Many people are not using proper etiquette when they send email messages – to friends or to business prospects. There are issues of etiquette in emailing that we need to think about every time we send a message.
For example, do not write your note in all capital letters or in all lowercase letters. Writing in all capital letters is the equivalent of shouting in email. (My wife’s cousin writes all his messages in lower case letters. Some people not only write in that style, but will not use any punctuation. That can be very frustrating and makes reading messages very difficult and time consuming!)
How often do you get an email with a return receipt request attached? I have some friends who always ask for a return receipt on all their emails, even after I suggest to them that they can turn that function off. If it upsets us, imagine what it would do to a prospect that we are trying to get in to see? We always want to be professional in everything that we do and our email messages is one of the first ways that a prospect begins to determine how prefessional we really are.
Excessive use the high priority setting for messages is like crying wolf! If we continue to use it on all our emails, the first time that we are trying to send a really critical message, we will have lost the effect of the priority setting.
Be sure to reread your message before you hit the SEND button! How many times have we sent an email and gotten a reply back that when we read it, we wished we could dig a hole and climb in? Reading our own screwed up words and sentences that come back to us is way too late a time to think about how we wish we had reread the note and made corrections before it went out!
Often we are writing to prospects who are very busy people, so we need to learn to get to the point in our emails. Make your email messages short and to the point. Don’t send unnecessary files either. Be sure to answer email messages back right away. If you don’t have time to provide needed details, do your prospect a favor and write a short answer back telling them approximately when you can deliver the needed information. People tend to use email because they’re very busy and they assume that you are busy too. However, common courtesy always wins the day!
Next time, we’ll discuss how go from “Hello, my name is Joe” to uncovering customer needs. We will discuss how to begin our sales calls. There are trainers out there giving bad advice to sales people on how to start a sales call and we'll talk about that in detail.
Good selling!
If you have any questions or comments, please email me at john@mccannmotivations.com. (I promise I won't critique them!)
Friday, October 16, 2009
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
Using Email to Obtain Sales Appointments
Previously I was talking about using voice mail messages to obtain sales appointments. In conjunction with voice mail, we can also use email messages to get in to see potential clients. However, before we can use email to get sales appointments, we first must leave what I call a “business footprint” with our target account.
First we must be leaving well-thought out voice mail messages. One of these messages can be used to alert a prospect that we will now be sending an email message with additional information that will be of interest to them. One of my own clients does most of his “business” by email as opposed to phone, so if anyone wants to get in touch with him, they need to be using email to do it. My voice mail message will tell him that I have some important information that I am forwarding to him in an email message that will go out this afternoon. At the same time, if I need to see him in person, I will ask that he let his assistant know which day and time would be best for me to come by.
Well guess what? You can do the same thing with people that you do not know personally, as long as you have created that “business footprint” beforehand. The prospect has to know who you are, who your company is and what you do in order for them to want to allow you in the door. This starts with a sound voice mail message – usually a question-based message designed to get the prospect to think about their current situation.
We are most likely not going to get in after just one voice message, so we will need to leave several over time. Each message needs to be different in content from the others, so we need to be creative. After leaving perhaps four or five messages, one last message would alert the prospect that you are going to be sending an email note.
One of the keys to getting a prospect to open our email message is the subject line. We need to pique the prospect’s curiosity here, just like we did with a question-based voice mail message. We can include a question in our subject line. We might ask something like: “What would happen if you could lower the overall cost of lighting in your plant?” (Here I am trying to link back to a question-based voice mail message that I talked about leaving a prospect in my last blog where I referenced the potential affect of relighting a building in order to improve the overall lighting effect while dramatically lowering costs.)
We need to pique the interest of our prospect first and then use bullet points to outline the key benefits of our program while not giving away the whole story. Our goal should be a personal visit to the prospect’s business. We need to save some “meat on the bone” for our in-person sales call.
Next time we’ll discuss ideas for proper email etiquette when writing to prospects and also some suggestions on the flow of our message.
