Sunday, November 30, 2008

The Power Of Agreeability Part One

Writen by Dr. Gary S. Goodman

My parents were fond of the expression: "You can catch a lot more flies with honey than with vinegar!"

Exactly, and the same logic applies to snaring customers.

Most of us who do business to business selling have to get through secretarial screening, or at least handle these sentries deftly, if we hope to catch the decision maker. But we err, by sounding too cagey, too strategic, and generally, not agreeable enough.

We can change this and get better results by altering slightly a key exchange with the screener.

For example, let's say I'm calling for Yoda, you know that hard to catch fellow, with the light saber and Zen-like expressions.

I'll call and ask for Yoda, please.

"He stepped out. Can I take a message?"

At this moment, many will reply, "No, I'll try him later."

This sounds evasive.

Instead be agreeable.

Say, "Sure, do you expect he'll be back in the next hour, or so?"

The screener will probably give you the information you need.

"Yes, he'll be back in 15-20 minutes."

Then, it's easy to say thanks and that you'll call back.

By the way, your voice is fresh on her mind, so when you do call, she'll recognize you, and probably put you right through.

You may have noticed that I never gave her that message that she asked to take for me; only an affirmative reply, right?

This is a very, very powerful technique.

By saying "Sure," you throw her off the scent, she feels successful, you've been nice, and she'll disclose information and be cooperative from that moment, on.

That's just one example of the power of agreeability in selling.

We'll explore this topic further, in future articles.

Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone® and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service. He is a frequent guest on radio and television, worldwide. A Ph.D. from USC's Annenberg School, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. He is headquartered in Glendale, California, and he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com.

Saturday, November 29, 2008

Dramatically Increase Your Teleseminar Value By Keeping Your Listeners

Writen by Preston Campbell

Have you ever been on a teleseminar that just didn't keep you engaged? You know the ones I'm talking about. The presenter just goes on and on and on and on ... yada, yada, yada. And it's like you, the listener, didn't even exist.

I've been on a few of these calls, but usually not for long. Unless there was something somewhere in the content that I really wanted to hear, I got off the phone. I've spoken to a lot of seminar participants (mine and others) and the common sentiment, is "keep me involved and interested or I'm outa here."

I remember one of my early teleseminars on How To Create Killer Offers. I was really busy and (shame on me) I got lazy. I had a lot of great information, but I didn't prepare well for the call. It was a small group of about 15 people (coaching prospects). After the normal introductions, I muted the call because one of the listeners was on a cell phone and we were getting background noise. Half way through the call I opened up the lines and asked for questions and comments. Guess what? ..... Dead silence. NOBODY WAS THERE. I bored the living $#%@* out them.

I didn't keep them engaged and they all got off the line. Boy, did I feel stupid. Well, believe me, I learned my lesson.

As a teleseminar host you absolutely must keep your listeners involved in the call. If you don't, they won't stick around for your offer (if you have one), they likely won't have a very good impression of you, and you may not get the chance to do business with them in the future. It's plain and simple, keeping listeners involved in your call translates to dollars in your pocket.

So, let's talk about some great strategies to keep your callers on the line to the very end of the call.

First. STOP right now. Think of a few strategies you could use to effectively keep people on your calls. Go ahead. Do it. It'll be fun.

Did you think of any? Some people find keeping their listeners involved really easy, others find it a challenge. The good news (some would say really great news) is there are many very easy ways to keep people fully engaged in your teleseminar.

1. Create strong, interesting, relevant content. If your content isn't interesting and relevant to your audience, you will likely lose them quick.

2. Greet and have people introduce themselves when they join the call. This gets people involed right from the start.

3. Change the rhythm/pace every 3-7 minutes. If you just drone on talking and talking and talking about the same thing at the same pace in the same tone, you will bore your audience to tears. You can use any most of the involement techniques listed here to change the pace of your presentation. I also like to break my talks in to subtopics of around 3-5 minutes. If you are doing a Q&A format, each question offers a chance to adjust the rhythm of the call.

4. Make your call a "safe space" to interact. Acknowledge and encourage participation. Thank and if appropriate reward people who do participate. You could tell people who participate that you've written their name down and to send you an e-mail so you can send a reply with a special free report as a reward.

5. Ask the audience lots of questions. Questions get the client to think. In fact, you can lead the audience with questions. You might ask the audience to write the answers down. You can also open the lines and let callers answer. Another strategy is to let callers IM or e-mail answers to you.

6. Open the call up to questions from listeners periodically. You can do this after each major subject area or offer Q&A breaks an periodic intervals (I like to do them at least every 15 min if there aren't too many people on the call).

7. Take questions via Instant Messager or e-mail during the call. Answer them as they come in.

8. Open the call and YOU ask the listeners questions, ask for feedback, ask for inputs, their experiences related to the current topic. This can't always be done if you have so many participants that the background noise is high.

9. Conduct a survey during your call. You can ask for responses via e-mail, IM or even send people to a web site with an online form. You might want to offer to share the results at the end of the call. If it is a yes/no set of survey questions, you can have everyone who thinks the answer is yes hit a key on the phone so everyone can hear the key tones and then have everyone who thinks the answer is no hit the same key or a different key. Make sure the key is not a teleseminar function key that mutes or unmutes or causes some other impact to the call.

10. Relate your subject matter to the listeners personal experiences. Get them to associate what you are talking about with their past experiences. For example if introducing the excitement of something new you have to share you might ask: "Can you remember a time you started something new and you were so excited you could hardly sit still? Remember what that was like? It felt good didn't it? (pause) That's what this will be like. Imagine ..."

11. Use fill-in-the-blank notes. This is a fantastic strategy to keep listeners paying attention. If they want to get the great content in the blank space, they will stay engaged.

12. Have exercises and quizes. You can even offer prizes to the people who e-mail or IM the right answer first. Save the answers for later in the call. You can score

13. Use stories/metaphors. People love stories. Your stories can have outward and hidden messages for the listener. Your stories can help people connect with concepts. Stories allow people to connect internal experiences with the characters and other elements of the story to drive home your messages and help people understand concepts.

14. Paint mental pictures. Use vivid language that helps make your subject come alive. For example, someone selling an internet marketing course could say "once you implement these strategies you will be blown away by the flood of reponses. Imagine your e-mail box full of auto responses saying you got a sale, you got a sale, you got a sale. Picture the big smile on your face as you walk into the bank with all the check you collect. Imagine how great you'll feel as the teller hands you all the cash you earned ... all for just a few hours of easy effort."

15. Use visual aids and props. Refer the listener to notes, to web sites, things that they would have around the phone they are using to call into your teleseminar. You can ask listeners to bring things to the call such as books, articles ar anything else that might be relevant.

16. Include interesting facts, quotes, and case studies. People love fact quotes and case studies. Further, these can be used to build your credibility, get your message across more effectively and promote your product.

17. Be excited and enthusiastic about your topic. If you can't be enthusiastic, why would you expect your listener to feel any differently. Get pumped up for your teleseminar, have smile on your face, project energy and enthusiasm in your voice. Some people find it helpful to have a mirror in front of them so they can see themselves. Try this and as you look at yourself during the teleseminar, you'll get a feel for what you are projecting to the listeners.

18. Use curiosity. Ask a question, then don't finish it until later. Start a story don't finish it until later. Promise some interesting or even startling information later in the call.

19. Get the audience to take physical action. For example, to illustrate for hypnotherapist trainees a suggestibility test you could say: "every body stand up and now, go ahead this will be fun, yeah that means you, do it. Put both arms and hands straight out in front of you. With both hands palm down. now close your eyes. Turn the right palm up. Now imagine a heavy dictionary on the right hand pulling, pulling down and then a string attached to the left hand, getting lighter and lighter, lifting lifting. Open your eyes. Has anyones hands moved apart?" Most hands will have moved apart showing suggestibility.

Remember, listener involvement is one of the most critical aspects of a successful teleseminar. There are other critical elements as well, any one of which if done well can can make your event great or if done poorly can lead to a disaster.

Until next time, make it a great day!

Discover How To Qucikly And Easily Generate Massive Cash Flow With Teleseminars Visit http://www.TeleseminarSuccess.com

Friday, November 28, 2008

How To Know Youre On A Winner

Writen by Jon Lonergan

The catchword today for business is flexibility.

With changes in suppliers, customers, and the processes connecting them altering almost daily (or so it seems) the future clearly belongs to the organisations which can adjust to change quickly and effectively.

The good news for Call Centres is that, unlike more traditional sales organisations, the modern Call Centre has the equipment in place to measure this easily.

Instead of doing a sales training course and then waiting some weeks or months before you can reasonably evaluate the effectiveness of the course, the Call Centre can institute any change regarding CRMs and measure its effect on sales on a frequent, regular basis.

In the traditional face-to-face small-scale operation, the manager can make the change but not be sure of its effectiveness or whether the change is due to the changes instituted as things change anyway.

