You, like me, may be a business owner, sales person or professional. You may have to make cold call as a key part of our marketing mix. Unfortunately, fear, apathy or reluctance can paralyse you. Fair? You probably never find yourself making work to look busy so you can justify avoiding making those cold calls but you may know people who do? Or perhaps you employ people like this?
What Do You Hate Most About Most Cold Calling?
The most common reasons people like us hate and fear cold calling is that we feel that the recipient is probably busy and will not appreciate your interruption, especially if you're selling something i.e. we empathise with our prospect because we don't like it when people do it to us. Perhaps you also fear rejection on a cold call?
In a recent poll we discovered these 2 reasons accounted for 70% of professionals being guilty of call avoidance. Do they feel familiar to you?
What If …. You Could Just Eliminate the Pressure!
But how?
It's simple really. For a start, do NOT sound like every other salesperson.
Let's examine what most cold callers do.
"Hello, Mr Smith, I'm from . The purpose of my call today is to introduce myself and my company. We specialise in and have produced some very impressive for companies just like yours. I'm sure a company as progressive as yours would be interested in gaining an edge in the market place and I believe we can help you. I'd like to come over and meet you to show you how we do this and discuss how we could help you. Would Tuesday or Wednesday be better?"
The recipient of the cold call has to endure that high pressure guff, probably when they are busy and often they don't even get a chance to get a word out because the salesperson is under pressure to deliver their "elevator pitch" and secure an appointment. It's "a numbers game" after all.
When they do get a time in the diary, both the salesperson and victim …. Oops! Prospect …. usually find these meetings uncomfortable and unproductive. Doesn't a low close rate (i.e. less than 1:3) indicate this to you?
If you make it past the secretary of course, and you may well be fobbed off down the food chain, have you ever noticed how it's often easier to get an appointment and look busy by settling for a low level contact than the real decision maker? Is it your experience that you do a lot of hard work, prepare, give a great presentation, sometimes even get asked to write a proposal, maybe do a little free consulting (i.e. educating your prospect on new developments), give them your pricing only to be told either:
"Thank you for your excellent presentation and proposal . I don't think I can make a decision yet as I need to think this over."
OR "Thanks , that was very interesting [your alarm bells should ring when you hear this]. You gave an excellent proposal. If it were up to me [more alarm bells] I'd recommend we go ahead, but it's not. I need to go to my to take this forward. Why don't you give me a call in a couple of weeks and I'll let you know how I got on?"
"We can't afford that right now. Give me a call in 3 months when we might have budget."
WARNING If you accept that type of answer you are probably being misled, and have just educated a non-prospect. They have stolen your knowledge which they do value because you have been willing to give it away for free.
Rule: Your job is to sell today and educate tomorrow.
You never have to beg for an appointment again if you use No Pressure Cold Calling techniques.
Imagine not sounding like every other cold caller. Consider what it would be like to cold call and be invited in to meet decision makers on a regular basis so your sales pipeline was always full and you never have to use the excuse "I'm too busy to prospect!". When you hear that excuse don't you know something is badly wrong?
What's the Impact on You of Not Prospecting?
The impact of not prospecting in your business is what? 3 months, 6 months, a year down the line? How does it affect your revenues? Your forecasting? Your profits? Your job or financial security?
Cold calling may not work for you. But what if you cold called and it did work 60%, 70% even 80% of the time and you find yourself being invited in to meet decision makers who have pains you can heal within a timetable you're happy with and a budget to make their pain go away?
Challenge:
What do you do in the first 30 seconds of your cold calls to control the sale from the outset while making your prospect feel like they are in control?
How do you avoid sounding like every other cold caller?
What can you do in your cold calls to eliminate the possibility of a "think it over" in the sales process even in your first meeting?
What do you do in your cold calls to help you disqualify non-prospects early in the sales cycles so you never waste time or reosurce on meeting them needlessly?
What do you do in your cold call to secure a decision in your first meetign to buy or advance the sale?
How can you be and sound negative on a cold call to your significant advantage?
What do your competitors do to get on your prospects' nerves? How can you sound completely different and get invited in, instead of begging or forcing an appointment?
Think of 3 ways in which you can get past voice mail and three to get past gatekeepers?
Hope this sparks your thinking.
(c)Sandler Sales Institute, 2006 Regards Marcus Cauchi Managing Director S.A.L.T. (Europe) Ltd Sandler Sales Institute® - Licensed Franchisee Guerrilla Marketing® - Licensed Master Practitioners Mob +44 (0) 7876 616 983 Tel 0845 458 1237 (UK Only)
London1.Sandler.com
Sales Training: Making No Pressure Cold Calls - To learn more about this author, visit Marcus Cauchi's Website.
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Marcus Cauchi
(Visit Marcus's Website)
Marcus Cauchi is London's first licensed
Sandler sales trainer. 19 years in direct
sales, he's sold physical products,
services and intangibles with varied
success. Over 16 years he left behind over
£56 million in deals he could have won,
but did because he didn't know any
better. He thought you had to qualify for
needs, present the benefits of your
solution, trial close, follow up with a
proposal or further information and the
close. He learned the hard way that when
you "pitch" a prospect lies to protect
himself. When you present and answer his
questions, he'll steal your ideas. When
you close, he'll mislead you or defer to
a higher authority (boss, wife, CFO) and
then when he's got you to document in
writing (proposals) and give away your
confidential pricing, he'll shop that
around your competitors to get the best
deal. When you follow up for a decision,
he'll give you unlimited access to his
voicemail and hide. Marcus teaches
counter intuitive selling. Average clients
increase revenues by 100-1100% in a year.
He's probably not for you though as it's
difficult and expensive.
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