In the meantime, be sure to visit my website at www.mccannmotivations.co. If you have a comment or question, email me at john@mccannmotivations.com or you can call me at 864-968-0262. Until next time, good selling everybody!
First we must be leaving well-thought out voice mail messages. One of these messages can be used to alert a prospect that we will now be sending an email message with additional information that will be of interest to them. One of my own clients does most of his “business” by email as opposed to phone, so if anyone wants to get in touch with him, they need to be using email to do it. My voice mail message will tell him that I have some important information that I am forwarding to him in an email message that will go out this afternoon. At the same time, if I need to see him in person, I will ask that he let his assistant know which day and time would be best for me to come by.
Well guess what? You can do the same thing with people that you do not know personally, as long as you have created that “business footprint” beforehand. The prospect has to know who you are, who your company is and what you do in order for them to want to allow you in the door. This starts with a sound voice mail message – usually a question-based message designed to get the prospect to think about their current situation.
We are most likely not going to get in after just one voice message, so we will need to leave several over time. Each message needs to be different in content from the others, so we need to be creative. After leaving perhaps four or five messages, one last message would alert the prospect that you are going to be sending an email note.
One of the keys to getting a prospect to open our email message is the subject line. We need to pique the prospect’s curiosity here, just like we did with a question-based voice mail message. We can include a question in our subject line. We might ask something like: “What would happen if you could lower the overall cost of lighting in your plant?” (Here I am trying to link back to a question-based voice mail message that I talked about leaving a prospect in my last blog where I referenced the potential affect of relighting a building in order to improve the overall lighting effect while dramatically lowering costs.)
We need to pique the interest of our prospect first and then use bullet points to outline the key benefits of our program while not giving away the whole story. Our goal should be a personal visit to the prospect’s business. We need to save some “meat on the bone” for our in-person sales call.
Next time we’ll discuss ideas for proper email etiquette when writing to prospects and also some suggestions on the flow of our message.
In the meantime, be sure to visit my website at www.mccannmotivations.co. If you have a comment or question, email me at john@mccannmotivations.com or you can call me at 864-968-0262. Until next time, good selling everybody!
Friday, June 19, 2009
Voice Mail Suggestions for Sales Appointments
In my sales training classes I always ask my class how many sales people always leave a voice mail message when they find themselves in the prospect’s voice mail system. You might be surprised (because I know I was), to learn that over half of my classes report that they DO NOT leave a message! They don’t want to leave a message but instead will try again to get through to their prospect at another time. The problem is that if they are in voice mail today, they will be again tomorrow!
Years ago I had a lady in Human Resources for a large national company who was referred to me by the President of another company. He told her that he was going to have me call her, so when I got into her voice mail, I thought nothing of it and left a message referencing my conversation with the President. She never called me back. I left a second message a few days later, then a third and after many repeated attempts, I left a sixth message, each one referring to why the President asked me to call her. I was very frustrated. I had even called the President back to see if he did in fact talk with her – which he had.
Immediately after my sixth message I had hung up the phone and shortly thereafter, my phone rang. When I answered it, I was shocked to hear the HR lady on the other end. What she told me shocked me again, but I have always remembered the conversation to this day. She said, “If I don’t I don’t personally know the person calling I do not call them back until after they have left me six voice mail messages. I feel that if they aren’t that interested in speaking to me, why should I be interested in speaking to them?”
This is a bit of an extreme, but it does tell a useful story. We do need to leave messages for our prospects giving them a reason to call us back. Tom Freese in his book “Question Based Selling” talks about the Charlie Brown Syndrome. No one ever saw Charlie Brown’s teacher, but we all know what she sounded like, “Waa, waa, waa.” He says that is exactly what most voice mail messages sound like when left by sales people. They all sound alike. Instead, he says that we need to pique the interest of our prospect by leaving questions in our voice mail messages instead of making statements. Questions will cause our prospect to want to know more information.
