go into sales for a career, the lessons from his Dad and the Grandfather he never met will be out in cyberspace for him to read and to get to know us.

Thank you to all of you for everything you have done for me.

Thank you to everyone who have read, or are reading, this blog or my client emails.

Ev

A Heck of A Nice Guy

My son unloading food donations for Cub Scouts

Why Newspaper Job Ads are Dead pt. 4: Poor Customer Service

As a veteran of the job posting wars of the 1990's and 2000's I just wanted to jot down my thoughts, because back then the newspaper recruiting classifieds were the biggest method there was to find a job besides networking. I helped chip away at that big rock, until now that same job section is about two pages. Here is the fourth part of this article. To read the others click the links below:

pt. 3: Not Local
pt. 2 Revenue and Pricing
pt. 1: A Local Perspective

Lets review a couple of points from the other articles first:

Why were so many companies trying the internet and taking budget away from the newspaper? The internet boom was on! Remember all the DotCom companies that were popping up? The fuel they provided for the economic boom of the late 1990's? Now days we look back and wonder how did we ever live without our internet connections? Companies were searching for other ideas to reach job seekers. There was a talent shortage going on (and still is). Companies were willing to try anything to find the employees they needed.

Price was another factor. Internet ads were usually $100-$300 with full color and were unlimited in size. You could ad color, pictures, logos, anything that could be placed in the ad. The same money might buy you a 15 line classified ad. No pictures. No color. Placement on the website didn't usually matter as much as in a newspaper. Small companies with small budgets were treated the same as large companies with large budgets. A small retail store could compete equally with a retail giant chain because the cost of getting thier ads noticed with additional services like homepage logos and featured ads were affordable to all.

Both of these lead to another reason why newspaper ads died, poor customer service.

Poor customer service was a problem. A big chunk of the clients I sold in those days were fed up with the mistakes in the layout or billing. The mistakes they could have forgiven if they were given an ounce of cooperation by the paper, however since the newspaper had always been the recritment advertising industry leader they were very inflexible with package price and "make-good ads." They thought they would always be the big player in the room and they could do whatever they wanted and always be profitable. Customers would often tell me horro stories of trying to get someone on the phone, only to not have calls returned or be passed on from one person to the next and never seeing their corrected ad run. With job boards the customer could change the ad almost instantly if they made a mistake when they posted it themselves, or were able to call someone local if they needed help to correct an ad.

The fact that customer service was located nearby also helped. Companies liked the fact that if they had a problem they could call "Ev" who was located in the same city just a few minutes away. They got to know "Ev" as a face of the company. 'Ev" took them to lunch, met with them to follow up on their results, and became a consultant or friend that valued who and what they are as a company and what they were trying to do. As long as what "Ev" said made sense and they liked who "Ev" was as a person and salesman they were willing to give the job board a try.  Snotty customer service reps locally for the newspaper or anonymous customer service reps for bigger newspapers who didn't know or care about local company "X" except to get them to pay their bill so the rep would get their commission.

Longevity of account reps was also a factor. I stayed in the industry for 13 years. Clients and prospects knew who I was. I was that old pair of shoes in the closet that may not be the fanciest, but sure were comfortable and looked good. Others stayed in the industry for several years too. Newspaper reps, not so much. More and more companies switching over to online ads complained that they never know who their rep was. Couldn't get in touch with them when they needed to buy ads or make changes to an existing ad, but always heard from the rep when the rep needed to make their monthly goal. Clients see through that very fast. Then all you become is a commodity and no one wants to be treated like that.

So if you have read the other articles, here are the three big reasons newspaper job ads are dead:

1. Pricing
2. Not Local
3. Poor Customer Service

Maybe this is great insight or not.   
I don't know. 
It is just the view of someone who was there and helped make it happen.

Thanks for reading!

Ev

A Heck of A Nice Guy

Journal with another lame website

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has gone with another partnership with Monster.com in an effort to boost recruitment advertising.
Since I got into the business in 1995, the newspaper has tried a number of different iterations in an attempt to gain back the recruitment advertising revenue lost from the print side.
It started in 1998 with Employment Wizard which was just the paper scanning the print ads and putting them online.

When compared to their main rivals at the time, WisconsinJobs.com and MilwaukeeJobs.com, it was a novice site. That changed into a better attempt with JSOnline, then a partnership with Monster.com. That ended with the paper going back to promoting their own job section on the website. Now the partnership with Monster is back.
The problem the paper faces hasn't changed, how do you recover the dollars that were spent on recruitment advertising with them and are now going somewhere else?

Currently MilwaukeeJobs.com is the remaining local big player, however even they are under threat by LinkedIn.com, Indeed.com, and social media, what is the Journal Sentinel to do?
There are no easy answers, however having been part of the local recruitment wars from 1997-2010 and seen first hand the changes the paper made to their site over that time, I would figure out what my strengths are as an organization and resource. What is the community lacking and can our organization fill that need and more importantly dominate it?
For example I would find out what demographics read the physical paper and more importantly use the website. Then create a job website based around and marketed to those demographics. If the data showed the website was popular with medical personnel and lawyers, I would concentrate on a design and features that would cater to those groups and focus my marketing efforts on those groups. It would be a niche website, but I would work to be the absolute best recruiting website for those demographics so that no matter what other sources a company uses to get those people they have to include me somewhere in the mix.  If other companies wanted to advertise other positions I wouldn't turn them down, however I would understand that revenues would be grown strictly from my dominance of that category of job seekers. The hard part is figuring out what that niche would be. If it was easy all companies would have that figured out and never struggle.
Ev
A Heck of A Nice Guy