Sales Chump

At first glance this question seems kind of silly.  But really think about this.  How many times do you get a return call from a voice mail you leave?  What percentage are you getting?  Do you find most times you have to call and catch the prospect next time on the phone?

Chances are if you’re being honest, your % of returned calls from voice mails are low.  If they’re not, then this isn’t necessarily for you and you should share your tips.  When I first started in sales, my ratio of returned calls from voice mails or messages left with the gatekeeper or assistant was probably 1 out of 25.  I thought it should be higher so I listened to old calls (luckily my company records calls).

I listened to them as if I was the prospect.  Few things I found:

1. My messages were rather long and I found myself fast forwarding (which means they were probably deleted)
2. My messages were vague or gave too much info
3. My messages weren’t personal enough

I saw most of my messages were around 45 to 90 seconds which is long for a voice mail.  When talking live with a prospect you don’t have that long to talk to gain interest.  A message is even harder because they can delete it without feeling like they’re being rude.  If I wouldn’t even listen to the full messages, why should I expect someone else too?  Most of you are saying “duh” right now but this was when I was brand new.  I found 30 seconds is the max time you want to have.

I also saw I was inconsistent with my message.  I was either very vague and didn’t give enough info to get the person interested enough to call me back or I gave too much info where they didn’t need to call me back.  You want to find a balance that gives them just enough info to get them interested but not your whole pitch to where they feel calling would serve no benefit.  Also giving too much info without knowing your prospects needs can be harmful.

My early messages were also very impersonal.  It sounded like I left the same message 100’s times before and that I didn’t expect a response.  This seems crazy but if your message portrays that people would be missing out if they didn’t call you and that you have gotten responses before, they are more likely to call you back.  There’s a subconcious tone that you give that people pick up on.  If you walked around with a dollar bill in your hand with your head down mumbling asking if someone wanted a dollar you would be surprised at how many people wouldn’t accept it.

You want to make sure you mention your name, company, what it is you want to speak about and a number.  Make sure you describe a little about your services or products and give a benefit that speaking with you would give their company.  Otherwise if they don’t see why talking with you would help them, they won’t call you.  Using that format has moved my return calls into a 1 out of 4 or 5 range.  If you have their email, it’s always nice to mention you’ll follow up with an email as well.  Decision makers a lot of times find responding via email is easier as it doesn’t make them threatened or in a defensive mode as they can reply when they have time and they feel they can share true feelings rather than give false positives.

What if I’ve left several messages already?  This can be tricky but I’ve found showing a little frustration in your tone on your next voice mail while still being professional and respectful gets results.  You don’t want to do this on the first few because it will come off rude.  But if you’ve left 4 or 5 messages over a few months with no response it can be very effective if done right.  I like to use something like this:

Hi Mr Smith.  This is John Williams with ABC.  I’ve left you a few messages in the past and wanted to speak with you briefly.  I realize you’re busy and that this might not be a priority or it doesn’t make sense to talk right now but if you could find a minute to give me a call to tell me when it would make sense to speak about this, we can discuss further at that time.

What that message does is it shows that you care about their schedule and acknowledge you might not be calling at the right time.  But it also shows you are busy as well and that your time is valuable too.  This message has had over a 50% return for me when it gets to this point.

Hope those tips help you improve your return call rate.  Please feel free to chime in if you have a method that works well.

The Manager had a post a while ago talking about cutting bait and I wanted to revisit this idea of “cutting bait”.  A lot of this post will reiterate what was already said but we can touch on some new things too.  The title of his post was Can’t land a deal? Cut Bait!  But how many of us actually do this at the right time?

Cutting bait is a must to succeed and as sales reps we all find this hard to let a lead or prospect go.  If a lead or prospect isn’t going anywhere though it is just wasting time and energy that can and should be spent elsewhere.  But when is it the right time to cut bait?  How do I know when it’s time?

More often than not, you will know when it’s time.  Have you left voice mails and emails all to remain unanswered by your prospect over the past several months?  Chances are it’s time to cut bait with this lead.  This type of lead is even harder to part with as you haven’t got a direct answer from the prospect saying no.

Haven’t you said to yourself “I wish they would just call me back and tell me no”?  Well soemtimes silence is the loudest form of saying no.  If you’ve left voicemails and sent emails that generate responses typically and you’ve tried calling during different times of the day and month and don’t get a response, that silence can be taken as the sincerest form of not interested.

How do I know when someone says no if they really mean it?  Well this would depend on how well you talked with the prospect.  Did you go right into your product’s features and benefits without talking with the prospect finding out what is important to them, what they need?  If so, the no was probably knee jerk.  But if you went through your sales process and sincerely listened to the customer about what they want or what they need and you weren’t able to produce something that would help them satisfy that need or better their situation then the no is sincere and it’s time to cut bait.