Suppose that you sell lighting products (fixtures, bulbs, etc). And suppose further that by re-lamping a facility a customer could save a lot of money based on the types of bulbs and fixtures that they use. One way to leave a voice mail message about this idea is to make statements such as:
“We are the largest supplier of electrical fixtures in the Upstate.
We carry a wide variety of lighting products from GE to Sylvania.
We can provide you with the latest in lighting technology that can save you money.”
This approach will probably not get a prospect to call because it’s similar to what they hear all the time, every day. But instead, what if we left a voice mail message like this:
“The reason for my call today is to answer any questions that you might be asking yourself such as:
How much of my monthly electrical bill is directed toward the lighting in my plant?
Is there a way that I can change my current lighting program in order to increase the overall lighting affect in my plant, while decreasing my monthly electrical bill at the same time?
What would my ROI be if I totally re-lamped my entire building?
If you have been thinking about any of these questions, then you and I need to meet because my company and I can help!”
As you can see, this is a totally different approach – moving the focus away from us and our company and products, and shifting it over to the customer and their problems. We need to think of the various problems that our product or service can solve and then create some questions for a voice mail message that get prospects thinking about their own situation. This shift in focus may cause the prospect to want to learn more and therefore increase the chance that they will call us back.
Next time we’ll focus on using email to obtain sales appointments. In the meantime, you can contact me at john@mccannmotivations.com or by phone at 864-968-0262. Until our next meeting, I wish you good selling!
Years ago I had a lady in Human Resources for a large national company who was referred to me by the President of another company. He told her that he was going to have me call her, so when I got into her voice mail, I thought nothing of it and left a message referencing my conversation with the President. She never called me back. I left a second message a few days later, then a third and after many repeated attempts, I left a sixth message, each one referring to why the President asked me to call her. I was very frustrated. I had even called the President back to see if he did in fact talk with her – which he had.
Immediately after my sixth message I had hung up the phone and shortly thereafter, my phone rang. When I answered it, I was shocked to hear the HR lady on the other end. What she told me shocked me again, but I have always remembered the conversation to this day. She said, “If I don’t I don’t personally know the person calling I do not call them back until after they have left me six voice mail messages. I feel that if they aren’t that interested in speaking to me, why should I be interested in speaking to them?”
This is a bit of an extreme, but it does tell a useful story. We do need to leave messages for our prospects giving them a reason to call us back. Tom Freese in his book “Question Based Selling” talks about the Charlie Brown Syndrome. No one ever saw Charlie Brown’s teacher, but we all know what she sounded like, “Waa, waa, waa.” He says that is exactly what most voice mail messages sound like when left by sales people. They all sound alike. Instead, he says that we need to pique the interest of our prospect by leaving questions in our voice mail messages instead of making statements. Questions will cause our prospect to want to know more information.
Suppose that you sell lighting products (fixtures, bulbs, etc). And suppose further that by re-lamping a facility a customer could save a lot of money based on the types of bulbs and fixtures that they use. One way to leave a voice mail message about this idea is to make statements such as:
“We are the largest supplier of electrical fixtures in the Upstate.
We carry a wide variety of lighting products from GE to Sylvania.
We can provide you with the latest in lighting technology that can save you money.”
This approach will probably not get a prospect to call because it’s similar to what they hear all the time, every day. But instead, what if we left a voice mail message like this:
“The reason for my call today is to answer any questions that you might be asking yourself such as:
How much of my monthly electrical bill is directed toward the lighting in my plant?
Is there a way that I can change my current lighting program in order to increase the overall lighting affect in my plant, while decreasing my monthly electrical bill at the same time?
What would my ROI be if I totally re-lamped my entire building?
If you have been thinking about any of these questions, then you and I need to meet because my company and I can help!”
As you can see, this is a totally different approach – moving the focus away from us and our company and products, and shifting it over to the customer and their problems. We need to think of the various problems that our product or service can solve and then create some questions for a voice mail message that get prospects thinking about their own situation. This shift in focus may cause the prospect to want to learn more and therefore increase the chance that they will call us back.