How do you know the improvement in sales is due to the new processes or due to something else? Or what if it is successful - how long does it last?

And what does this mean in practice?

At CustomCall, in line with its company Core Value of Continuous Innovation, this issue was dealt with in the following way: 6 CRMs from 4 different teams were brought together for 2 hrs for a workshop to improve their sales.

Then the sales conversion rates were measured over a one month, two month and three month period.

These results were compared with their results for one two and three months preceding the workshop.

This produced an improvement of

one month + 11.43%
two months +22.04%
three months +22.66%

Looks good but maybe everyone else changed too without any training.

So the same comparison was done with the whole campaign. Comparing Campaign After-workshop-date to Before-workshop-date sales gave the figures:

one month –1.37%
two months +05.80%
three months +05.71%

Removing the changes which happened anyway for the whole Campaign, the final difference for the effect of the workshop on the training group was:

one month +12.80%
two months +16.24%
three months +16.95%

Over three months the workshop produced a 16.95% increase in sales conversion rates.

Then the workshop was repeated for another 6 CRMs and after only one month the change (minus Campaign change) was 16.30% improvement in sales conversion rates.

Getting CRMs from different teams means the change is not due to one Team Leader for some reason bringing about a special improvement. Comparing the test group with the whole Campaign means they're not undergoing an improvement which is happening anyway, as the full Campaign serves as a control group for the test group.

This makes measurement a no-brainer.

Interestingly when I told one of the CRMs his sales had gone up 45% over the three months he said "Oh I didn’t realise". So even those who benefit from change are not necessarily the best judge of the value of that change, Luckily with mechanisms in place to keep track we can make an informed objective judgment.

That was just one example but since all modern Call Centres have the equipment in place to do the same, it's a waste of resources if they’re not doing some research like this at this very moment. Maybe giving a group of CRMs an apple a day would result in increased sales. Maybe giving them an extra 10 min break would do that too. Maybe oranges would be better. Who knows?

The key is to try something and then measure it.

(c) Jon Lonergan 2005

Jon Lonergan NLP Consulting
http://www.gettablegoals.com/CRuMpet/
PO Box 12 Beverly Hills
NSW Australia 2209
Ph +61 2 9867 2445 Mob 0401 856 057

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Telemarketing Do Not Call Lists

Writen by Seth Miller

Do-not-call lists are playing spoilsport to any and all of the various telemarketing initiatives out there. These lists are compiled in a central database and filled by people who have called in and place their own names on the list. In addition, there can also be do-not-call lists for single companies, if that person expressly calls in and asks them not to call. These lists must be adhered to as closely as possible. The agencies planning telemarketing campaigns now find quite an uphill task thanks to do-not-call lists. The consumers play a big role in setting up do-not-call lists. They give telephone numbers that they want to be included in the lists. There is no denying the fact that telemarketing do-not-call lists are bad news for telemarketing companies.

Those who believe in making cold calls to potential customers should now think of opting for another viable telemarketing strategy. However, from the consumers' point of view, telemarketing do not call lists are blessing. People who do not want to receive these calls simply put their phone numbers on the list. To give the customers a fair degree of opportunity, majority of the states have come up with an extensive National Do Not Call Registry. Both the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission have found several consumers signing up for the telemarketing do not call lists.

So it has become compulsory for telemarketing companies to make sure they do not call customers whose numbers are on the list; otherwise, the company can be liable for heavy fines.

Telemarketing Lists provides detailed information on Telemarketing Lists, Telemarketing Do Not Call Lists, Telemarketing Lead Lists, Telemarketing Sales Lists and more. Telemarketing Lists is affiliated with Telemarketing Services.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

The Best Times To Make Calls

Writen by Wendy Weiss

Do you want to reach your prospect directly? Would you prefer to reach your prospect without first having to speak with a secretary or assistant? Then keep these calling times in mind.

As a general rule, the best times to reach high-level executives are before business hours, after business hours or during lunch. Try calling early in the morning before 9:00 a.m. or after 5:00 p.m. At those times, generally, the secretary has not yet arrived or is gone for the day. Executives are frequently answering their own phones.

Calling before and after business hours can actually create a bond between you and your prospect. Your prospect is in the office early, working, or is in the office after hours, working—so are you! That shows that you have something in common, and it shows your commitment to what you are selling.

Lunchtime is a good second choice for a time to reach your prospect. The secretary usually goes to lunch. Her boss frequently does not, and she may be in her office, answering her own phone.

Don't let preconceived notions keep you from making calls. Many people don't like Monday mornings, so they assume that Monday mornings are not a good time to make introductory calls. But for some, Monday mornings can be a great time to call. Some people schedule their week on Monday morning, and if you can catch them before they've finished their schedule, they can fit you in.

Your may find that there are good calling times for your particular industry. I once was calling Creative Directors in advertising agencies and found that for the most part, I could not begin to reach them until after 10:00 a.m.—so I would start my calls at 10:00 a.m. Keep records of the times that you reach prospects. You will begin to see a pattern emerge. Evaluate that pattern to determine when is the best calling time for your particular market.

© 2005 Wendy Weiss

Wendy Weiss, "The Queen of Cold Calling & Selling Success," is a sales trainer, author, and sales coach. Her recently released program, "Cold Calling College", and/or her book, "Cold Calling for Women", can be ordered by visiting http://www.wendyweiss.com Contact her at wendy@wendyweiss.com. Get Wendy's free e-zine at www.wendyweiss.com

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Handling Quotim Not Interestedquot

Writen by Will Turner

Have you ever called someone to schedule an appointment and their immediate response was "I'm not interested"? It's often a knee-jerk reaction that people have to salespeople, particularly telemarketers. You may have used it yourself when you got that pesky call that interrupted your dinner. But why are people using it with you when you call to schedule an appointment? And what can you do about it?

First and foremost, you have to understand that their reaction to you is nothing personal. The fact is that lots of salespeople have come before you and have done a poor job of selling. Maybe they used manipulative or high-pressure tactics. So now your prospect is more than a little suspect.

To get a different result from your call, you shouldn't act like a typical salesperson. Your goal should be to engage the individual and get to the truth. You start the process by looking at what you say when the prospect answers the phone. Do you ask for help or do you just bulldoze your way through? Do you use a positioning statement that is clear, articulate and focused on what is important to the prospect? Are you putting pressure on the prospect or are you open to have a real dialogue.

If you have done everything right, you still may get an "I'm not interested" response, but your chances are much greater that you won't. But if you do, your objective should still be to get to the truth. The only way to get to the truth is to ask the simple question, "Do you mind telling me why?"

If you ask in a nonconfrontational manner, you will often find that the "I'm not interested" is disguising another objection like, "I'm too busy", "Money's tight", or "I figured you were just another pushy salesperson". By engaging the prospect in an honest and open dialogue, you will discover the truth and increase your odds of moving forward and building a relationship.

Will Turner is the Founder and President of Dancing Elephants Achievement Group, a sales training and consulting company. Will has over 20 years of sales and sales management experience and is the author of over 150 sales-related articles and programs as well as the co-author of the book, Six Secrets of Sales Magnets. Will can be reached at Will@dancingelephants.net.

Monday, November 24, 2008

The New Telemarketing Part V Needs Based Selling Empowers Customers To Close Themselves

Writen by Dr. Gary S. Goodman

Fifth in a series of articles, we'll discuss various issues and practices associated with modern ways of selling over the phone.

***************************************************************** The New Telemarketing™ is a set of selling practices designed to accomplish several things:

(1) To sell more goods and services than its predecessor, the "traditional" style;

(2) To be less offensive than its predecessor to buyers;

(3) To be consistent with a customer service style of communicating;

(4) To help in recruiting and retaining qualified phone representatives and managers; and

(5) To repair and reform the image of telemarketers in business and consumer communities. *****************************************************************

Traditional telemarketing is a one-size fits all method. It presumes that everyone has the same needs, and a solution, pre-selected by the seller, will be appropriate in every conversation.

The New Telemarketing™ operates from the premise that calls need to be custom-manufactured. This means certain elements need to appear in all calls, but there are some unique aspects that need to be customized to the tastes and interests of each listener.

Moreover, even if listeners were, in fact, the same, and had identical needs, they want to be treated as individuals, and the ritual of eliciting their individual needs constitutes a significant buying satisfaction, in itself.

Specifically, a New Telemarketing™ call will get the prospect to say these three things:

(1) I have a need.

(2) My need is important, and worth addressing, now.

(3) I want your help in addressing it.

When a customer utters these things, she is qualified and motivated, and she realizes it from monitoring her own admissions along these lines.

From this moment of acknowledgement, the buyer pushes for completion of the sale, and the seller doesn't have to push, at all.

This is a defining moment in a New Telemarketing™ call.

It feels as if the customer is freely choosing to buy, instead of forcibly being sold.

And the conversation feels like a customer service encounter and not a contentious selling situation.

