Interview with Robert Sturtevant, AMA New Member: “There’s an evolution going on with how people access information. No one laments the fact that we don’t use stone tablets any more.”

AMA Interviewer: Maria Ratanova - American Marketing Association
Interviewee: Robert Sturtevant of Boston Business Journal

A unique person in the BBJ

MR - Can you describe your role in the Boston Business Journal?
RS - I have a unique function in the American City Business Journals as a whole. My position changed over a year ago. I was a Senior Account Executive managing advertising accounts. I still do that, but part of my time is now spent as a Sponsorship Sales Director overseeing the processes and benefits, and providing tools and communications for the rest of the sales team, to make sure that we get our sponsorship sales done. We have three business lines: the print product, the electronic products, and the events business, which was our fastest growing business in 2008.

MR - How do you attract sponsors?
RS - We put on business events that are attended by 500 to 1000 top level executives. We had Pacesetters in April. In May we are doing a Green Business Summit, which is all related to sustainability. In June – Best Places to Work. They are sponsorable events. And we know from surveying our sponsors that the greatest benefit they derive from their investment is associating their brand with the theme of our event. We also have sponsorable publications like the Book of Lists. Our readers place a high value on it: it’s the most objective content based on pure research.

MR - How did you become Sponsorship Sales Director?
RS - I think the most important contribution I made was leadership by example. And I had a lot of new sponsorship initiatives, I tended to sell more sponsorships than anyone else. There are many ways that the clients can spend their money with us. And, you know, certain industries are more apt to buy sponsorships than the others. So I tended to handle industries that were more likely to buy sponsorships, I really liked it and understood it. That, I think, made me a good candidate for this role.

MR - Can you describe your best project in the BBJ?
RS - I’ll sum it up by saying that the 2008 sponsorship revenue grew by 45% over 2007. I’ll take some credit for that.

Thriving BBJ versus dying newspapers

MR - Newspapers are going through hard times today. What helps BBJ to stay up?
RS - We are a niche publication. People often express concern when I tell them I'm a media figure, they think we are struggling, but in fact we are not. We have grown circulation four out of the last five years in Boston. While the daily papers are seeing decreases in readership, we are seeing a general uptick in readership. American City Business Journals had their best year in 2007, both in terms of advertising revenue and in terms of increased readership. We are a thriving media company in a struggling economy, not a struggling media company in a struggling economy.

MR - What are your strategies?
RS - It’s a number of factors. First, the daily papers historically relied heavily on help wanted and classified advertising. With the advent of the Internet that became outmoded. But we are a niche publication: no one else delivers the content we deliver in a way that we deliver it. We are reporting on the local, market by market, small to medium-sized businesses that drive the country’s economy.
Second, we are recognizing the evolving media. We have launched a national business social networking site: www.bizjournals.com, which is a company within itself, it's responsible for all of our additional content and websites. Our audience of daily e-mail updates subscribers and website visitors is growing fast: we have 650, 000 visitors to our website per month and almost 22,000 daily e-mail subscribers, which is twice as many compared to last year.

MR - Does the content of the BBJ ever overlap with that of The Boston Globe?
RS - Not really. We are a business tool, we are read in a workplace by top level business people. The truth is that a lot of our readers don’t read The Globe, because by the time we get to it's print edition we’ve already seen or heard our local and national news through the email devices or on the radio, or through newsletters, or RSS feeds.

MR - Why do you think the BBJ’s chances to survive are better that those of The Globe?
RS - There is certainly an evolution going on with how people access information. No one laments the fact that we don’t use stone tablets any more. But as long as there are businesses and people running them, there will be a need for good local coverage and content. Most B2B companies derive 80% of their revenue locally. Therefore local business news remains critically important to help them grow and succeed in business. But I think the BBJ will gradually evolve into something else, which will include events, online, and who knows what else is coming down.

MR - How did you get involved in marketing?
RS - I have a funny answer. When I was 11 years old, I was licensed by the US Department of Agriculture in the state of Vermont, to breed and sell hamsters to pet stores. That’s how I learned my first lessons in sales, negotiating skills, pricing and product development. I say that somewhat tongue in cheek, but there is some truth to it. Then in my 20s I owned a commercial residential cleaning company with my wife. That’s when I started to realize that I could make a career out of sales.

MR - If you are your own brand, then what is the tagline for a brand campaign for you?
RS - Live, laugh, love.

MR - What makes a good marketer?
RS - You need to understand the audience.

Twitter or no Twitter?

MR - Do you use social media in your work?
RS - I only recently got involved with LinkedIn, and I'm not on Facebook. I signed up for Twitter impulsively, but don’t fully understand how it works, and most importantly – how Twitter can help me find somebody who wants to spend $50,000 advertising in the BBJ within the next two weeks. I’d like to be shown how I can use it to my advantage.

Love, kids and what we all should eat

MR - Do you have passions outside work?
RS - I have a big vegetable garden. It’s about 1000 sq. ft., tomatoes, squash, green beans, root vegetables: carrots, beets, to make some Russian borsch. I love beets. And I have four kinds of berry bushes.

MR - What is your biggest accomplishment?
RS - My two children, 9 and 14 years old, and my family in general. I have one of the healthiest marriages I know of.

MR - Do you have any idea of what you might be going ten years from now?
RS - I’d like to start some kind of sustainable community project. I’m very interested in slow food movement, local agriculture and local farmers: the movement that Edible Boston is advocating. I’d like to figure out how to do this and make money out of this.