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2019 Mentor Program Blog Post: Megan Miley & Kevin Albrecht

By Kevin Albrecht posted 09-01-2020 11:35 AM

  
MENTOR: @Megan Miley
Senior AE Corporate Support
Maryland Public Television (Owings Mills, MD)

MENTEE: @Kevin Albrecht
Business Development Coordinator
WGVU Public Media (Grand Rapids, MI)


Megan’s side of the story….

Why did I want to mentor?

Let’s be honest, the thought about a paid vacation (okay, a work trip) to Seattle during the spring might have been the number one reason why I signed up. 

Halibut Cheeks, Alaskan Crab Legs, Oysters, Mussels oh my, I could just taste it! I’m landlocked right now in Vermont, what do you expect? I’m a Baltimorean and have survived on crabs and oysters for decades. One can only eat so much venison in my new state.

And of course, a few months into the program it hit, COVID. Scratch the PBS Annual Meeting and scratch a return visit to PBS Corporate during the fall. All meetings go virtual, at least we were able to meet our mentees face to face last fall.

Other reasons for joining, I always like learning about other PBS stations across the US. Are they a dual, state license, AAA, Classical or University etc…..What makes them successful? What can I steal from them that could work for Maryland Public Television? That was always a big takeaway from Marketing 301 at Clemson University, KISS. Keep it simple, stupid.

They lined me up with Kevin Albrecht with WGVU Public Media, a dual license station. It was an easy friendship from the beginning, I don’t think I could have found a nicer more professional AE to have partnered with. We got to work right away, goals for being a mentee, see below: 

  1. Closing Techniques
  2. Confidence in sales presentations and phone calls
  3. Agency Relationships
  4. Prospecting
  5. HITTING AND SURPASSING GOAL for FY 19/20

We took those objectives and made a plan, two-one hour phone calls a month. If he had questions on off weeks, he would just freely reach out via email or phone, that was never an issue.  He knew my door was always open. I would share proposals and emails with him daily, giving him examples to use in his market.  Share what worked for me, what didn’t.

Once you drink the PBS Kool-Aid it becomes easier to discuss the mission of PBS and or public media in general. CPSI training helped on all of his wants, it wasn’t just the mentor role. Having both of those for Kevin really rocketed him forward. 

We worked on objections, there are only a few reasons why people don’t buy. Once you start to handle those objections and learn how to counter them, it gets easier and easier.  Confidence grows stronger.

As for agencies, everyone associated with PBS have those same issues, you are not alone. We both attended the PMDMC session called “The Great Corporate Support Pivot of 2020”. If you haven’t listened, please check it out, all recorded. Agency media buyers are usually 20 somethings and they might not be familiar with PBS. We have a unique audience; we need to reiterate that fact every time we talk to media buyers. Plus, Kevin worked it out showing how we are more affordable than most broadcasts based on our impressions. He has now started sharing that data with other AE’s.

Prospecting, we discussed how and where to find new leads. How to email them, how to call them. When to follow up etc. Email outline was the best way for cold calling b/c then we could recreate that for several prospects. You change their name and individualize it. Do they have more than one location? How long have they been in business? IVS comes into play here and the more you do, the easier it gets.

Regarding his goal, that was tough last year b/c of Covid, so many companies pulled their ad dollars and kept their purse strings tight. I know other departments across the US had an uphill battle, this is something that was never expected or planned. As 

for 20/21, he’s in a GREAT spot. I believe he will surpass.

So yes, I recommend being a MENTOR, not just for the PBS Annual event. You can really help others grow their markets and have PBS thrive. Plus, you get to learn more about various states and make friends with like-minded individuals. I’m not ending my relationship with Kevin once this is over, we will continue on our friendship and share ideas and use each other to vent about tough clients or celebrate wins together.