Believe me, cutting bait isn’t easy for me either but at a point in time you look at your notes on a prospect and realize after 2 or 3 times longer than your typical sales cycle you’re still at step 1, it’s probably time to let it go.  Think about it this way (makes me feel better)… you could have completed 3 sales cycles in the time it took you to get this 1 going.  Set a time in the future where you dig through all those old (dead) leads and go through them all at once and if you have 10 to 20 of them, you might find yourself getting somewhere with 1 or 2 of them 6 months or a year down the road.

As sales people sometimes we just push forward so fast we don’t even remember the last sale we made.  When it’s a big sale it’s a little easier to remember and recollect your thoughts on how that sale made you feel.  Today I write about a big fish that I was able to reel in and it gives off that “new sale smell”.

I tend to work with larger corporations that have big name recognition.  Now this has it’s pro’s and con’s.  The sales cycle is typically a lot longer but the payoff is much greater and the name recognition that it brings to the company get’s the executives talking.

Well after several months and working with legal departments revision after revision for the contracts needed, we finally were able to seal the deal with a signature.  The selling of the product was done well before the deal was finalized.

I know it sounds cliche to say “it’s not about price” but in this instance the value was placed equally on price as well as the terms of the deal.  It wasn’t so much about the price of the product but more of the willingness for my company to sacrifice some of their terms and conditions as well as our soon to be customer’s terms and conditions. There were definitely negotiations and deal making but it was never involving the price.

I don’t look back much on my sales but ever so oftern you get that one that makes you think back to what got you the deal as you sit down and your desk still has that new sale smell.

This article comes from our good friend Jeb Blount of Sales Gravy:

Look around you. It’s as if everything, along with the economy is just creeping along. This is a far different pace than in the boom years that preceded the recession. Some of this is understandable. When we are afraid, we want to take our time so that we make no mistakes. After we’ve been burned we move forward tentatively. We become more deliberate. We slow down. But is this the right course of action?

 

I have a friend who works as a sales director for a division of a large company. We like to get together from time to time and share war stories. In a recent conversation he told me about a paradox that was impacting the ability of his team to sell. He said that because of the recession his company was being more cautious about brining on new customers. They had installed a new layer of approvals and it was taking twice as long as it had in the past to get new contracts approved. But at the same time he said he was getting tremendous pressure to sell more business because his organization desperately needed top line revenue. He threw his hands up, “What the hell do they want me to do Jeb? My salespeople are frustrated, our new clients are questioning our integrity, and though I know it is not intentional, the entire sales process is grinding to a halt.”

Unfortunately, this is not that unusual. During recessions we have the tendency to slow down. And slowing down is not just isolated to businesses – we do the same thing in our personal lives. Look around you. It’s as if everything, along with the economy is moving in slow motion. This is a far different pace than in the boom years that preceded this crisis. Some of this is understandable. When we are afraid, we want to take our time so that we make no mistakes. After we’ve been burned we move forward tentatively. We become more deliberate. We slow down.

But there is good news for the individuals and businesses that rise above this paradigm. These are the people who will not allow fear to cloud their vision. With clarity, they can see opportunity where others cannot. And instead of slowing down they speed up.

Think about it like this. If you were driving a car on an interstate going 70 miles an hour and there was another car going 60 miles an hour one mile ahead of you, how long would it take you to overtake and pass that car? I won’t bore you with a high school word problem suffice to say it would take miles of driving to eventually catch up. This is what business is like in a normal economy. It takes much more time, effort and money to catch your competitors. However, what if you were in the same car going 70 miles an hour and one mile ahead of you there was a car parked on the side of the road stationary. How long would it take to pass that car? What if you were moving even faster?

This is the argument for accelerating during a recession. Businesses and people everywhere have pulled over to the side of the road and parked, hoping to ride out the recession in safety. Others like my friend’s company are creeping along in the slow lane. So right now, there is amazing opportunity to put the pedal to the metal and pass them while they are all standing still. Right now, speed is your greatest competitive advantage.

Now is the time to aggressively attack the market, adopt new technologies that improve productivity, introduce new products and services, and become more efficient. Now is the time to hit your competitors harder, invest in your brand, set new goals and create a new vision for yourself. To prosper during the recession, urgency is mandatory. Sooner or later, the recession will end and when that happens speed will give you a huge head start over your competitors who have been sitting on the side of the road.

Urgency and acceleration are about mindset. In many ways just a simple belief system that gives you the strength to trust in yourself and your talent. Acceleration in a down economy is about getting out of your comfort zone and letting go of the status quo. It is about accepting that things have changed, letting the past go, and then building a new future. I’m not saying this is easy because it is human nature to default to our comfort zones. But it is necessary if you want to thrive during the recession. Take time to set new goals. Get clear on what you want. Open yourself up to new possibilities. And then take decisive action to move forward one step at a time.

There is opportunity everywhere. And opportunity has always been here – it didn’t just get up and leave because the economy went sour. It is just different opportunity. But you can only see this opportunity when you look forward instead of backward. You can only exploit it when you replace fear with trust in the fundamentals of sales and business. And when you accelerate, moving faster, driven by urgency, always looking forward, I guarantee that you will be unstoppable.

Jeb is also the writer of the Sales Quick and Dirty Tips.