Improve B2B Acquisition and Cold Calling
69Does your prospect like listening to you?
Nothing compares to cold calling
What is your experience with cold callings? Or shoud I better asked: what kind of experiences do your prospect have with you cold calling?
Regarding conversion in B2B business nothing compares to cold calling. I mean it! If it is about making new clients, generating appointments, clients and sales, cold calling is the best way of acquisition. Do you believe me? Most of us did learn a lot about selling, calling, connecting, bonding, nurturing in b2b business. Do you still think about the impression you make? Do you have a good conversion rate?
We put together a list of hints for the improvement of every b2b sales conversion rate. We are not talking tricks and technics! Simply improve yourself and generate more new customers and more sales!
What did mummy tell you: Manners count!
Its the average day and you have finished prospecting for new contacts. A last thought about your claim and off you go hunting for money. You charm away the secretary and take the first hurdle. The executive is picking up ... What do you do?
- You hit him away with your claim he simply can't refuse
- You challenge about his common mistakes
- You are showing him your expertise with alot of foreign and technical terms
- Everything at once not even giving him the time to recognize your name
- You respect him and his time, introduce yourself kindly and ask him to offer you some time, offering to call another time
From my experience people are not sitting by the phone waiting for my call, unless I arranged a tele conference in advance. Therefore they have their heads spinning with errands, work and problems like most of us. Do you like it to be nagged? Do you like it to be interrupted without asking? Do you like people asking for your time and taking it without waiting for your answer?
A kind entrance always buys me time for a 5 min. call, a chance to place a short claim or an appointment for calling again.
What did I win? The undivided attention of a prospect - that's all I need for starters!
Looking for a relationship or a quickie?
I don't like to sell at the first call. remeber we are talking b2b business, i.e. normally recurring sales. I don't even call to place a product at the first time. What do I make this first call for?
You and I obviously want to sell. The prospect either is already buying a comparable or you have something to sell delivering him (hopefully) real benefit. Either case: its our business time and we are there to make money doing business - your prospect, too!
Rushing into, hitting him/her like a hammer to get a quick deal doesn't leave the impression we all need: lasting business. I don't tell you to wait until after the third date to go for second base, but you don't enter flirting telling the room number and the time you are able to spend either.
That's what I go for first: leaving my name, leaving a positive impression, raising interest.
And you know what: 75%-plus of the times the prospect is asking for information to be emailed and is inviting to call again.
Its all about claims and technics, isn't it!?
Don't bring in the overload of selling technics. Most people are not stupid. Hearing my own name every 5 seconds to start bonding ... I might puke. Giving me all the impressive words you ever heard of, believe me I might ask you, what you are exactly talking about and I did study a lot of stuff.
Don't go the classic trial close way: 1. yes ... 2. yes .... 3. yes .... this might still work with your grandma, but (hopefully) not in a professional environement. With me it is: 1, 2, 3 - click!
Give your prospect the feeling of working the same side - or at least be an inclusive professional. You both know, what it is about, so share your side and make it a "we" feeling.
Challenge your prospect each time you call a little bit. Leave him/her something to think about. This way you find open ears next time. Apropos open ears: a lesson that was really hard for me to learn, too: every person has 2 ears and 1 mouth - use it this way. Invite your prospect to open up and talk about views, opinions, plannings, strategies, developments. Every information counts.
Interact, share information, exchange data - you can do this knowadays, everyone is sitting at a computer. This way you start working together before you sold something and believe me: the feeling sticks!
Be all ears ... and hit the homerun, because you will get the ball served!
Leave a great impression, challenge and be inclusive
That's what B2B cold calling acquisition is about
Remember these hints the next cold calling session and you will be happy and you improve your conversion rate significantly.
Summarizing it:
- Behave and show you have manners
- Don't try to impress
- Challenge a little
- Instead of technics show professionalism and be inclusive
- Be all ears
- Start interacting
I would be very happy if you
- could leave me a comment on how this works for you,
- refer this little article to 3 followers of yours and
- ask them to follow and do the same.
Leave me an Email adress with the comment and I will reward your kindness, help and attention with a list of 50 great directories (high pageranks) for you to improve your page rank and search engine visability!
From next week on, we will have our page also in English language, feel free to visit:
http://www.b2b-sales-performance.de
In case you have questions or you want to make money in European markets, you can drop me a short email: info@b2b-sales-performance.de
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CommentsLoading...
@seo guru: thanks for commenting. Be adviced that we make a big difference between prospecting and sales. Lead qualification comes before sales and cold calling to reach out to executives! Your tip about colleagues, that's what I mean about being inclusive treating the people with respect and appreciation.
I will have a look at your blogs, thanks for sharing.
I hope you don't mind me asking: Do you do sales or do you "only" coach. Had the experience with someone teaching sales but never picking up the phone making clients.
Thanks again for commenting.
@b2b, I am amused. So to answer your question, I have built three national companies from the ground up and in all three I had to start out as the lead sales person, and still today I sell more than my 180 reps combined, in fact I end up presenting and closing many of their prospects for them. I have 35 years in the actual doing, coaching, hiring, training, recruiting, interviewing and working with sales from the prospecting to the close to the follow up. So yes I actually have the experience of the doing, but when you are the CEO you wear many hats. To be honest as much as I try to move out of the sales process, I never seem to be able to do it, probably because I enjoy the interaction so much with prospects, clients and reps. And bo I don't mind you asking it sounds like you have to deal with much the same things I experience
i do agree
seo guru Level 3 Commenter 6 months ago
Well this is a subject that is near and dear to my heart after training nearly 8,000 sales and sales and management people. I agree with much of what you have said but the single biggest thing to remember when prospecting especially by telephone is to treat the person as if they are a colleague not a lead. People will make time for colleagues not sales people. Now in today's communication driven world most reps would prefer to skip prospecting and generate warm call ins. Prospecting is the single biggest fear and least used and properly deployed process in the sales cycle. And yet without a prospect to present you can't make a sale. I have written a whole series of blogs on this subject. Feel free to view them.
Best regards
Anthony.wunsh@medicalpaysolutions.com