In future articles we'll discuss the mechanics involved in getting customers to agreeably disclose they have a need, it is important, and they want our help.

Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone®, You Can Sell Anything By Telephone! and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service, and the audio program, "The Law of Large Numbers: How To Make Success Inevitable," published by Nightingale-Conant. He is a frequent guest on radio and television, worldwide. A Ph.D. from USC's Annenberg School, a Loyola lawyer, and an MBA from the Peter F. Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. He holds the rank of Shodan, 1st Degree Black Belt in Kenpo Karate. He is headquartered in Glendale, California, and he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Scripts Dont Sell But People Do

Writen by Dr. Gary S. Goodman

If I had fifty bucks for every time someone has asked me to write a telemarketing script, I'd be wealthier than Bill Gates.

Ok, maybe not that wealthy.

I would think that readers of my best-selling books, You Can Sell Anything By Telephone! and Reach Out & Sell Someone®, could do it for themselves; at least a rough draft.

Anyway, what I've told these script seekers is scripts are next to worthless, if you don't know how to bring them to life. You need instruction in how to use them.

Today, I trained a telemarketer at one of my coaching clients' sites, and he is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. He's a typical READER.

What I mean by this is he sounds flat, bored, canned, and robotic. Isn't this how most of us sounded in English classes when we were forced to recite poems that we had to memorize?

(Longfellow may have been a great poet, but that experience taught me to hate the word, daffodils, ever since!)

My point is this: three things need to come together for a script to succeed:

(1) Text

(2) Tone &

(3) Timing.

I call this, no surprise here, The Three T's.

Leave out one T, and your script fails.

Of course the fourth T, the one that gets the other three into action, stands for Training.

People need training in precisely how to use a script, and this includes specific instruction in where and how long to pause. Hint: It's NOT at the punctuation marks!

You could have a wonderful script, but without the training in delivery it can fail, miserably; while excellent training with a mediocre script can support at least passable success.

So, please don't overvalue words on a page or a computer screen. In the final analysis, they do not and cannot sell for us; only we can!

Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone® and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service, and the audio program, "The Law of Large Numbers: How To Make Success Inevitable," published by Nightingale-Conant. He is a frequent guest on radio and television, worldwide. A Ph.D. from USC's Annenberg School, a Loyola lawyer, and an MBA from the Peter F. Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. He holds the rank of Shodan, 1st Degree Black Belt in Kenpo Karate. He is headquartered in Glendale, California, and he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com.

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Beware Of Cold Calling Quacks Dont Study Surgery With Those Who Flee At The Sight Of Blood

Writen by Dr. Gary S. Goodman

I love to read articles written by people who have never made a dime by cold calling.

They seem to shout the loudest that cold calling is a waste of time.

For them, it's true. But I've made my career and my fortune doing it.

What is their problem?

If they aren't afraid to pick up the phone, and their patter is competent, why aren't they getting results, too?

The simple answer is they don't do enough of it. They quit long before "the numbers" start to work for them.

I mean "The Law of Large Numbers," and if you're unfamiliar with this principle, pick up my audio seminar bearing this name, published by Nightingale-Conant.

But let's return to this question: Why are so many telephone losers so hasty to conclude there is no money to be made on the phone, if they don't suffer from fear of rejection, performance anxiety; they can't get up for the game, or a skill deficit?

I believe it boils down to a different concern: THE FEAR OF WASTING ONE'S TIME.

They are such marginal performers that they are petrified of making any investment in their own success that isn't guaranteed to pay off quickly, however modest the reward might be that accrues to them.

I'll bet most of these die-hard anti-cold callers are commission-a-phobic, too. They utterly wet their pants when confronted by the prospect that they'll be paid ONLY for performance and nothing else.

This comes from fundamental insecurity. Without a safety net, a base salary, the love and approval of a doting boss, they're lost little lambs.

But—get this—they want to teach YOU how to sell!

Would you take singing lesions from someone who is tone deaf? Would you learn to play golf from someone who has never ventured beyond a miniature course? Would you study surgery with someone who is frightened by the sight of blood?

Yet they want you to be their sales training client.

Hey, if they can get you to buy that, maybe they have some selling skills after all!

Best-selling author of 12 books and more than 900 articles, Dr. Gary S. Goodman is considered "The Gold Standard"--the foremost expert in sales development, customer service, and telephone effectiveness. Top-rated as a speaker, seminar leader, and consultant, his clients extend across the globe and the organizational spectrum, from the Fortune 1000 to small businesses. He can be reached at: gary@customersatisfaction.com.

Friday, November 21, 2008

Unlocking Your Treasure Trove Of Contacts Can Uncover A Gem Of A Customer

Writen by Andy Szebeni

When we are setting up new telemarketing campaigns, one of the first questions clients ask is "will you provide the database"?

Probably the single-largest determinant of success for a marketing campaign is the prospect list: the potential customers you want to target. The initial reaction of most A&P clients is immediately to go out and buy a chunk of names by size of company in their local area. But often this is a very crude way of deciding where you want to get customers from.

By far the best source of new business is people you know. Perversely, many people new to marketing argue that, if they have not bought yet, well they won't buy if I ask them again. No! No! No!

One marketing theory states that future customers need to be exposed to your company 7 times before they make the decision to buy from you. So you are far better contacting people that you have met at networking meetings, that are fellow members of a Chamber of Commerce, may have seen your advert, visited an event you exhibited at or in any other way may have been exposed to your company or product.

So the very best list is in fact your existing customers to whom you can cross-sell or up-sell. So always start with your own contact base.

Hopefully, as a consummate networker, you enter the details of every person you meet at networking events onto your contact database. Almost everyone has Outlook and that offers a great basic contact management tool. Even if you don't think you will do business with someone, if you pick up their card, they should go on your database.

So let's assume you have been systematic. If you meet on average 10 people at an event, you attend one a week, in three years you will have 1500 new people on your database. What a goldmine!

Next, before you market to them, you need to segment the prospects. Rarely is their location of prime relevance, even though A&P clients often ask for appointments near them. In most cases you probably communicate 90% of the time with your clients on the telephone or via email.

So pick the industry sectors and company sizes that are most likely to be interested in your product. The time you spend carving up your existing database will pay dividends. Because you will get a better response rate which means your money or time spent on telemarketing will reap you much better returns.

Andy Szebeni is director of sales training and telemarketing company A&P. For more information and free tips and hints go to http://www.a-and-p.com.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Why Traditional Cold Calling Doesnt Work

Writen by Jacques Werth

Most people who use the term "Cold Calling" believe that all telephone prospecting is "cold calling." As the name implies, you call each prospect only once, trying to sell your way into an appointment. It's the kind of prospecting that most salespeople do, and usually hate to do.

What's wrong with traditional cold-calling?

Prospects don't like to be cold-called any more than you like calling them. Because you're pushing so hard for an appointment, they feel wary and defensive. As a result, they push back angrily, they refuse to give you an appointment, and you feel rejected.

Perhaps, if a prospect sounds "interested," you will try a second call, and try again to sell an appointment. Most prospects don't want you to call them again, and will reject your request for an appointment, again. Therefore, few prospects will get that second call, and even fewer a third call. If you do get appointments with reluctant prospects, you'll only close a small percentage of them.

REAL Prospects Really Buy!

A High Probability Prospect (HPP) is someone who needs, wants, and can afford to buy your product or service, now. There are more HPPs than you can ever find the time to meet with--yet most salespeople don't know they exist.

High Probability Prospecting

In the HPP process, the objective is to determine whether each person you talk to wants what you're selling, now. Each call takes an average of 35 seconds: they either want to buy, or they don't. If they don't, just say "Okay, good bye," and call the next prospect. Those who don't say "Yes" today are more likely to say "Yes," the next time that you call. Most of those who say "Yes," without being persuaded, will also buy without being persuaded.

"Warm Calling"

In High Probability Prospecting, we call our prospecting list every three to four weeks. After the initial call, each time you call a prospect is a "warm call." Each time you call your targeted prospecting list, you'll get better results than the last time you called that list -- if you're not trying to sell appointments. Most sales are made to people after they have heard numerous High Probability prospecting offers.

People become HPPs in their own time, for their own reasons. It's seldom because you convinced them that they have an urgent need for your product or service during a prospecting call. Just because you want to sell now doesn't mean that a prospect wants to buy now.

Referring to the High Probability Prospecting process as "cold calling" is inaccurate. The vast majority of calls you make in HPP are "warm" calls. The HPP process has rendered Traditional Cold Calling techniques obsolete.

©Jacques Werth, High Probability® Selling - All rights reserved.

Jacques Werth, author of "High Probability Selling," is an internationally respected Sales Trainer and Sales Consultant. HPS graduates are excelling as Top Producers in over 70 industries. Visit http://www.highprobsell.com to read more articles, preview the book, and learn more about High Probability Selling.

