Interview with a Deal Maker

I recently spoke with a colleague, Josh, who is in the advertising sales business, selling available commercial time on a cable television network.  I asked a few questions about his negotiating practices, and his answers are featured below:  

I first asked Josh about the challenge of separating people from the problems in negotiating, and he responded, “When in negotiations with clients, who in a majority of the time are friends, I have to separate the friendship from the business relationship.  A lot of buyers like to use the friendship as leverage to get a better deal; however, I just always put the business objectives of the network ahead of any friendship.”

Then I followed up with a question of dealing with the negative emotions that often arise in negotiating.  To this, Josh said, “In direct response [advertising], we deal with a lot of negative emotion, especially when a client is bumped or just not clearing.  We deal with this by offering the client an alternate option or options, and they’re usually satisfied.”

When I asked about using leverage and power, he answered that during “the past two years, the sales teams certainly had the leverage with all the money coming in; we were picking and choosing what business to take.  However, everything is cyclical, and I never abuse any power I may have at the time.”

I then questioned Josh about how he deals with shady tactics or tricky deals, to which he simply answered, “I personally only experienced one shady tactic, and my way of dealing with it was to go to management, make them aware of the situation, and then just handle it the way our company policy tells us to.”

Josh continued, explaining about his take on mutual benefit negotiations.  “I don’t really like to do any mutually beneficial deals.  In my negotiations, I have seen it backfire badly.  I sell what we have at the rates needed to achieve [our] goal.  I will, however, always try to help clients in any way possible to make their deals work.  I never make any promises or guarantees, but I usually am able to get them some sort of deal, if need be.”