Next time we’ll focus on using email to obtain sales appointments. In the meantime, you can contact me at john@mccannmotivations.com or by phone at 864-968-0262. Until our next meeting, I wish you good selling!
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Using Voice Mail to Obtain Sales Appointments
Please visit my website at www.mccannmotivations.com for more information about sales training and other topics.
If you haven’t figured out by now that voice mail systems are for the benefit of the user, as opposed to being for the benefit of the caller, then you’ve not been making many phone calls trying to get in to see people in business these days. Voice mail is a very handy screening tool for buying influences and managers within the accounts that we are trying to penetrate. In order to become more successful we have to be prepared to use voice mail when we are asked to use it by the person’s recording.
Most people in sales are not very prepared to leave a professional voice mail message. Maybe we sales people are always thinking that the glass is half full, and because of that attitude, may constantly believe that the person we are calling is actually going to answer the phone. That very rarely happens in today’s busy business environment. In fact voice mail is great for managers who don’t want to be bothered by incoming phone calls.
In order to be prepared to leave a message, we need to know some basics about it. Busy executives are not going to rewind a voice mail message in order to catch the name and phone number of the person calling, so we have to do that for them. To do this, we must leave our name, company name, and phone number at the beginning of our message and then leave our name, company name and phone number at the very end of our message. However, we’re now faced with a problem that was covered in our last blog about speaking into the phone in a manner that enables the listener to understand what we have said.
We need to insert a pause between our first and last names and between the words in our company name. For example, I would say, “This is John (pause) McCann of McCann (pause) Motivations.” When it comes to leaving a phone number, I got a wonderful suggestion years ago in one of my sales training classes from one of the students. This guy was a salesman for a janitorial supply distributor in the Southwest. He suggested writing the phone number down as you say it into the phone. By doing this you will tend to slow down dramatically. We all can speak much faster than we can write. This is one of the best ideas I have ever heard with respect to using the phone in a professional manner. (I wish I could remember this guy’s name because I’d love to give him my personal thanks again and a lot of credit in this forum!)
In our next session we will cover approaches to use when leaving a voice mail message. You can contact me at john@mccannmotivations.com or by phone at 864-968-0262. Until our next meeting, I wish you good selling!
If you haven’t figured out by now that voice mail systems are for the benefit of the user, as opposed to being for the benefit of the caller, then you’ve not been making many phone calls trying to get in to see people in business these days. Voice mail is a very handy screening tool for buying influences and managers within the accounts that we are trying to penetrate. In order to become more successful we have to be prepared to use voice mail when we are asked to use it by the person’s recording.
Most people in sales are not very prepared to leave a professional voice mail message. Maybe we sales people are always thinking that the glass is half full, and because of that attitude, may constantly believe that the person we are calling is actually going to answer the phone. That very rarely happens in today’s busy business environment. In fact voice mail is great for managers who don’t want to be bothered by incoming phone calls.
In order to be prepared to leave a message, we need to know some basics about it. Busy executives are not going to rewind a voice mail message in order to catch the name and phone number of the person calling, so we have to do that for them. To do this, we must leave our name, company name, and phone number at the beginning of our message and then leave our name, company name and phone number at the very end of our message. However, we’re now faced with a problem that was covered in our last blog about speaking into the phone in a manner that enables the listener to understand what we have said.
We need to insert a pause between our first and last names and between the words in our company name. For example, I would say, “This is John (pause) McCann of McCann (pause) Motivations.” When it comes to leaving a phone number, I got a wonderful suggestion years ago in one of my sales training classes from one of the students. This guy was a salesman for a janitorial supply distributor in the Southwest. He suggested writing the phone number down as you say it into the phone. By doing this you will tend to slow down dramatically. We all can speak much faster than we can write. This is one of the best ideas I have ever heard with respect to using the phone in a professional manner. (I wish I could remember this guy’s name because I’d love to give him my personal thanks again and a lot of credit in this forum!)