Wednesday, November 19, 2008

Cold Calling For Introverts

Writen by Hal Warfield

In her book, The Introvert Advantage, Marty Olsen Laney talks about the defining moment when she embraced the fact that she was an introvert. It came in the form of a statement, "Oh, there's nothing wrong with me, I'm just an introvert!"

According to her research only 25% of people are introverted which leaves us the daunting task of dealing with the 75% extroverts of the world. And surprising as it seems, there are those of us who have, for one reason or another, chosen to make our living in sales.

Being in sales poses many problems for introverts but probably the biggest is the idea of making cold calls. Now before we look at cold calling for introverts let's look at the concept of cold calling itself a bit closer.

Sales guru, Jeffry Gitomer, says that cold calling is the least effective method of generating new sales. It interrupts the prospect, probably irritating them, and has a fairly low rate of return. Having said all that, cold calling is still needed and sometimes required of those of us in sales.

As an introvert I have always looked with envy at the ease with which an extrovert approaches cold calling. Because they dwell in the outside world (while many introverts find their reality in the inner world) they find it easier to pick up the phone and call. They are usually more outgoing naturally so conversation with strangers is easier. And, darn it, they also don't seem as affected by the inevitable rejection; seemingly able to shrug it off and move on to the next call.

Introverts will sometimes go to great lengths to avoid cold calling. First we have to plan who to call - who is most likely to be positive or at least neutral about our call? Then we have to make sure we have all our information together to handle any contingency that might come up - files, literature, scripts and anything else that might take 5 or 10 more minutes to find. Then we have to think about our prospect's schedule - we don't want to call too early or too late and, you know, everyone is too busy on Mondays and Fridays aren't a good day to call either.

Once we've exhausted every excuse we're left sitting looking at the phone. It's time to pick it up and call. Short of drugs, there's probably no way to completely eliminate the stress cold calling causes introverts. But let me lay out a technique that works for me; both reducing my stress and, surprisingly, producing good contacts and prospects.

As a caveat there is one aspect to this technique that may bother some people but give me until the end of the article to provide some explanation. The underlying assumption here is that someone in the business or company you are about to cold call could have requested information about your product or service. This assumption could include Internet inquiries, "bingo" cards in magazines, inbound 800 number calls, or any other way to request information. It doesn't mean that they actually did ask for information, only that they could have.

We begin by at least knowing what department or area of a business or company would usually be interested in our product. If you sell forms, which department uses those forms? If you sell advertising, would the marketing department be the logical place to start? If you're in industrial sales, which department mainly uses your goods or services?

Take a deep breath, pick up the phone and dial. If you get an automated attendant you can usually raise a "real" person by hitting "0" on your phone. When you get that real person say something like this, "Hello, my name is Joan Smith with ABC Company. I need to speak with someone in your ___ department (that department name being the one you previously identified). In 90% of calls they will connect you without comment. We'll deal with the other 10% in just a minute.

The phone will ring and your stress level will peak. Will someone answer or will you end up in voice mail - what you say next remains the same either way. When someone (or the message machine) answers say something like this. "Hello, my name is Bill Jones with ABC Company. I'm new in this position and as I was going through my predecessor's files I found a request for information from your company but it doesn't have a name on it. I didn't want to throw it away without at least trying to see if the information had been sent. Do you know of anyone who would have requested information on (your product or service)?"

And wait. They may ask for your company name again. They may ask for more information on the product or service you just mentioned in passing. But most of the time their reply takes one of the following forms.

"Well, that would have been (a name). Let me connect you to him - make sure you have a pen ready during this call." When you're connected to Bob (or his voice mail) repeat the thread above, that is, you've found a request for information with no name and you want to make sure that whoever requested the information got what they needed.

Sometimes, the person will say, "Well, that would have been me but I don't remember asking for information." No hostility, just puzzlement. Your response at that time is "As I said, this request doesn't have a name on it so it may not have come from you." Then you can give an abbreviated sales pitch by asking, "Are you already using (your product or service)?" A positive answer gives you the opportunity to ask if they are satisfied. A negative answer lets you ask if they would like to see information.

A third response you might get would be this, "Well, that would have probably come from Anne Adams and she's not here. Would you like her voice mail?" Your reply something like this, "Yes, please, but do you mind giving me Anne's email address as well? That way I can send her a link to our website just to be sure she gets the information requested." Again in most cases the person on the phone will give you their name, their email address, and maybe even this most coveted of responses, "You know, this is a timely call. We just brought a project off the back burner that uses (your product or service). Can you come by to meet with us?" For an introvert, this is the Holy Grail.

Let's back up a minute to the 10% of operators or receptionists that don't put you right through. They may ask, "Can I ask what this is concerning?" At this point I give a short version of my original thread, that I have a request for information from my company but no contact name and that I don't want to simply throw the request away. This will usually disarm the screener and get you a name or at least a ringing phone.

Those few that you get through to who say, "nope, wasn't me and we have no need for that" are the ones you let go with a brief apology and thanks. Don't let it rattle you.

Now back to the ethical question that this may raise for some of you. "I'm really telling a lie - no one asked for this information" and that is true. For some of you that point may eliminate you using this technique but first ask yourself this question. If you believe in your product or service, then you feel that the companies you call on can benefit from what you sell. If they knew they could benefit would they ask you for information? If they could and should have asked for this information that could benefit them AND if they were aware of your company, they would have asked, wouldn't they?

So using this line of reasoning you can make the jump to the idea that they would have asked if they'd known to ask. So you are simply making them aware by your call.

I realize this is rationalizing - but 90% of the people with whom I have used this technique are polite, interested, and give me excellent information. And many of them have benefited from the information I give them. And the alternative is to grit your teeth, call a receptionist, stumble through an explanation of who you are and what you're selling, hope they don't tell you to call purchasing, or put you through to someone who doesn't want to talk to a sales person AND who is in an irritable mood today.

What makes this approach less stressful to the introvert? For whatever reason it is easier for me to call someone who first called me. If they called me first then they must be open to talking with me and I find this an easier call to make. This technique simply assumes that the person you're talking to would have called you if they had known of the benefits of your product or service.

So give it a try - call a couple of people who might have asked for your information. Offer them the chance to really see your information. Then go lie down for about 10 minutes to let the stress go away. After all, we still are introverts!

Hal Warfield is a speaker, teacher and coach. Write him at warfield@midsouth.rr.com. Or read additional self-development and business articles at http://www.halwarfield.com

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Some Thoughts On Effective Telemarketing

Writen by Jonathan Farrington

Uncovering new opportunities and potential new business is an essential task of any sales team, however, it is probably one of the most unpopular activities. The main reason for this is that professional salespeople, just like the rest of us, fear rejection.

The reality is though, if we have confidence in our products, solutions and services, we owe it to ourselves and to our company to tell as many people as possible. I have always taken the view that if a prospective client rejects my proposal, then they have lost out on dramatically improving their business. A positive and confident mind-set is essential for successful telemarketing and cold calling.

So what are the rules?

Plan & Prepare:

Make sure that you are prepared for the call:-

• Have all the relevant documentation to hand.

• Prepare a 'script' including everything you wish to ask. Use bullet points not sentences.

• Familiarise yourself with the "script" - practice, write down your agenda and be direct.

• Keep the opening of the conversation simple, but say something interesting, try using a prime desire statement to "grab" their interest so they'll want to hear more.

• Explain why you are calling.

• Question - use a variety of questioning techniques i.e. Open, Reflective, Direct, Hypothetical, Exploratory etc.

Set Yourself Goals & Clear Objectives (Primary & Secondary):

Consider - what is the purpose of the telephone call? (aim high but realistic)

• Is it to inform?

• To establish a need?

• To obtain an appointment?

Never attempt to sell your product or services over the phone (unless you are in a telesales role)

Never make a statement you cannot back up.

Remember to Discipline Yourself - Don't Be Deflected

Ensure That You Have The Right Information:

Never assume that the information you have is correct:

• Confirm you are talking to the right person.

• Confirm they have the authority and not just the title.

Be informed

• Know the industry they operate in.

• Who else have you helped in that industry?

• Tell them.

Reaching The Decision Maker:

Don't attempt to establish the decision maker and then talk to them in one phone call, if you don't know who to speak to then that is a call in its own right.

Set yourself a target, say four attempts to get through to the decision maker, if you still are unable to reach them, try a different approach.

When to call: If you keep a call log of all your calls, you'll soon get to know which are the most productive times to reach the decision maker (e.g. traditionally Monday morning is a poor time to cold call).

Human Barriers: The higher up the organisation you go, then the higher and wider the barriers seem to become, with receptionists, secretaries and personal assistants all seemingly having no other purpose than to stop you getting through to the decision maker.

Try outside the normal office hours. You will avoid the receptionist and may get straight through. Security staff are often a good source for information and they are usually more than willing to show off their knowledge about the company - they also have the time to talk!

As a last resort, send a letter first explaining that you will be calling - therefore the receptionist is "expecting your next call".

