Sales pitch help

[Judderz]

LinkedIn is another good place for Networking.

Never met anyone who didn't get rejected when trying to sell something, all part and parcel of sales. Suck it up, use it as a learning curve, what sales patter works on some customers, won't necessarily work on other customers, learn to be flexible, tell the customers what they need to hear, make them feel they are the only ones that are important. A nice friendly service goes a long way.

 

[Stu Plows]

Are you self employed Stu or an associate, or what? If the former, you'd better get over rejection fast. Nothing wrong with your emailing and then calling, I do it, you've been polite enough to not cold call first and given a time that you will phone, that's standard practice. You will, occasionally (), find somebody is expecting your call and be all "warmed" up, for you and you have only achieved the same result as through any other advertising medium.

I get salesmen ringing me maybe 5/6 times day, I'm often on site and busy and I can be curt, but if they've already sent an email, then mostly, I am not.

I advertise all over the web, locally too, flyers, posters the lot. But, when work is in short supply, sitting by and looking the phone, will not produce any tangible results. So........

Yes I am self employed.

Suppose the consensus on the rejection is ‘suck it up and be a man about it’.

Thanks for the advice guys, a wealth of info and advice on this forum.

 

[nickyboy]

Join your local chamber of commerce, ours has loads of networking events, you can offer member to member discounts and you can target the director, partner level of most companies. Try to link up with local accountants who don't have an IFA function at their practice. Also introduce yourself to other local professionals. Get yourself on Linkedin more for name reecognition, a bit like facebook for business, not my thing particularly but I do know people who have got jobs as a result.

^^^^ This.

Cold calling or cold writing will get you nowhere. What people are buying from you is your expertise that they don't have. They want a recommendation to use you from someone they trust so network like crazy with lawyers, accountants, tax advisers etc etc. If you can get into a position where they trust you to do a decent job, they will pull the work through for you

 

[MarkF]

Yes I am self employed.

Suppose the consensus on the rejection is ‘suck it up and be a man about it’.

Thanks for the advice guys, a wealth of info and advice on this forum.

Always remember that its not personal. When you haven't any business in, then cold call, what else are you going to do? Knock on doors, see a new business, then call in, see an industrial estate going up, make sure you are first around it. My pension and will was arranged by a guy who just knocked on my unit door, why did he get my business? Because he was there.

All your local businesses will be paying out bonus's in May/June, you don't have to always go high level, decent salesman/managers will have good money burning a hole in their pants at that time.

Don't start with interminable pleasantries, get to the point quickly. I don't mind cold callers ringing me because I know it has to be done, but it drives me bonkers when somebody goes "Heeelelllooo, is that Mark at Rubberfix, okaaay, greaaaatt, fantaaastic, it's Tim from Global tossspotters inc, but first! How are you today sir?" By then I am already getting bored........

 

[JoeyB]

I hate cold callers but I can never manage to be mean to them lol.... retail sales staff on the other hand, thats a different story!

 

[MarkF]

I hate cold callers but I can never manage to be mean to them lol.... retail sales staff on the other hand, thats a different story!

My phone number is a magnet for them. There are 2 distinct types, one is like Stu, a professional with something to sell, himself or a product, so I'll listen whilst making a decision to either, carry on listening or cutting them short, after all we both have time we can't afford to waste. The other type is a poor bod on desk reading from a dreary script (Usually an SEO company), these are the ones that waffle, I cut them off, I take too many of such calls & just don't have the time.

 

[JoeyB]

We were bombarded over the last month or so with utility companies trying to sell us their electric / gas / whatever....it was just ridiculous. In the end I just asked one of them why we were getting so many calls. He said its because we had either just moved in, ran a new PSTN line or activated the address with the post office. Unfortunately for us the answer was yes to all three lol

 

[simon the viking]

I used to run an entertainments business and I used to send out "flyers" to pubs and clubs a good hit rate was 5 - 10 percent I used to send out 100 - 150 at a time and they rang me I never followed up the flyers myself I waited for the phone to ring and it always did.

Give em an incentive TO CALL YOU my flyer used to have all my details and selling points on it and a separate voucher telling them they could book us for a one time half price event £40 instead of £80 (and promised a discount for regular bookings £10 off for once a month £20 for fortnightly) it worked well I was always fully booked for months after a flyer shot..... when I went quiet I did it again

Totally different business I know but selling is selling whatever the product.

 

[MarkF]

I agree Simon, I've seen loads of small businesses spend good money on optimisation for what are, local businesses, I've seen them spend time networking and Gumtreeing and this and that and I've thought, "You'd get more orders putting a .50p postcard advert in the local post office window". Everything is worthwhile but don't underestimate old fashioned advertising. There is nothing wrong with having financial services on an A5 flyer, about £50 will get you 5000+ good quality ones! A kid can drop them off at house, put them in gyms, businesses, the newsagents, it's good exposure for peanuts.

 

[CopperBrompton]

Don't start with interminable pleasantries, get to the point quickly.

This x100.

I'm self-employed, and get 3-4 sales calls a day. The ones who begin "Hi, my name is X from Y, do you ever have a need for Z?" are fine. The ones who want to engage me in conversation just piss me off and have no chance of selling anything to me.

That said, cold calling will almost always fail. As others have said, when I want to buy something, I want recommendations from people I trust by preference, and from unbiased third-parties if not. There is almost nothing I'm going to buy from a stranger calling me out of the blue, with or without an email first (that probably didn't get through my spam-filter anyway).

When I edited a magazine, I once said to our head ad sales guy that I didn't know how he could do his job: he spent most of his day being told 'No' with varying degrees of politeness. He said his stats told him he made one sale for every 38 calls, so he checked off each 'No' as one step closer to a sale.

 

[screenman]

I would not have the business I have now without cold calling. You have to be a bit odd to enjoy it though.

 

[bikepacker]

I think it was and American called Tom Hopkins who calculated the percentage of cold calls that ended in a sale. He then calculated back as to how many calls gave him a sale. He then divided his sale profit between the amount of cold calls. His method then for overcoming rejections was that every time he got a "no" he would say thanks knowing it gave him so much money. May not work in your case.

Many years ago I wrote a sales manual for an insurance company and I remember the opening that yielded the best results was: "If there way that you could secure your financial future, would you want to hear about it"? If "yes" follow up with "give me a few minutes of your time to answer some questions and then I will show you how". That was 28 years ago and things may be much different now.

 

[dan_bo]

[quote="JoeyB, post: 2908515, member: 24130"]If you hate rejection then you are going to struggle. Once you get over that you won't be on the back foot when on the phone...learn to expect it and then you won't be surprised. In my experience people buy from people, so get yourself to some networking events and start building relationships. Keep going back to the same events as you'll then get to know people and it will slowly become easier.

Cold calling has its place but its a time consuming numbers game, and you will have to make a lot of calls to reap any benefit later on.[/quote]

Yep. Dont take it personally. Do you reply to every single email in your inbox?

Didnt think so. Heartless bastard.

 

[Over The Hill]

Anything like this will have a ratio of approaches/interest/sale of about 40/10/2 for a quality lead in. As soon as it gets more like a mail shot you may be on 1000/10/2

I would say you need to aim your pitch somewhere that has a linked event that would prompt a need for what you sell.

For example - property lawyers; they do not want to approach everyone, just those who are buying or selling a house so would get an "in" with estate agents where you will find the person they are after.

IFA, wills etc are tough sells.