In our next session we will cover approaches to use when leaving a voice mail message. You can contact me at john@mccannmotivations.com or by phone at 864-968-0262. Until our next meeting, I wish you good selling!
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Phone Etiquette When Making Sales Appointments
One of our biggest assets when making sales appointments is the telephone. However, we need to use proper telephone etiquette because this is often times the first contact that a prospect has with our company. We have a great opportunity to shine in the eyes of our prospect, so we need to show that we are above our competition. This also points out that we are care very much about our prospect. You’ll see what I mean in a minute.
Years ago I got some great ideas on phone etiquette from a training company that Johnson Wax Professional brought in to work with our distributors. They were called the Stanley Brothers from Texas, Bill and Jack, and they had great suggestions that I still use to this day.
When making phone calls to prospects expecting to obtain a sales appointment, we need to practice several important things. First, we should stand up when making these phone calls. If we remain sitting, we compress our diaphragms, which changes the tone of our voice. When we stand, we come across in a more commanding manner with a more powerful voice. Try this for yourselves. Call a friend and be sitting at your desk at the beginning of the call. Ask your friend to tell you when they notice something different in your voice. (Tell them that you are trying an experiment.) After a sentence or two - stand up! Your friend will tell you that something just changed. When you ask them to describe the change, they’ll tell you that your voice just got much better, more commanding.
If you get lucky enough to actually get to speak with your prospect LIVE, rather than being put into his or her voice mail system, you must be prepared with what you want to say. There are some calls that I make that I feel are very important and I really want, or need, to obtain an appointment. With these calls, I usually write a very short list of bullet points to refer to during the call, especially when I get nervous. On really important sales phone calls, I always get nervous! There have been times in the past when nerves have caused me to forget the reason that I was calling! These bullet points help bring me back to business.
At the beginning of the call, I always give my name and my company name. The problems that many people have are that our names and company names are words that we say many, many times a day. In the excitement of the minute, we tend to rush these words together when speaking and it’s often difficult for our prospect to understand what we just said. It can be very difficult for people to place a long pause between their first name and their last name. (It actually took me three months to practice this to the point where I can speak my name very slowly when talking to someone.) This is very important when speaking to someone who does not know who I am and did not expect my call.
Here is another thought. If you have a very difficult last name to pronounce, (one with many consonants, for example) you might be better off just using your first name and then your company name, such as, “This is Jerry, with ABC Company.”
Out of common courtesy, we must get in the habit of asking the prospect if they have time to speak with us. My method of doing that with strangers is to ask, “Do you have a minute, or is someone with you?” With people I already know, like my clients, I’ll ask, “Do you have a minute, or are you in the middle of something?” If you get in the habit of asking a question similar to this, you will actually receive compliments from people you are calling for the very first time. This helps to set yourself above your competition as being someone who cares more about other people than they do about themselves.
Next time, we’ll follow this section up with some suggestions for using proper etiquette when leaving voice mail messages.
Visit my website at www.mccannmotivations.com or email me at john@mccannmotivations.com. You can also call my toll free number at 866-603-1578.
Years ago I got some great ideas on phone etiquette from a training company that Johnson Wax Professional brought in to work with our distributors. They were called the Stanley Brothers from Texas, Bill and Jack, and they had great suggestions that I still use to this day.
When making phone calls to prospects expecting to obtain a sales appointment, we need to practice several important things. First, we should stand up when making these phone calls. If we remain sitting, we compress our diaphragms, which changes the tone of our voice. When we stand, we come across in a more commanding manner with a more powerful voice. Try this for yourselves. Call a friend and be sitting at your desk at the beginning of the call. Ask your friend to tell you when they notice something different in your voice. (Tell them that you are trying an experiment.) After a sentence or two - stand up! Your friend will tell you that something just changed. When you ask them to describe the change, they’ll tell you that your voice just got much better, more commanding.
