The Around Campus Group
The Around Campus Group is a media and advertising company. Headquartered in Raleigh, NC, it employs over 800 college students nationwide to sell advertising space in student planners, a mobile app, and a website.
Going into my senior year of college, I was selected to be an Outside Sales Representative. The company flies the representatives to the University of North Carolina in May for a weeklong sales seminar to educate them on the basics of sales and how to position its product above the competitors’. After the training program, the reps were thrust into their territories and immediately began selling. I was based in Philadelphia and was part of a three man team assigned to fill space in the Drexel University Student Planner, Around Campus mobile app and website. We worked very closely with the team at the University of Pennsylvania.
It took me over five weeks to get my first sale. The most aggravating part was seeing my peers succeed while I was stuck at zero. With guidance from my managers and by sticking to the sales process, I ended the summer regionally ranked 5th out of 53 with a total of $18,560 in sales and hit 128% of my personal goal. Our team closed 69 accounts with sales totaling $50,600 and hit 105% of our wholesale goal. We were ranked 3rd out of 16 teams. I am a Blue Collar Award winner, which is awarded to reps that average over 35 sales calls a day over the course of the summer.
I loved the problem solving aspect of this position. I was able to go into a business analyze its strengths and weakness and present it with an opportunity to expand its revenue stream. This experience was very challenging and frustrating, but I learned a lot about myself and it solidified my career path in sales.