Cold calls!!!!!!!!

Hi

I spend a lot of time on the phones, not necessarily all are cold calls but it depends on what product or service you are selling.

I never go in both feet first, try and establish a rapport with the person you are speaking with, ok you only have a few seconds to make that impression but i always have 3 or 4 different opening lines depending on how the person answers the phone. If they come on aggressively im always a little laid back and always ready to escape without evening mentioning im trying to sell anything, better to leave with a good impression of the company than try and ram something down someones throat at the expense of the company name.

If they invite conversation take the opportunity to have a brief chat, nothing wrong with exchanging brief pleasantries and getting to know a little about your prospective buyer.

Next it depends if you need to make a return call - if you do try and remember the secretaries name- if he/she makes any comments about her life or circumstance - try and remember this and when you call back call her by his/her name, you will be amazed how well that works, personal touch!

If you get to speak to the decision maker straight away, keep this business like but still friendly, be clear what it is you are offering and the terms of the prospective sale, if you do have to call back again make notes about any comments your prospect may have dropped out in conversation, the name of a business colleague or family member, it just helps to keep it human.

I think what im trying to say in a nut shell - dont sound like a robot making the 100th call of the day - always sound fresh & happy as its your 1st call - be happy but not over excited - be confident but not arrogant -thats it !

Be interested to hear back from you with any good results, or if you think ive written a load of rubbish

Clive makes some good points.

It is also worth knowing your statistics, if 1 in 100 people buy or 1 in 5000 buy, then you get some idea of the task ahead of you and you can feel relieved that that door shut in your face is just another one of those statistical "No's" out of the way .... for every "no" you are getting closer to that sale, cherish them, don't hate them.

only some

thanks lol

Good advice on "if they come on aggressively im always a little laid back and always ready to escape without evening mentioning im trying to sell anything, better to leave with a good impression of the company than try and ram something down someones throat at the expense of the company name." I have been told that I am not aggressive enough, but I know what you mean. When the table is turned, I do not stay on the phone long with someone who only purpose was to ram his sales pitch down my throat, either. You are so right about personal touch. I've had situations where the gate keepers said no, but one of the staff (a nurse) tried to convince her and ultimately set up a phone conference. All was due to our sons like the same sports. Amazing, huh? Rubbish...NOOOOO Thanks for the response!!

This is something I am ruthless over, if they are calling me, I had better get a personal answer immediately, if they are using a dialer and a few second delay happens, it is a 'no chance' call from the off.

I am regulary heard saying things like 'would you like to speak with me or the guy sitting next to you?' & 'you may want to try again when you knw what you are doing'.

I have set up a call centre (very succesful) and ripped and rebuilt another (again very succesful) I have trained sales staff in telesales for both Network 3 and 02 (UK) and it is so easy to make a good call, if somene does not do it with me the call is over, if they do a good job, I praise them personally.

It is a very hard industry to work in, but an easy one to master, be normal, be professional, be honest and above all, be polite.

And gate keepers are easy when you know how, there are some that you will never get past, period. But the greatest trick I ever learnt and taught is make it sound like you are an arrogant frend of the recipient, for example if the name you are after is 'Mr John Doe, CEO' simply have a strong voice, and do the phones answer to a suggestive nod:

"Hi its Chris, pop me through to John will you please, Thankyou" Then shut up.

Strong authoritive voice is a must

I'm useless at cold calling, so take my advice with a pinch of salt, but this is how we used to do it.

We used to have a room full of youngsters provided with bought in data sheets hitting the phones, and doing the cold calling. But apart from speeding up Clives hair loss as he had to manage them, we found, at least for our industry, it sends out the wrong signals and became counter productive, one of the reasons being because all our contacts had already been hit by our competitors.

So we changed direction, did a way with all the youngsters on the phones and invested in things like better web content, adwords campaigns and general marketing and let enquires come to us. To be fair to Clive the only cold calls he has to make these days are contacting customers whoses details are expired and have forgotten they've listed with us!

So maybe this could be a possible scenario for your own business, an adwords campaign or similar to get the interest, and get the enquires to come to you. This then gets you past the gate keepers when you contact them back.

We still get some quite aggresive secrataries/gatekeepers who really don't want to transfer the call, even when we have an email or message from their boss asking us more information!

I hate cold calling.
especially as most of it is off shore as soon as I hear the accent phone down.

And before any PC police start ranting I am of Asian Persuasion.

Amen, I had a great team in manchester, mostly asian, and they used to say Chris, I was jumping as its illegal, but whenever I was not around they would, as their words were 'Nobody buys from an asian' (They didnt say asian, but you get my drift, it damages your business, but only because of the penny pinching companies outsourcing their call centres abroad, Asia, SE Asia etc.

But the real reason i get in a phone slamming mood, is because every foreign call I get affects our economy for the worse.

Your fellow passport holders understand how you think and what you want, a completely different culture cannot do this, and they just read from scripts, so annoying when they cannot think for themselves!

Arrggghhhh!