If you get lucky enough to actually get to speak with your prospect LIVE, rather than being put into his or her voice mail system, you must be prepared with what you want to say. There are some calls that I make that I feel are very important and I really want, or need, to obtain an appointment. With these calls, I usually write a very short list of bullet points to refer to during the call, especially when I get nervous. On really important sales phone calls, I always get nervous! There have been times in the past when nerves have caused me to forget the reason that I was calling! These bullet points help bring me back to business.
At the beginning of the call, I always give my name and my company name. The problems that many people have are that our names and company names are words that we say many, many times a day. In the excitement of the minute, we tend to rush these words together when speaking and it’s often difficult for our prospect to understand what we just said. It can be very difficult for people to place a long pause between their first name and their last name. (It actually took me three months to practice this to the point where I can speak my name very slowly when talking to someone.) This is very important when speaking to someone who does not know who I am and did not expect my call.
Here is another thought. If you have a very difficult last name to pronounce, (one with many consonants, for example) you might be better off just using your first name and then your company name, such as, “This is Jerry, with ABC Company.”
Out of common courtesy, we must get in the habit of asking the prospect if they have time to speak with us. My method of doing that with strangers is to ask, “Do you have a minute, or is someone with you?” With people I already know, like my clients, I’ll ask, “Do you have a minute, or are you in the middle of something?” If you get in the habit of asking a question similar to this, you will actually receive compliments from people you are calling for the very first time. This helps to set yourself above your competition as being someone who cares more about other people than they do about themselves.
Next time, we’ll follow this section up with some suggestions for using proper etiquette when leaving voice mail messages.
Visit my website at www.mccannmotivations.com or email me at john@mccannmotivations.com. You can also call my toll free number at 866-603-1578.
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Warming Up Our Buyers
Visit my web site at www.mccannmotivations.com for more information on sales topics.
During my past thirty-five years in sales and sales training, I have constantly heard about the best ways to warm up a buyer when meeting them for the first time. Until recently, it seemed that trainers would suggest that sales people should pay attention when entering a buyer’s office. We were told to notice if there were articles or pictures or something displayed that could be used to build rapport with this person.
Some trainers have suggested that we should notice if the buyer plays golf, or if they fish, or if they display a model car or plane – anything that we could use to open conversation. It has been suggested that this will show our buyer what a great person we are to know by demonstating that we care about the person! Be careful here, because you could fall into a major trap that could actually get you thrown out of their office.
Years ago I learned of a website called SalesAutopsy.com. The author, Dan Seidman, writes stories about sales situations that people have submitted to him about screw-ups that have occurred during sales calls. One of the more dramatic examples centered around a sales rep who noticed a picture of his potential customer standing with John Madden, or at least someone very large and burley who looked like John Madden. The sales person asked: “Wow! How did you get to meet John Madden?” The buyer seemed confused and asked what the sales person was talking about. The rep pointed to the picture sitting on a credenza. The buyer then said sternly: “That’s not John Madden. That’s my wife!” How much do you think that guy sold that day?
Instead of looking around a buyer’s office for pictures of the buyer fishing or for a golf trophy, we need to get down to business and minimize the small talk. 85 % of buyers in a survey indicated that they don't have time for small talk and frankly don't want to be “warmed-up” with discussions of personal business.
Instead we should be asking questions that have to do with information that the buyer knows better than anyone else – the buyer’s job, their department, and his or her company. We need to focus our questions on business-related topics dealing with what is happening in the buyer's department or company right now. Through this discovery process we are looking for opportunities to uncover the hidden, or latent, business needs of our customer. More on this topic in another issue.
Next time we will discuss how to use the phone and email to obtain sales appointments.
For questions or comments, please email me at john@mccannmotivations.com or call me at 864-968-0262. Thank you and good selling!
