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How to Make Cold Calling Opportunities Out of Voice Mails

Written by: Ari Galper

Article Overview: Turn voice mails into a cold calling journey of discovery!

How to Make Cold Calling Opportunities Out of Voice Mails

Most people who still use the traditional cold calling mindset look at voicemail as a dead end. They say to themselves, “Oh well, I may as well leave a message and hope he calls me back.”

This almost never happens, and we know it. But we’re often so relieved not to have to talk with someone, that we leave a message anyway. We avoid dealing with another person’s potential negative response to us and we avoid being challenged by the receptionist as well.

By the time the day is over, we might feel good because we’ve played the “numbers game” and made a lot of calls. But our productivity has been minimal. And over time that can make us feel frustrated by our experiences in cold calling.

With the new approach to cold calling, voicemail is an opportunity for discovery. It leads us beyond voicemail. Voice mail becomes a starting point for you begin the process of locating the person you’re trying to contact.

Our objective is not to pursue people to make a sale in this new way of cold calling. It is to uncover the truth of their situation and to be okay with the outcome, whether it’s a “yes” or a “no.”

So we can begin to feel more comfortable hitting “0” when we get someone’s voicemail. Because we then have an opportunity to go back to the receptionist and begin a dialogue based on asking for help.

Here’s how the dialogue might go:

“Hi, maybe you can help me out for a second? I’m trying to get hold of Mike and I got his voicemail. Would you happen to know if he’s at lunch, or on vacation, or in a meeting by any chance?”

Here, you aren’t just asking to find Mike. And you’re also providing possible solutions to finding Mike. This helps the receptionist feel as if he or she is part of the problem-solving process.

The receptionist is likely to offer one of two responses. The first is, “Yes, he’s in a meeting (or at lunch or on vacation) and I’m not sure when he’ll be back at his desk.”

This answer has just given you a lot more information than you would have if you had just left a voicemail. Now you know your contact’s whereabouts in real time and you can
call back at a more appropriate time.

The second response is, “No, I don’t know where he is.” In this case, you would reply, “That’s not a problem...” This low-key statement diffuses any possible pressure that the
receptionist might be feeling about not being able to answer your question.

You can then continue with, “Would you happen to know anyone whose desk or office is near him or who works in his area who might know where he is?” Again, you’re offering another option for solving the problem. In many cases, the receptionist will then transfer you to a colleague of your contact who can help you determine his or her whereabouts.

The receptionist may also reply, “No, I don’t know anyone in his area.” You then say, “That’s not a problem...” and offer, “Would you happen to have a paging system or his cell phone number by any chance?”

If the receptionist replies, “Sorry, we don’t have those,” then at that point you can say, “Thank you very much. I really appreciate your help. And then hang up, and call back another time.

Does the idea of paging potential clients or calling them on their cell phone make your stomach clench up? Are you thinking that you can’t cold call people that way because they might reject you?

That fear is only to be expected if your agenda is to sell something to the person. In other words, if you’re still using the traditional sales mindset. But once you master the new cold calling perspective, you’ll feel comfortable calling anyone, any time, using any mode.

As long as you’re 100 percent focused on your potential client’s world, you’ll find that people will be receptive to you. You can easily navigate throughout an organization with the type of dialogue described above, because you’re asking for help in a relaxed manner and you never put anyone on the spot.

Suppose that your efforts to locate your contact in this way fail. At that point you can leave a voicemail, but it should always be your very last option. Here’s an example of an appropriate cold calling voicemail:

“Hi John, maybe you can help me out for a second? I’m not sure if you’re the right person or not, but I’m trying to reach the person responsible for reporting problems about unpaid invoices. My name is John Edwards, my number is...”

Try this way of approaching the situation of voice mails, and you’ll be surprised and pleased at how often it becomes a highway instead of a dead end.

To your success,

Related Articles
  Cold Calling - Fish or Fowl?
  Cold Calling Works!
  Should You Use Sales Letters Before You Cold Call
  Stop By All That Business Your Are Driving By If You Want to Increase Sales
  What Cold Calling Business Lead Management Can Do For Your Business

Article Tags: desk, dialogue, discovery, experiences, lunch, mindset, negative response, new approach, numbers game, objective, possible solutions, productivity, receptionist, truth, voice mail, voicemail



Related Forum Posts
Voice SMS! - Ashish, I enjoy sending txt messages and it seems faster to send a Voice one than txt. How do you plan on informing the user that there is a limitation to the amount of voice you can record in a Voice SMS? I believe txt has about 168 character limit.
Re: How to develop sales contacts? - Everyone has the right idea here. Depending on your business, there are different techniques that you could use. For consultants and sales heavy businesses, there are three tactics that I have found especially useful in my business: 1. Attend Networking Events 2. Cold Calling 3. Referral Program 4. Affiliate Program (most successful) The affiliate program was successful for me, as I hooked up with a franchise consultant, and he gave multiple unit businesses that needed my credit card processing services. I highly suggest you hook up with a sales partner, and give him a cut of the monthly revenue.
Re: Direct Mail Postcards - Post cards would be really expensive to send from Japan...but one way to advertise that is not expensive from overseas is by Cold Calling using cheap VoIP equipment. I know Japan has a really good internet connection, so as long as you are willing to stay up late, it might be an option. I cold call from Thailand far, far away from any city using a CDMA wireless internet connection and have had pretty good results. I find tho, that cold calling works best for business 2 business (b2b), rather than b2c products. --matt
Re: Cold Calling - As long as people are out of jobs, you'll probably have a lot of people who say they want to work for straight commission, but if they don't get paid fairly quickly, they usually move on. We've run into that and went through about 500 people (whose resumes looked really good) until we found about 3 good resellers. People just don't want to work for anything. Or they do a good job getting the business but don't do the follow up necessary to make the sale......so they move on thinking they need money NOW. Our business requires all cold calling as well. It's really tough for people to perfect that but there are a lot of good books out there. On is Cold Calling Techniques, by Stephan Schiffman
Voice SMS - Ashish, Is this a Voice message that will be converted to Text and then sent via sms so that the recipient is reading text?


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