Close With A Commitment - Keep That Commitment:

If the commitment is to an appointment then always confirm in writing but,

- Be Brisk

- Be Polite

- Be Immediate

Some General Tips For Successful Telephone Communication:

- Always dial the number yourself.

- Ask for the contact by name, i.e. "Mr. Smith" please.

- If speaking to his/her secretary you may use the contact's first name as well.

- If asked who is calling use your full name.

- If asked the name of your company don't be afraid to give it.

- If asked why you are calling, tell them.

- If they are not available, say you will call back and ask the most convenient time.

- If they are on another call, do not stay on the line.

Telephone Qualification Process:

The following is a list of areas you need to incorporate into your 'script' with some suggestions as to how you may find out the answers, however the secret to good telephone communication is to make it yours, i.e. your language, your terminology, that way you will feel confident and this will be apparent to the person you are calling.

Responsibility/DMU (Decision Making Unit)

Who should I be talking to regarding the purchase of?

Who else would be involved in such a decision?

Money

When do you believe a budget will be made available for such a purchase/project this year?

What do you envisage that budget to be (i.e. is it realistic).

Is the budget dependent upon anything?

Implementation

When is this purchase required to be completed by?

Is there a particular reason for this timescale? (Are they realistic?)

Competition

Who else are you talking to?

How did you choose them?

Expertise

What are you hoping to achieve? (Is it within our capabilities?)

Commitment

I feel I understand what is required and that we can help, I'd like to discuss your requirements further face to face, would Thursday or Friday next week be suitable?

Some Rules for You to Remember:

Always Smile - It projects a warm personality which is non threatening.

Always Be Enthusiastic - It's infectious.

Stand Up For The Important Call - You will sound more decisive, more authoritative and it expands the diaphragm.

Always Plan Your Call - Be prepared, know the reaction you are aiming for.

Copyright © 2006 Jonathan Farrington. All rights reserved

Jonathan Farrington is the Managing Partner of The jfa Group To find out more about the author, read his latest articles or to subscribe to his newsletter for dedicated sales professionals, visit:http://www.jonathanfarrington.com
You can also now visit Jonathan's Blog at: http://www.thejfblogit.co.uk

Monday, November 17, 2008

Telephone Sales Made Simple

Writen by Lance Winslow

Most sales managers and seasoned sales executives know that telephone sales and cold calling are among the best strategies for improving the sales in a company's sales department. But, not all salespeople enjoy doing telephone sales and many are not very good at. Is there a way to make telephone sales simple? Well, there are professional telephone sales strategists and consultants who can make it seem simple, but in the end it is not as easy as it looks and takes a significant commitment to the process.

How do you find a really good telephone sales consultant or marketing guru that is worth their weight in gold? Well, the best way to find the perfect telephone sales strategist and consultant is to find a seasoned executive who specializes in customer service and telephone sales. With the proper customer service background such telephone sales executives and consultants are exactly what you are looking for.

They can make telephone sales seem simple. How do they do this? Well, first they come in and do a survey of how your current employees and your sales staff are doing with regard to telephone sales. Then, they make suggestions on what you can do to improve things and use simple training techniques to help the employees kick their bad telephone habits and develop new improved skills. That is how it works, but you may be surprised how difficult it is to do without these seasoned professionals on your team. Please consider this in 2006.

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Telesales Success Begin With The End In Mind

Writen by Andrew Rowe

You may remember the following excerpt from Steven Covey's book 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: "Clients often ask me, 'how can we get our inside sales team to talk to more prospects?' Sure...threats, begging, yelling, low level torture, coercion, and brut force entice reps to make more calls as long as the manager is there with his whip, but productivity plunges when the manager isn't around. I believe the motivation to expose yourself to rejection multiple times per day has to come from within."

For salespeople with the potential to be motivated "from within", I have used the following exercise that beings with these two questions:

What do you want to earn in the next year? How much do you need to sell in order to earn that sum?

Then together, we calculate the daily level of activity needed to accomplish that earning goal.

While everyone says they want to make $100,000+ per year, most folks aren't willing to put in the necessary effort. The difference between success and failure in goal-setting is the participants' acknowledgement that they REALLY want to earn six figures and not just fantasize about it.

If sales are lacking, we examine why deals are being lost to competitors and then develop a closing strategy for the other deals in the pipeline. If the pipeline is thin, usually the reason is insufficient activity (calls and contacts).

My motivational conversations with sales executives generally go something like this, "I want to help you hit your goal, and I'm concerned you will come up short if something doesn't change." If after a few sessions, I don't see increased activity, it is generally because the person has concluded that they can't or won't meet expectations.

Of course, exceptions occur. For instance, some people have seemingly lower activity but a higher close rate or a higher average sale. As long as the sales targets are being exceeded, I'm OK with this....if not, sales management could turn into a painful process for all involved.

The following worksheet is an example of what I've used to help sales people determine their needed activity. GREEN highlights are calculation fields.

Monthly 2006
Sales Goal $100,000 $1,200,000
Average Sale $5,000 $5,000
Sales Needed 20 240
Estimated Close Rate 50% 50%
Number of NEW Deals Added to Pipeline 40 480
Value of NEW Deals Added to Pipeline $200,000 $2,400,000
Contact Hit Rate (% interested of those contacted) 20% 20%
Needed Monthly Contacts 200 2400
Dials to Contacts 20% 20%
Needed Dials 1000 12000
DAILY GOALS
Number of NEW Deals Added To Pipeline Daily 2
Value of NEW Deals Added to Pipeline Daily $10,000
Approx. Contacts per day 10
Approx. Dials per day 50

So, by beginning with the end in mind and working backwards through the steps necessary to achieving certain sales goals, your inside sales team will have a roadmap for greater success. And that's a win-win for everyone involved, especially your organization.

About Cube Management

Cube Management delivers sales acceleration services to emerging growth and mid-market companies. The experts at Cube Management work across the entire spectrum of marketing, sales and business development to provide customized solutions (whether recruiting, interim management or consulting) that drive revenue and profit growth. Cube Management combines Strategy, Process & People to produce winning results. Download the Cube Management Inside Sales Guide and the Cube Management Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Guide.

Saturday, November 15, 2008

Telephone Sales Selling Personal Car Oil Changes At Corporations By Phone

Writen by Lance Winslow

If you own a mobile oil change service and you want to expand your business one good way to do that is to get with the human resource department at all the local corporations near you and offer Mobile oil change services to the employees while they work. Of course before they will allow you to come on the property you will need proper insurance and convince them that you will not leave oil stains on the grounds.

You may have to give your proposal to the human resource department, facilities maintenance department and the risk management department. To get these appointments it helps to have someone on the inside such as an executive who can introduce you to the human resource Department. Nevertheless this is not always necessary sometimes you can simply call them on the phone.

The best way to get the phone numbers of human resource departments for large corporations is to go to the local Chamber of Commerce and get a Book of Lists and often a local Chamber of Commerce directory will also help you it the correct phone numbers.

When selling personal car oil changes at corporations by telephone is important to talk to the human resource director and explain to them that such an amenity for their employees is a value added service and the employees will be happy to have such a service.

They also need to know that you will not disturb the productivity of the company and come on-time each month. Please consider all this when selling mobile oil change services at corporations over the telephone.

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

Friday, November 14, 2008

Cold Callings Dark Side

Writen by Frank Rumbauskas

Have you ever wondered why sales managers are so insistent that you cold call?

Have you ever wondered why many companies will not even consider a marketing budget, and instead mandate cold calling, make it a job requirement, and tell you you'll be fired if you don't do it?

Doesn't it seem a bit strange that you'd be paid so much in salary just to run around collecting fifty business cards a day, or making fifty telephone calls when your talents are so much better than that?

There is a reason for all this insanity. It's the dark side of cold calling, and the real reasons why many companies still force salespeople to engage in this old, antiquated method of doing business.

First of all, cold calling doesn't cost the company money. It costs you money. They get to avoid spending money on marketing, and instead they let you do the hard work of cold calling. This is in spite of the fact that cold calling has the lowest returns of any and all sales activities, and therefore leaves you with the lowest possible paycheck.

Second, cold calling doesn't cost the company time. If they wanted to put together a marketing plan they'd either have to hire more employees to do it, take current employees away from other duties, or hire an outside firm to implement it. Instead, they tell you to do it. This saves manpower and eliminates the need to either hire new employees or hire an outside consultant. The end result is that is costs you time and forces you to waste your valuable time on the lowest-percentage sales activity instead of on something more productive.

The insanity of all this is that trying to save time and money by forcing you to cold call ends up costing the company huge amounts of time and money! It obviously isn't profitable to have salespeople cold calling when it consistently has the lowest returns of all sales activities. However, they do it anyway, with the belief that it's a smart way to cut corners. The fact of the matter is that having salespeople cold call is penny-wise and pound-foolish. It lets companies cut corners in the short term, but with very dire long-term consequences. Cold calling, when relied upon as the main source of new business, frequently leads to lost profits, downsizing and even bankruptcy.