During my past thirty-five years in sales and sales training, I have constantly heard about the best ways to warm up a buyer when meeting them for the first time. Until recently, it seemed that trainers would suggest that sales people should pay attention when entering a buyer’s office. We were told to notice if there were articles or pictures or something displayed that could be used to build rapport with this person.
Some trainers have suggested that we should notice if the buyer plays golf, or if they fish, or if they display a model car or plane – anything that we could use to open conversation. It has been suggested that this will show our buyer what a great person we are to know by demonstating that we care about the person! Be careful here, because you could fall into a major trap that could actually get you thrown out of their office.
Years ago I learned of a website called SalesAutopsy.com. The author, Dan Seidman, writes stories about sales situations that people have submitted to him about screw-ups that have occurred during sales calls. One of the more dramatic examples centered around a sales rep who noticed a picture of his potential customer standing with John Madden, or at least someone very large and burley who looked like John Madden. The sales person asked: “Wow! How did you get to meet John Madden?” The buyer seemed confused and asked what the sales person was talking about. The rep pointed to the picture sitting on a credenza. The buyer then said sternly: “That’s not John Madden. That’s my wife!” How much do you think that guy sold that day?
Instead of looking around a buyer’s office for pictures of the buyer fishing or for a golf trophy, we need to get down to business and minimize the small talk. 85 % of buyers in a survey indicated that they don't have time for small talk and frankly don't want to be “warmed-up” with discussions of personal business.
Instead we should be asking questions that have to do with information that the buyer knows better than anyone else – the buyer’s job, their department, and his or her company. We need to focus our questions on business-related topics dealing with what is happening in the buyer's department or company right now. Through this discovery process we are looking for opportunities to uncover the hidden, or latent, business needs of our customer. More on this topic in another issue.
Next time we will discuss how to use the phone and email to obtain sales appointments.
For questions or comments, please email me at john@mccannmotivations.com or call me at 864-968-0262. Thank you and good selling!
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
The Process of Building Client Trust
A client’s trust is one of the most valuable assets for sales people. It can generate new leads for us in the form of referrals – those that are asked for, and those that come our way without being asked. One of the best lines that a sales person can hear on the other end of the phone is, “You don’t know me, but your client, Joe Smith at ABC Company, said that I needed to talk with you.” It just doesn’t get any better than that in selling!
Trust that is cemented in our customers whenever they think of us takes a long time to build, but we can start that process right from our very first contact. Let’s suppose that we receive a referral of a person at another company and we intend to call them on the phone to secure a person-to-person appointment. Assuming that we are really lucky and manage to speak to them on our very first attempt (we’ll talk later about dealing with voice mail), there are some things that we can do to immediately start the trust building process.
When we introduce ourselves on the phone we should be aware of several things. First, we need to say our name and our company's name very slowly. Most people say their names so many times during the day that to them it seems like everybody should easily understand them. The problem is that the person on the other end of the line, who doesn’t know that Joe Smith from ABC Company is going to be calling at 3:05 PM today, often has difficulty understanding what we are saying. To them, we are apeaking way too fast.
By slowing down our pace when talking, we're showing that we care a lot about the other person. We don’t want them to have to ask our name a second time after our introduction. Some people may even feel a bit embarrassed at not catching our name the first time. Because of that, they may not ask us to repeat our name. A valuable personal connection can be lost here.
We need to speak very clearly and at a rate of speed that allows not only that we are heard, but that we are also understood. One way to do that is to pause for at least a one second between saying our first name and our last name. I can hear some of you now questioning that one second is not very long, and you are right. However, to the person on the other end of the line, it’s enough time for them to hear both words plainly, as long as we don’t mumble when speaking.
A suggestion here. If you have a difficult name to pronounce (for example, one that has many consonants and not many vowels) you might consider just using your first name and company name when introducing yourself. You may even be able to use the spelling of your last name as an additional reason that you two need to meet in person so you can give them a business card and help them with pronunciation!
