Teleprospecting: Have You Tried Being Direct?
Today's post is a special guest post by one of our BDR's, Dan Marx.
Sales can be tough. Prospecting may be even tougher at times. We sometimes deal with rejection on a minute-by-minute basis and are expected to forget about each occurrence and move on. Oftentimes, we set ourselves up for rejection by starting with a poor introduction or by focusing our attention on what our company does, instead of what the person on the other end of the phone needs.
Decision-makers receive dozens, if not hundreds of cold calls each day. Unfortunately, there are still many prospectors who are only interested in pitching their products and services. They spend countless hours writing scripts, not taking into consideration the prospect's actual pain points. Product dumping is obviously not the most effective method for grabbing the attention of today's busy executive. Others try to grab the attention of prospects using an engaging opening question. After reading an article last week, I began considering another prospecting method.
Back in 2008, Peter Belanger wrote an article entitled "The Best Cold Call Approach Ever." The story starts out with Peter hiring a gentleman named Frank for a telesales position with the company. On Frank's first day, he called a major restaurant chain in California and was able to sell them fifty laptops for a total of $250,000 in the same afternoon.
Here is the greeting and headline Frank used:
"Jack, this is Frank Jordan with Microline in Santa Ana; we're a cost-plus hardware reseller, and I wanted to see what procedure you'd like me to follow to compete for some of your business..."
Peter goes on to analyze the headline and discuss why it is so effective. I think it's easy to see why this headline worked for Frank. He could not be more direct with his purpose, shows respect for the prospect's schedule, and sets reasonable expectations. Wouldn't you appreciate this approach more if you were the decision-maker getting a cold call? Knowing this, why don't more teleprospectors use a similar direct approach?
I think most of us would agree that we respond better to people who are honest and upfront with us. It sure would save both you and the prospect on the other side of the phone a lot of time, right? My point is that most teleprospectors spend so much time critiquing their introduction and messaging to appeal to prospects that they don't consider the option of having an open and direct conversation.
What do you think?