Companies that are succeeding today don't bother with cold calling. They implement a marketing plan that generates qualified leads, and they provide those leads to the salespeople, who simply go out and close them. This is the only sensible way to do business in the twenty-first century.

Frank Rumbauskas is the author of the New York Times Best-Seller, "Never Cold Call Again: Achieve Sales Greatness Without Cold Calling." He is a sales trainer, consultant, and inspirational speaker who has taught over 15,000 salespeople how to generate endless leads without cold calling. You can learn more at http://www.nevercoldcall.com

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Telephone Inquiries And Auto Detailing Sales

Writen by Lance Winslow

In the automotive detailing business people will call and be interested in service and often these people will be calling from a yellow page ad or a brochure or potentially a referral. It is important to turn all of these telephone inquiries into sales, however many companies do not do this because they do not recognize the potential customer is on the other line.

Sometimes customers may call up four or five auto detailing shops to get the best price. Many times these detailing companies will treat the call in potential customer badly because they think the customer is shopping around for price and does not care about the quality that they can offer. However this is only because the customer on the phone has never had explained to them the differences of value of service and prices.

Rather than being rude to the customer or quoting them a lowball price to get their business it is much better to engage the customer in conversation and find out exactly what they're looking for and assure them that you can handle the job if in fact you can..

If you cannot do the work up to their expectations as they explain their need on the phone to you then it is better to refer them to another detailing company that can. Each auto detailing company should train all their employees to treat each potential customer on the telephone as if they were already a great customer but only need a little bit of knowledge about auto detailing.

Educating the consumer is important and consumers need to know that value is also very important and rather than using the cliche that you get what you pay for, it is much better to explain to the customer what you can do for them, how you do it and why the price is what it is. Consider this in 2006.

Lance Winslow

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Generating Leads Through Telemarketing

Writen by Jimmy Sturo

Telemarketing is one of the most common ways that a business can generate leads. It is a versatile approach. Lead generation telemarketing can be inbound or outbound, meaning that systems use prerecorded messages and can dial either random numbers or numbers from an imported list.

Telemarketing is one of the few lead generation techniques that is flexible enough to be immediately adaptable to new situations. The telemarketer can answer questions or provide additional information as needed in response to the potential customer's comments. Also, while prospective buyers may ignore direct mail or advertisements, they will not ignore a ringing telephone. Once the person answers the phone, a good telemarketer can generate a lead.

Inbound lead generation telemarketing involves the prospective customer calling the company to find out about their products or services. This is the best kind of lead generation telemarketing because the potential buyer has already shown interest by making the call. It is then up to the telemarketer to say the right things in order to retain the prospective buyer's interest. Often, people will call for information about certain products or to see if there are any sales or discounts available. It is up to the telemarketer to be able to provide the caller with all of the necessary facts that the caller asks for.

Outbound telemarketing is less successful than taking inbound calls. It is difficult because it often involves what is called cold calling. This is when a lead generator makes an unsolicited call to a potential customer. The person has no idea who is calling them or why. A high percentage of people react badly to being cold called. It takes someone with great communication skills and the ability to handle rejection to make a successful cold caller. Other times, the callers are equipped with a list of potential leads. The caller's responsibility is then to verify that the person is indeed interested.

Another option for lead generation telemarketing is to use a lead generation system. Lead generation systems are machines programmed to dial phone numbers and deliver a recorded message when the phone is answered. Many people hang up on these machines, but they are a cost effective way to generate leads. Some lead generation systems can be given a list of potential leads to call, thus increasing the chance of success.

Lead generation telemarketing is a great, flexible, adaptable way to gain new customers. People with good communication skills are often very good at this type of work.

Lead Generation Info provides detailed information about sales, mortage, MLM, business-to-business, internet, and insurance lead generation, lead generation telemarketing, and more. Lead Generation Info is the sister site of MLM Leads Web.

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Overcoming Voice Mail Challenges

Writen by Jay Conners

If you are in the business of sales, than ultimately, cold calling is part of your weekly, if not daily routine.

Let's face it, cold calling just isn't very exciting, and you need to make many cold calls in order to have success.

During my days working as a loan officer for a mortgage company, I would spend two and a half hours each night, Monday through Friday banging out my cold calls.

My goal was to take at least three applications per evening, resulting in fifteen applications per week, with a goal of turning at least three of the fifteen applications into actual loans.

I faced many challenges during those evenings of cold calling. Such as hang ups, and people saying things such as "I already took care of that," and "take me off of your calling list," etc.

One other challenge I came upon was the answering machine. There was nothing worse than selling to a machine.

But after much rejection from the actual live human beings I was dealing with on a nightly basis, I began to think of the answering machine as my friend.

I would use the answering machine as a tool to have my potential customers get to know me.

I would speak in a friendly upbeat voice, introducing myself and the company I worked for.

But, I would not just leave it at that. I would take the opportunity to describe in brief a product we had available that I believed would meet their needs.

I always kept it short and sweet, not giving the customer an opportunity to delete me because my message was long and drawn out.

Leaving your name and number simply is not enough to entice a customer to call you back, especially when cold calling.

So dangle a carrot in the way of one of your products and there will be a good chance your customer will call you back.

Jay Conners has more than fifteen years of experience in the banking and Mortgage Industry, He is the owner of http://www.jconners.com a mortgage resource site. You can also check out his blog at http://wwwmortgagespot.blogspot.com for more articles

Monday, November 10, 2008

Bbb Better Business Bureau Have They Changed Their Ways

Writen by Lance Winslow

The BBB, Better Business Bureau had been previously accused by members and non-members for their questionable sales practices. The sales teams used by their franchisees or licensees to sign up customers were reading from a sales script one, which was at best a little misleading. As it would be prudent not to comment on this matter most business owners are not willing to say anything, although many do consider the sales tactics used in the past to be problematic. Personally I have not followed up to see if in fact the BBB has changed their sales tactics, although do recommend one does do some investigative reporting.

You must understand of course that having a BBB plastic sign in your business, tends to give confidence to consumers to buy from you, so that is a plus for them. Good brand name building. A true pragmatic small business owner might over look such things as misrepresentations in their sales pitch to get that sign and prominently display it in their establishment. Theoretically one could argue that point.

Personally I would not choose to mention anything negative about the BBB, but I did put it in a letter to the FTC, which is public record, not sure if the Federal Trade Commission bothered following up on it, in fact the BBB is in the news today working with the FTC?

http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/10-03-2005/0004157777&EDATE=

http://www.motorage.com/motorage/article/articleDetail.jsp?id=184916

The BBB serves a purpose in the market, but as we know absolute power often corrupts absolutely. Indeed, the BBB acts above the law and with the FTC, while not always following the law or rather the expectations of ethics one would assume, that is to say someone like me. No further comment. It would not serve our company to have interviews on this matter as many in the society take BBB as gospel. How little they know? Think on this.

Lance Winslow

Saturday, November 8, 2008

Cold Calling Can Lead To Severe Depression If Your Prospecting Efforts Are Not Diversified

Writen by D.M. Arenzon

In the financial markets the key to building a successful investment portfolio is through diversification. This means that a diversified portfolio includes stocks, bonds, mutual funds and other investment vehicles. This type of "diversified approach" in the financial markets can also be applied to your prospecting efforts. This means that you need to diversify your prospecting efforts beyond cold calling. Other lead generation opportunities include:

*Customer referrals

*Prospects that you meet at networking events.

*Incoming leads that you receive through advertising mediums such the internet, television, radio, magazine, newspaper, yellow pages and direct mail.

*Increase your exposure by submitting articles to industry publications.

*Increase your exposure by submitting press releases about your company (check out www.prweb.com).

*Participate in industry message boards and blogs.

*Send targeted emails to prospects (make sure you follow the CAN SPAM ACT).

*Exhibit at local tradeshows and chamber events

These eight examples are excellent ways to increase your income beyond making just cold calls. But, what would happen if you decide to ignore these eight lead generation opportunities? What would happen if you focus 100% of your lead generation efforts on cold calling? I believe that by choosing this course of action you will become frustrated and your frustration will lead to depression.

How do I know this to be true? I know this to be true because at one point in my cold calling career I had focused 100% of my time on cold calling to generate new business. In fact, there was a time when I made close to 400 to 500 calls a week for many years. That's about 80 to 100 calls a day! As a result of my lack of lead generation diversification, my frustrations with cold calling lead to a temporary period of severe depression. What's my advice in one word or less? DIVERSIFY!

Copyright 2006 MR. COLD CALL SEMINARS - All rights reserved.