After giving your name and company, be sure to ask the prospect if they have a minute to speak with you. This shows that you are courteous and concerned for the other person’s time. It’s also critical in the very beginning of your sales process to build the prospect’s trust of you, before they have even met you. This will help separate you from the vast number of sales people who don't use this approach when calling. If I am talking with someone for the very first time, I always ask a question like, “Do you have a minute, or is someone with you?” If you’re calling clients or people that you have known for a long time, the approach is similar, but using slightly different words. I will often ask, “Do you have a minute or are you in the middle of something?”
On one occasion, I was calling the CEO of my largest client and I asked him, “Do you have a minute or are you in the middle of something?” He responded right back to me, “You know you always ask me that!” To which I responded that I was just trying to be polite. He told me he knows why I ask the question, he was wishing more people would take the time to ask it as well. I’m very proud of the trust that this client has in me. This approach helped me generate that trust from the very first day I called this man and it continues to help me to this day.
Next time, we’ll talk about continuing the trust-building process during our warm up time when meeting our buyers during our initial face-to-face meetings. Good selling!
John J. McCann III
McCann Motivations
864-968-0262
www.mccannmotivations.com
I'm also on Facebook and LinkedIn
Trust that is cemented in our customers whenever they think of us takes a long time to build, but we can start that process right from our very first contact. Let’s suppose that we receive a referral of a person at another company and we intend to call them on the phone to secure a person-to-person appointment. Assuming that we are really lucky and manage to speak to them on our very first attempt (we’ll talk later about dealing with voice mail), there are some things that we can do to immediately start the trust building process.
When we introduce ourselves on the phone we should be aware of several things. First, we need to say our name and our company's name very slowly. Most people say their names so many times during the day that to them it seems like everybody should easily understand them. The problem is that the person on the other end of the line, who doesn’t know that Joe Smith from ABC Company is going to be calling at 3:05 PM today, often has difficulty understanding what we are saying. To them, we are apeaking way too fast.
By slowing down our pace when talking, we're showing that we care a lot about the other person. We don’t want them to have to ask our name a second time after our introduction. Some people may even feel a bit embarrassed at not catching our name the first time. Because of that, they may not ask us to repeat our name. A valuable personal connection can be lost here.
We need to speak very clearly and at a rate of speed that allows not only that we are heard, but that we are also understood. One way to do that is to pause for at least a one second between saying our first name and our last name. I can hear some of you now questioning that one second is not very long, and you are right. However, to the person on the other end of the line, it’s enough time for them to hear both words plainly, as long as we don’t mumble when speaking.
A suggestion here. If you have a difficult name to pronounce (for example, one that has many consonants and not many vowels) you might consider just using your first name and company name when introducing yourself. You may even be able to use the spelling of your last name as an additional reason that you two need to meet in person so you can give them a business card and help them with pronunciation!
After giving your name and company, be sure to ask the prospect if they have a minute to speak with you. This shows that you are courteous and concerned for the other person’s time. It’s also critical in the very beginning of your sales process to build the prospect’s trust of you, before they have even met you. This will help separate you from the vast number of sales people who don't use this approach when calling. If I am talking with someone for the very first time, I always ask a question like, “Do you have a minute, or is someone with you?” If you’re calling clients or people that you have known for a long time, the approach is similar, but using slightly different words. I will often ask, “Do you have a minute or are you in the middle of something?”
On one occasion, I was calling the CEO of my largest client and I asked him, “Do you have a minute or are you in the middle of something?” He responded right back to me, “You know you always ask me that!” To which I responded that I was just trying to be polite. He told me he knows why I ask the question, he was wishing more people would take the time to ask it as well. I’m very proud of the trust that this client has in me. This approach helped me generate that trust from the very first day I called this man and it continues to help me to this day.
Next time, we’ll talk about continuing the trust-building process during our warm up time when meeting our buyers during our initial face-to-face meetings. Good selling!
John J. McCann III
McCann Motivations
864-968-0262
www.mccannmotivations.com
I'm also on Facebook and LinkedIn
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