 

Kevin’s side of the story…

Like my mentor Megan Miley from Maryland Public Television (MPT), PBS Annual Meeting was definitely a bonus for applying to the PBS Mentor Program. However, it was my ambition to grow in my corporate support role and have the opportunity to work with someone from another station in a different part of the country that really sparked my interest.

This last year in the PBS Mentor Program has been such a wonderful and fulfilling time. In a mentor, I was looking for someone who could be a teacher, a friend, an advocate, or a coach. I found all of these in Megan! I was fortunate to be paired with Megan because we have similar personalities and similar styles of how we approach our work. Without surprise, we hit it off right off the bat when we met last fall, but I never knew just how much I was going to connect with Megan over this past year! But more on that later.

Megan and I got to work right away and started narrowing down the goals I wanted to accomplish during the program. We focused on closing techniques, confidence in sales presentations and phone calls, developing and maintaining agency relationships, prospecting, and HITTING AND SURPASSING GOAL for FY 2020.

We took these goals and made our game-plan for the upcoming year. This included holding at least two, one-hour phone calls a month. But of course, this wasn’t enough. With this being one of my first professional development opportunities, I wanted to utilize the resources and advice that Megan had to share. I always had questions and was looking for feedback on my “sales” strategy and proposals to potential sponsors. Megan was fantastic in this regard and always had an open-door policy. I was able to call or email Megan night and day, and for those quick questions, she was just a short text away. It made our collaboration easy and it felt as though I was working right next to her at times.

Megan’s openness to share proposals, correspondences with prospects and sponsors, and examples of different industries that were working and not working in Maryland’s market helped me develop and refine my strategy when approaching prospects and sponsors in the West Michigan market. I would get emails from Megan almost daily to which we would collaborate, provide feedback, and even debate on strategy. 

Out of everything that Megan taught me, the one thing that I know will always stick with me was creating the Opportunity Pipeline. This singlehandedly became my lifeline over the last FY and will be my lifeline for future FYs. From it, I was able to organize my contacts and proposals, highlight my wins, and even prepare for the next FY. I would send my pipeline to Megan every time we had our scheduled calls and we used it as the framework for our agenda that week. We would review changes to the Pipeline, discuss new opportunities and strategize, and utilize the Pipeline to discuss the topic at hand for that week’s call.

Megan and I were able to work on every goal I had for this program. She had an answer or strategy for everything and I was able to improve on all of my goals. It was truly an honor to learn from Megan. Although I may not have met my FY 2020 goal, due to some unforeseen circumstances (cough, cough, COVID-19), I know the teachings that I learned from Megan over the last year have prepared me to hit the ground running for FY 2021.

Lastly, one of the key takeaways of the PBS Mentor Program was learning that Megan and her colleagues at MPT have many of the same obstacles and frustrations that we at WGVU have. She really opened my eyes to cross-station collaboration. And, by doing this, I’ve had the opportunity to learn from not only Megan but, others from across the country. I’ve developed work relationships with a number of people and have had the chance to ask questions, learn about their stations, and create proposals based on our discussions and ideas. Instances that come to mind include drafting a unique cold-call email that could be used for a new industry that I have not worked with, creating a COVID-19 Initiative Sponsorship at the outbreak of all the shutdowns, and assisting a colleague with a strategy for working with agencies in where they show price per impression as a way to entice a sponsor looking for a cost-effective platform.

By being Megan’s mentee, I was able to grow in my own professional development as a corporate support professional. It instilled a new confidence in my abilities and allowed me to refine and learn new skills. But most of all, and I said I would come back to this… I was able to create a lasting connection with my mentor. Megan has become more than a mentor and coach, she has become someone I can call a friend. Even though the program is coming to an end, I plan to stay in touch with Megan and continue to share ideas, vent, celebrate, and catch up on each other’s families. Thank you so much PBS for the opportunity to be a part of the PBS Mentor Program! If I could do it all again, I would in a heartbeat. I definitely would recommend this program to anyone. Thanks again PBS!

 

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