Behind The Scenes With Mr. Cold Call

Mr. Cold Call is the author of "How To Have Fun Cold Calling" and "115 Common Sales Objections, 156 Clever And Savvy Responses." According to Mr. Cold Call, "Your cold call success is dependent on 11 winning personality traits (known as your Telephone Persona Of Success!)." Collectively, these traits allow you to uniquely market yourself over the telephone so that you can inspire your prospect's curiosity and reduce their resistance. Are you interested in finding out more about Mr. Cold Call? Then sign-up for his free weekly cold calling tips at http://www.mrcoldcall.com

Friday, November 7, 2008

Do Not Dismiss Telephone Sales Potential

Writen by Lance Winslow

If you own a business then you need to be aware of the value of the telephone and how you can use it to increase your company's sales potential. Many businesses make mistakes by not training their employees to use the telephone correctly. Communication, sales and customer service go hand-in-hand. You might be surprised how many sales you are losing due to your own employees not handling the telephone correctly.

Most seas and business management executives will recommend that you do an audit of your telephone usage in your company. Monitor the phone calls for a week and how each employee is handling customer questions, complaints and sales. In doing this you will find it there are simple things you can do in ways you can train your employees to be more effective on the phone and increase your sales.

One of the biggest complaints the customers make is how they are treated on the telephone from companies they do business with. Certainly you have heard your friends complain about credit card companies, the phone company, airline reservations or been put on hold in the middle of a phone call. Perhaps you two have been stressed out during telephone calls to the companies you do business with and perhaps you have promised yourself that you will never do business with that company again.

You can see exactly what happens in such cases when you look at things from the customer's perspective. Yet, when you run the company often you not think of how the customer feels on the other into the phone. There are simple psychological things that you can say to customers while on the phone to make their buying experience more pleasurable and in doing so you will increase sales.

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Making Cold Calls Is The Telephone Prospecting Equivalent Of Sending Spam Emails

Writen by Tino Buntic

Consider the following four questions:

  1. If an internet marketing consultant told you that sending spam emails is a good way to advertise your business, would you do it?
  2. Do you hate wasting your time sorting through dozens of unsolicited email messages?
  3. Do you ever get frustrated when you receive cold calls from telemarketers, especially when they call at inopportune times?
  4. If a sales consultant told you that making cold calls is a good telephone prospecting method, would you make cold calls to solicit new business?

I would bet that you would answer "no" to each of the first three questions. The last question you may answer with a "yes" or a "no" depending on your attitude towards sales prospecting methods.

But it is my belief that there is no difference between cold calling and sending spam emails. Making cold calls is the telephone prospecting equivalent of sending spam emails; both are forms of interruption marketing. That is, both prospecting methods are used to force your own sales pitches onto unwilling and unsuspecting consumers. Both of these techniques are detested by their respective recipients. Yet, cold calling is still considered an acceptable means of prospecting by participants in the sales profession and spam emailing is not.

Why is this the case? There was a time, maybe twenty years ago, that cold calling worked. It was a good way to prospect for new clients. However, it doesn't work anymore. But the sales profession has not been able to adapt to new marketing methods; they do what they have always done, whether or not it is still successful.

Are you sick and tired of cold calling? Then Tino Buntic invites you to create a profile at Trade-Pals.com to receive qualified sales leads without cold calling - For FREE! TradePals provides free sales leads and free advertising to North American business professionals.

Tino enjoys reading blogs and highly recommends Bill Baren Blog, the creative intersection of life and business.

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

The Power Of Good Timing

Writen by Jacques Werth

Steve was very upset when he called me a couple of months ago. "I did exactly what you taught me. I made 1424 dials and presented 171 prospecting offers. I got two appointments and I only made one sale. Am I doing something wrong, or doesn't High Probability Prospecting work in the insurance industry?"

How long did it take Steve to make those 1400+ calls?

"About thirty hours, over a period of three weeks."

How much time did he spend with the two appointments that resulted from all that dialing?

"About 7 hours."

How much commission did Steve make on the sale that he closed?

"About $1,600," he reported.

Therefore, Steve made $1,600 for about a weeks' work- not too bad for a beginner. He averaged about $43/hour.

"It's not very good, either," was his response, still quite upset. "What am I doing wrong?"

"Nothing that a little more experience won't fix," I told him. I suggested that he continue calling his list for another couple of weeks. Then, when he reached the end of the list, he should call the people at the beginning of the list again, this time with a different prospecting offer for the same product.

Steve calmed down and agreed to do that.

A month later Steve called again. "Well, I made 1537 calls in the past month, and presented 174 offers, mostly to the same people that I had called a month earlier. I made appointments with 5 High Probability Prospects, and closed 2 of them."

Steve was not complaining: He made $3,300 for about 50 hours of work- averaging about $66/hour. Then, he quit his other job! "Did I get that much better in one month?" he wondered.

Steve did not get that much better in one month- although there is no question that he improved considerably. The Power of Good Timing also contributed to the dramatic improvement in his results. Now that he can work at his insurance business full-time, he should be able to triple last months income.

"Being in the right place at the right time" is NOT just luck when you use High Probability Prospecting. It's vital to remember that people become High Probability Prospects in their own time, for their own reason.

When you are calling a good, targeted list, most of the prospects WILL become High Probability Prospects eventually- Prospects that are ready to buy what you're selling- now. That's why we train salespeople to repeatedly contact their prospects, usually about once a month. You want to ensure that you are there when they're ready to buy.

Steve sells insurance. In the month that lapsed between his first and second calls to prospects, it's likely that some of them experienced life-changing events, such as weddings, births, raises and promotions, business ownership, job changes, new homes, college tuition, deaths, etc. Any of those occurrences may have compelled some of them to want what he was offering- right now. That's the Power of Good Timing.

In High Probability Prospecting, Good Timing is a factor in successful selling. Here's another: The Difference between Cold-Calling and Warm Calling.

The first time Steve contacted his list with a High Probability Prospecting Offer, he was a stranger making a cold-call. When they said "I'm not interested," he said "Okay, good bye." He heard them, accepted their answer, and immediately disqualified them. That left the prospects with a good experience.

The second time Steve called he was no longer a stranger, he was making a warm-call. And, he presented a new offer, with two additional features. In the month between calls, some of the people he had originally made offers to had been considering that maybe they did want insurance: The combination of the 'warm' call,' a life-changing occurrence, and the new offer compelled some of them to meet with him.

In High Probability Prospecting, Good Timing IS a powerful factor - but it is rarely due to luck. Salespeople who methodically and systematically apply the principles of High Probability Prospecting routinely find themselves in the "Right Place at the Right Time".

Jacques Werth, author of "High Probability Selling," is an internationally respected Sales Trainer and Sales Consultant. HPS graduates are excelling as top Sales Performers in over 70 industries. Visit High Probability Sales Training to discover how to make fewer appointments yet close significantly more sales. Exclusive CDs and MP3s teach you to turn the "Numbers Game" Upside-Down at High Probability Sales Training.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Getting Return Phone Calls From Cold Calling

Writen by Lance Winslow

How can you get return phone calls from cold calling? Well it is not as difficult as you might think if you are very careful to leave a brief explanation of your products or service on the their voice mail and do it in such a way which is professional, to the point, and upbeat. Enthusiasm will help a lot and so will key words and phrases about how you wish to help them by offering your product or service.

It is very important when leaving voice mails to prospects not to go into a bragging session of how great you are or your company or on and on about how your product was rated number one or how you are the greatest service known to mankind. All this is highly irrelevant and this is telling rather than selling. You must briefly as in Bullet Type presentation explain the benefits of what you and more specifically you company will offer. It is also to important to let the prospect know of several best times to call you back, as you are busy, but need to make sure they are taken care of.

Once you get the hang of it you will actually prefer that you leave a quick message the first time in voice mail during cold calling and have a great pitch. Remember when they call you back they will have questions, perhaps objections and you can then better get to know the prospect and close the sale for your mutual benefit. Consider all this in 2006.

Lance Winslow

Monday, November 3, 2008

Voice Mail Prospecting Most Salespeople Leave The Wrong Kinds Of Messages

Writen by Dan O'Day

Do you routinely achieve a 65% - 85% callback rate on the voice mail messages you leave for prospects?

You can. But first you have to ignore the "conventional wisdom" being taught by sales trainers who never actually cold-call or by business consultants who teach rather than do.

In the course of my *research for my book, How To Get Your Voice Mail Messages Returned (http://www.VoiceMailReturned.com), I came across a presentation that some consultant gave on this topic. Like a lot of consultants, she didn't base her techniques on real-world experiences. Instead, she based it on a book she read.

(*The techniques I teach are based on field research. But I also was interested in what other people had to say about this topic.)

She teaches what you might call a "blueprint" of a standardized script you should follow when leaving cold-call voice mail messages.

Without violating anyone's copyright -- and while representing the "blueprint" as accurately as possible -- I will now share with you an example of a voice mail message that follows the principles apparently taught in the book she read.

If you prefer to use a traditional approach to voice mail, you can copy this example.

