Multimedia Account Executive

LINK Media | Covington, KY | Full-time, in-market

Most media sales jobs right now involve selling ad space for a company owned by someone who has never been to your city and has no plans to visit.

This is not that job.

LINK Media publishes LINK nky — covering Boone, Kenton and Campbell counties — and Cincinnati CityBeat, the region's arts and culture alt-weekly. We're looking for an Advertising Account Executive to sell print, digital, social and event sponsorships across both. Two publications, two markets, one very small company where the person selling the ad can walk over and talk to the person writing the story.

We're not going to pretend we have everything figured out. We're building something, we're building it fast, and we need someone who finds that energizing rather than alarming. Everyone we hire is a critical member of the team. Nobody here is bigger than the thing we're making.

Compensation

We'll be straight with you about how this works, because a lot of media sales postings aren't.

Months 1–9: A straight base salary of $45,000 – $50,000, depending on experience. You're learning two markets and building a book. We're not going to make you eat ramen while you do it.

Month 10 forward: You move to 20% commission against a non-recoverable draw. In practice, the draw is a guaranteed monthly floor. If your commission comes in under it, you keep the draw — and you never pay it back. If your commission runs over it, you keep the commission. There's no cap and no ceiling.

That "never pay it back" part is rarer than it should be in this industry, and it's deliberate. You will not finish a quarter owing LINK money. We're not going to build a comp plan that punishes you for a client's budget freeze.

Anticipated first-year earnings: $60,000 – $75,000. The AEs who build a real renewing book do better than the range, and we'd like you to.

Everything here is negotiable for the right person. If you're bringing a book or a decade of market relationships, tell us and we'll talk.

Full benefits after a probationary period.

What We Expect from You

• Sell. You'll be making calls and holding meetings every single day. Not "building relationships" as a euphemism for lunch — actual, closed business.
• Get out there. Networking across NKY and Cincinnati to find new prospects and put LINK nky and CityBeat in front of people who haven't heard of us yet.
• Talk to your teammates. Clear communication with production and accounting so the things you sell actually run, on time, and get invoiced correctly.
• Keep them happy. Consultative service that makes advertisers and sponsors want to renew before you have to ask.
• Bring ideas. Our content areas and events are wide open for creative sponsorship packages. Some of our best-performing products started as somebody's half-formed pitch in a Tuesday meeting.
• Don't be a jerk. We expect honest, ethical treatment of your teammates, our advertisers, and our sponsors. This is not a tiebreaker criterion. It's the whole thing.

Skills We Need You to Have

• B2B sales experience or formal sales training
• Proposal creation experience — you can build a pitch, not just deliver one
• Creativity, particularly the kind that finds a package where a rate card doesn't
• Strong written and verbal communication
• Comfort with a CRM and the discipline to actually keep it updated
• A driver's license and a car — this is not a Zoom job
• No degree required. One in business or marketing wouldn't hurt.
• Did we mention you shouldn't be a jerk?

What You Can Expect from Us

• Full benefits — medical, dental, vision and life
• PTO and paid holidays
• All the equipment you need to do your job
• Training and support on LINK's internal style and our culture
• Real access to leadership. We're small enough that if you have a good idea, you can pitch it to the CEO in the hallway.
• A giant newsroom full of tiny desks in beautiful downtown Covington, KY
• A sales team with no jerks

Your First Year

Months 1–3: Learn the products, the markets, and the rate cards. Ride along on existing accounts. Build your prospect list. Close your first deals.

Months 4–9: Own your book. Your own meetings, your own proposals, your own renewals. This is the window where you build the pipeline that carries you into commission.

Month 10 forward: Commission structure kicks in. By now you should be pitching sponsorship concepts of your own design for our print special issues, events, and newsletters — and the ones that land are yours.

You'll Need to Share Our Mission and Uphold Our Guiding Principles

Mission: LINK Media strengthens vibrant communities through independent, sustainable local journalism.

Guiding Principles — We are:

Solutions-Focused: We don't just report the news of the day. We dig deeper, informing our audience about how our community might solve its biggest issues.

Unapologetic Community Fans: We believe in our community—in what it is today, and what it has the potential to become. We want to see our community advance, and we understand the part that we play in that advancement.

Inclusive: We explore the issues that affect all of our readers, and give a voice to the diverse corners of our community, whether that diversity is economic, political, geographic or otherwise.

Good Stewards: It is our responsibility to make good use of our resources and to maintain a sustainable business model, so that we may serve the community long into the future.

Independent: We do not make endorsements, or publish our own opinions, about the issues that are facing our community. In addition to our reporting, outside opinions from multiple viewpoints will be sought, and clearly marked as such, in order to provide the robust debate that our community needs to make critical decisions about our collective future.

LINK is an equal opportunity employer. LINK prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type and affords equal employment opportunities to employees and applicants without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, pregnancy, age, national origin, disability status, genetic information, protected veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. LINK conforms to the spirit as well as to the letter of all applicable laws and regulations.