Persistence is the key to selling out-of-home. But relevance is important as well, because persistence without relevance is annoyance.

We’ve lost sight of relevance through all of the mass sales training and all the initiatives that come down from corporate. In my office we would have to take an actual client presentation we prepared, and present it to the sales team prior to going out. I can’t tell you how many times reps would just go through the standard PowerPoint deck of our marketing materials. I always received high marks because every single slide had a specific, relevant reason for being in the presentation, even if it was a general marketing slide. Every slide must be customized, even if just 2-3 words. Change “Out-of-home reaches 97% of the people in the Twin Cities” to “Out-of-home reaches 97% of the prospects that XYZ Company wants to reach in the Twin Cities.” Three or four additional words add relevance. The optimal is having a custom “reach” statistic for their target audience. All of a sudden the prospect thinks this is relevant.

I hear new sales reps in the bullpen, when they are leaving cold-call voice messages. Often, they’re not leaving a message with any relevance. You must have a relevant benefit headline. Start the voicemail with that benefit, then identify and explain yourself. You can research anything about any company in a matter of 10 minutes. To put this info in a one-sentence relevant teaser in a voice mail is very simple and very powerful.