Personally, I hope you won't follow this blueprint, because of the three underlying precepts I teach regarding voice mail messages:

1. The only goal of a voice mail message is to get the call returned (or, ultimately to result in a live conversation).

2. Most voice mail messages left by salespeople are not returned.

3. Therefore, the methods commonly employed by most salespeople usually are ineffective.

But if you believe the conventional approach to be just fine, here is a faithful example:

"Hi, my name is Dan O'Day and I am with Z-100 Radio. I understand that you are the Advertising Manager for ABC Widgets, which means you are responsible for the advertising in the Riverside area. I work for a division of XYZ Broadcasting that specializes in creating advertising campaigns that are specifically designed to drive sales for companies like yours. We have worked with everyone from Brand X Widgets to Brand Z Widgets. For example, last year we did an advertising campaign for Brand X Widgets in which we helped them advertise their new Super Widget. I would love to give you more specific details about other successful campaigns we have designed and talk to you about how we can help you meet your goals in Riverside. My name is is Dan O'Day and you can reach me at 555-476-8111. That number again is 555-476-8111. Thank you and I look forward to your call."

Well, there it is: A "professional" voice mail message which, according to some book, contains all the elements required to stimulate a callback.

Lots of luck.

We don't have enough space to analyze that message and list all the things that it does wrong.

But I will point out something that the creator of this "blueprint" doesn't quite understand:

The average business executive sorts through his mail over the wastebasket. As soon as he mentally identifies something as "junk mail," he drops it into that wastebasket. And the majority of his mail goes directly into the trash without ever being opened.

The average business executive listens to her voice mail messages with her finger poised over the "delete" button.

And as soon as she decides this phone call is not one that she needs to return or one that she will benefit from returning, she hits "delete"...

...and never looks back.

That means you must begin your message with something that makes the recipient afraid to hit the "delete" button.

And it must maintain the recipient's interest all the way to your "call to action" (i.e., telling them exactly how and when to return your call).

So you have a choice:

Do you want to leave "professional"-sounding messages that get deleted, not returned?

Or do you want to leave unique, intriguing messages that are are virtually irresistible to the recipient?

© 2005 by Dan O'Day

Dan O'Day, an internationally known Advertising and Marketing strategist, specializes in results-producing, one-to-one communication with customers. He's worked with media companies, ad agencies, and businesses in 31 different countries. His work has been praised by other marketing gurus including Jay Abraham, Joseph Sugarman, Joe Polish, etc. His book, How To Get Your Voice Mail Messages Returned, is the only resource in the world that includes detailed critiques of actual sales voice mail messages... plus O'Day's own rewrites to greatly increase the callback response of each call. How To Get Your Voice Mail Messages Returned is available for instant download from http://www.VoiceMailReturned.com

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Close More Sales By Making Your Prospect Feel Important

Writen by D.M. Arenzon

John Dewey, a 21st century renowned philosopher, psychologist and educator said that the need to feel important is a basic law of human nature. When you are contacting your sales prospect, engaging in conversation with them and even speaking with their gatekeeper it is so important that you apply this law of human nature. While this concept is common sense one could argue that it is not common usage. Why is this true? Because many of us get caught up in everyday life and we forget how important it is to make others feel important. How do you bring these "common sense principles" from your subconscious to your conscious mind? It's called awareness.

When you become more aware of this principle and use it in your everyday life you will find yourself closing more sales. Do you want to get started? Below are ten practical ideas that you can immediately use to make others feel important.

1. The Importance Of Remembering And Using People's Names.

"Excuse me, what is your name again?" Have you ever found yourself saying this? I must admit that this has happened to me many times. One creative idea to remember the names of others is to think of a moviestar soon after you have learned your prospect's name (or the name of their gatekeeper). So for example, a man's name is Harrison then think of Harrison Ford. Or, if a woman's name is Sandra then think of Sandra Bullock. Another strategy is to write the name of your prospect down on paper. This idea works well if you are dealing with gatekeepers or if you find yourself being transferred from one person to the next to reach the correct decision maker.

In regards to using people's name, I would suggest that you use your prospect's name at the beginning, middle and end of your conversation. Also, when you send them emails make sure you use their name in your email to them. Further, I would also make sure that when you speak with the gatekeeper that you politely ask them for their name.

How many times have you not asked for the gatekeeper's name and just said, "Can you please transfer me to (Name of your prospect)." How about if you said, "May I have the pleasure to know your name? Once you know their name I would say their name and then ask to be transferred again to your prospect. As a final note, I would record the name of the gatekeeper in your call notes so the next time that you call you make your prospect's gatekeeper feel important!

2. The Importance Of Sending Handwritten Thank You Notes.

How often do you find yourself sending emails rather than sending a thank you note? The reason most likely is because it's easier to send an email then to take the time to send a handwritten note. In regards to sending emails and making your prospect feel important, I usually send an email to summarize or confirm what we had spoken about over the telephone (i.e. you set up a time to meet with them).

In regards to sending thank you notes, I recommend that you send a thank you note to any prospect in which you have spent more than five minutes on the telephone with. Also, if your prospect does not return your telephone calls, I would suggest that you send them a hand written note that you have been trying to reach them. When you take the time to write a thank you note then you are letting your prospect know that they are important.

3. The Importance Of Timely Following Up.

Have you ever been in a situation when someone has said, "I'll call you tomorrow and give you an answer to your question." Did this person call you? If they forgot to call, how did this make you feel? Were you annoyed that they did not call? This type of example happens a lot so the next time that you promise your prospect something make sure that you follow thru with your word. Your word is your signature.

4. The Importance Of Sending Articles That Your Prospect Would Find Interesting.

I believe that if you take the time to send your prospect an article of interest then your actions imply that you have taken the time to really get to know their business and what they do. Think about it, how would you know what to send to them if you did not take the time to get to know them? If you are reading an article that your prospect might find interesting (i.e. forwarding this article) then email it to them or print it up and send it to them with a short handwritten note.

5. The Importance Of Listening More And Asking Good Questions.

How much should you listen versus talk when speaking with your sales prospect? The most common percentages that I have come across are 70% of your time should be spent listening to your prospect, while the other 30% of your time should be spent speaking with or asking your prospect questions. When you listen to your prospect you are making them feel important. When you ask your prospect questions you are making them feel important. These percentages will help you to adjust your ratios so that you spend more time listening to your prospect and understanding what they may need so that you can help them.

6. The Importance Of Taking Good Notes About Your Sales Prospect.

When you have completed a telephone call with your sales prospect take a few minutes after the call to record a few key points about them. I would record information about their professional objectives as well as personal information about them. When you call them back and incorporate key points that you have learned from previous conversations then your actions will make them feel important.

7. The Importance of Making Sure That You Know Your Prospect's Industry.

The most obvious way to get to know your prospect's industry is to research their website or read trade publications. Another great way to really get to know your prospect's industry is to only contact prospects in a specific industry. For example, spend a few weeks calling on just one industry (i.e. pest control companies or moving companies). This way you learn firsthand from experts in that industry what they are experiencing and bring that information that you have learned to the next prospecting call.

8. The Importance Of Finding Things That You May Have In Common With Your Sales Prospect.

Many websites have a section reserved for management profiles. Read these biographies to see if you may anything in common with your prospect. Maybe your prospect attended the same college as you? Maybe your prospect grew up in the same town or area as you? The more that you can find in common the better! I would try to use this information that you have in common early on in your telephone conversation. For example you could open your sales call with the following: "(First name of prospect), as a (Say year here) graduate of (Name of college) I'm hoping that you will take my call today? (Pause and then smile on the phone). This is (Your name) calling from (Your company) and the reason for my call today is (State the reason for your call).

9. The Importance Of Being Patient When Your Prospect Asks You A Dumb Question.

Have you ever been in a situation where you asked someone a question and they responded with a sarcastic tone and said, "We already went over that question!" Or maybe the response was not exact, but similar? How did this make you feel? "If a customer asks you a really dumb question be patient and answer their question. No one is perfect and sometimes things that are common sense to you are not common sense to others.

10. The Importance Of Smiling Because When You Smile It's Contagious!

Smile as much as you can on the telephone. While your prospect cannot see you smiling, they can sense the tone of the call and your smile has the power to influence others. Always remember that if you ask for the order with a smile you can really be unstoppable!

Copyright 2006 MR. COLD CALL SEMINARS - All rights reserved.

Behind The Scenes With Mr. Cold Call

Mr. Cold Call is the author of "How To Have Fun Cold Calling" and "115 Common Sales Objections, 156 Clever And Savvy Responses." According to Mr. Cold Call, "Your cold call success is dependent on 11 winning personality traits (known as your Telephone Persona Of Success!)." Collectively, these traits allow you to uniquely market yourself over the telephone so that you can inspire your prospect's curiosity and reduce their resistance. Are you interested in finding out more about Mr. Cold Call? Then sign-up for his free weekly cold calling tips at http://www.mrcoldcall.com