Читать книгу Media Selling - Warner Charles Dudley - Страница 45

The transition to an Internet‐dominated, digital economy created a shifting emphasis for media salespeople from that of selling and getting an order toward one of building relationships, solving problems, and educating customers based on insights coming from analyzing data. Meanwhile, there was less time available for preparation, planning, and purchasing as advertising campaigns ran for shorter and shorter periods of time, and buyers often wait until the last minute to place schedules or buy programmatically.

The new approaches explained above also require an understanding of a hierarchical set of concepts: a sales organization’s mission, objectives, strategies, and tactics. As in any military or business organization, in a sales organization the salespeople must understand these four concepts and follow their precepts in order to have consistent and meaningful selling‐as‐serving, focus‐on‐customer‐success, selling‐as‐educating, and connecting‐emotionally approaches.

Another important reason for emphasizing a sales organization’s mission that includes such values as selling‐as‐serving, focus‐on‐customer‐success, and selling‐as‐educating is because having a job that is serving‐oriented and meaningful is what a large majority of young people entering the job market today are looking for. A 2018 Harvard Business Review article titled “9 out of 10 people are willing to earn less money to do more‐meaningful work” details the many advantages to companies of providing meaningful, purpose‐driven work to employees.²²

However, before a sales organization (division or department) can articulate sales‐specific mission, objectives, strategies, and tactics, it must answer the purpose question about the company or organization it is a part of. The purpose question is, “What is our reason for existence?”

Peter Drucker’s view of a company’s only purpose being “to create a customer” was written in 1954, and was helpful for businesses in that era, but people and their needs have changed over the 65 years since Drucker made that often‐quoted statement. Drucker’s intent almost certainly was to shift businesses, particularly manufacturing businesses, from an internal, production‐focused approach to an external, customer‐focused, marketing‐oriented approach, which many of them subsequently did. In the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, most major businesses took a customer‐focused, marketing approach to their businesses.

But in the early 2000s the Enron and Worldcom scandals put a spotlight on corporate greed and deception as a new generation of employees entered the workforce. This new generation wanted more from their employers than just a paycheck. Many of them wanted meaning in their work at the same time as the Internet was changing the world. Internet companies, in order to attract talented young people, began to adapt purpose or mission statements that gave meaning to the work the young people did.

Google adopted a motto of “don’t be evil” and articulated a purpose or mission to express the reason for its existence: “To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” Google has since dropped the slogan “don’t be evil,” but still is driven by its meaningful and inspiring mission, which is one of the many reasons in 2017 Google topped the list of Fortune magazine’s list of the best companies to work for in America for the eighth time in 11 years.

Facebook is also considered by many young people to be one of most desirable companies to work for in America. In LinkedIn’s 2018 list of top companies at which people wanted to work, Facebook ranked number three, behind Amazon and Alphabet (Google’s parent company). One of the reasons for Facebook’s popularity is its mission statement: “Making the world more open and connected.” However, in 2018, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced a change in the mission statement. It is now: “Bring the world closer together,” which is still inspiring and positive and more in tune with Facebook’s effort to reduce fake news and divisive posts, some of which were attributed to Russia during the 2016 US presidential election.

Google and Facebook’s mission statements have been widely covered in the general and trade press. Why? Because the concept of a business doing well by doing good, in other words, having a commitment, or cause, of serving their communities and doing something good for humanity has been shown to be good business because it attracts and keeps good, purpose‐driven employees. Having a meaningful cause also appeals to consumers and suppliers.

For example, Facebook surveys its workforce twice a year, asking employees what they value most. After examining hundreds of thousands of answers over several years, the company identified three primary motivators: career, community, and cause. In a Harvard Business Review online article written by Facebook HR executives and Adam Grant, cause was defined as follows: “Cause is about purpose: feeling that you make a meaningful impact, identifying with the organization’s mission, and believing that it does some good in the world. It’s a source of pride.”²³ These findings from Facebook reinforce the notion that having a meaningful purpose, or cause, is a significant motivator for employees.

Even many traditional manufacturing companies have adopted socially conscious mission, or purpose, statements. For example, the mission statement of P&G, one of the world’s largest advertisers, is: “We will provide branded products and services of superior quality and value that improve the lives of the world's consumers.”

One of the reasons for the corporate emphasis on meaningful mission, or purpose, statements is the realization that, in general, most people want a sense of meaning in their work, as Facebook discovered. In Daniel Pink’s 2011 book, Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, the author writes that there are three things that motivate humans: autonomy, mastery, and purpose. People want autonomy because they do not like to be told what to do all the time. They seek mastery because there is an inherent drive to be good at something. They seek purpose to give meaning to their work.

Therefore, a sales organization must be in synch with its corporate mission, its corporate purpose. So, if you work for Google in sales, the purpose, or mission, of the company is, “To organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful,” but Google’s sales organization has its own mission to support its corporate mission.