A pleasure :-)
A pleasure :-)
Regards
Debbie
debbie@stafftraining.co.za
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Do you guys still do cold calling? It is like driving an ice cream van and listening to the same monotonous tune every day while hoping that someone will stop you and buy. Are there no better ways of getting to your target market?
All the above mentioned arguments and advice on overcoming rejection is valid, but what annoys people is when someone "just happens to be in the area" and pops in at an inconvenient time. Remember those annoying telephonic sales calls between 6 - 8pm when you want to put your feet up after a hard day? Consider why encyclopaedia and insurance agents no longer knock on doors at night. Why did the time share industry get a bad name?
Is it not better to phone and use an opening line such as; Good morning Mr Soap. Your name was provide to me by Joe Bloggs who is also a member of Business Forum (make a connection). Joe is very happy with my service (make sure this is true) and I would like to show you what I could do for your business... etc. (Practise your sales pitch so it does not sound animated). LISTEN and take notes. This may be invaluable in positioning yourself or your product. Make an appointment to see the prospect.
This way you make the prospect feel important. You do not just drop in unannounced at a bad time. You may not get a second chance. Do your homework BEFORE contacting the prospect. Phone the company for a quote on a product. Look at their website. Call his secretary or receptionist. Ask existing clients/customers for referrals or introductions. Word of mouth is still the best advertising.
By qualifying leads you can let go of the people who do not qualify for your time. You will then have more time prospecting for better, more profitable customers.
I am not a sales guru and I am sure that there are members out there who may have better advice. I just get very annoyed when someone calls me out of the blue to waste my time on some unwanted product. If I don't like it, why then would I want to subject my prospective customers to the same tactics?
Blurock - I wouldn't go so far as to say that we cold call as such. I like my girls to use the power of word of mouth. Nothing is better than getting a new client referred by another. We do however contact corporate clienst to find out if they have a staff wellness program and if they would be interested in us coming in to do a wellness day for them - it's a tough one to crack though more often than not.
I suppose though that I am lucky in a sense that half my business relies on cold calling and the other half on word of mouth. Catch 22 - swings and roundabouts. Where we struggle on the one hand we gain on the other.
I do agree with you on looking at a website and doing your homework. In my line of business it is more worth our while doing a wellness day for no less than 5 staff members so we do have to 'qualify' our clients before approaching them. As much as I value and appreciate out smaller clients, we rely more on the bigger corporates for contracts. Business is business I guess.
Nothing wrong with your approach Cat. I have a gripe with people who target an area rather than a specific prospect. They have a shotgun approach and waste your time trying to sell something you do not need or want. These are usually the guys who wonder why they work so hard for so little reward.
Sure do, but it's targetted. Very little of what we cold call today will convert into business this month, but a lot of it does convert eventually. And leads to all those other nice things, like referrals, networks etc.
In fact I suspect the roots of as much as 90% of my regular business (if not more) could be traced to cold calls that led to regular business that led to referrals as we do virtually no broadcast type advertising.
BTW I'd suggest prospecting is really just a subset of cold calling. The difference between prospecting and what you're talking about - the very worst forms of cold calling - is a matter of style. If you're tossing out a name of a common acquaintance as a door opener, that's heading into referral territory in my book.
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