askatoon: There’s a trend that’s winning converts among television sales departments and sponsors, and it’s called sales promotion. The idea is to tie sponsors to a contest that promotes a program or event, making both sides winners.

Delegates to CanPro ’94 rallied to the cause after a spirited presentation from David Hamilton, director of promotions and media relations for the Global Television network, and Jeff Eisler, promotions and marketing manager at cict-tv, Calgary.

‘It’s a good way to attract new clients and keep existing ones,’ Hamilton said.

‘Both sides benefit, once you convince the sales department a sales promotion won’t dip into their revenues,’ added Eisler.

Eisler said he initially ran into resistance from his sales department, but ‘now all the sales staff want promotions. Every client wants value-added; wants the style of promotion.’

Stations can have too much of a good thing, said Hamilton.

‘We have no set limit on how many promotions we do over a year, but we make sure we don’t have a number overlapping. We make sure there’s quality so people want to enter the contests.’

It all comes down to the bottom line and convincing station management sales promotions can improve it. Sales promotions are an idea whose time has come, said Eisler.

‘Sales promotions can generate revenue. They can promote programs at the same time. Time is in our favor.’ MB