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!