I deliver a lot of sales training and tell audiences that if you act like a salesperson, you’re going to get treated like a salesperson. Tweet this

That is, you’ll be treated badly–and who wants that?

People always nod as if they agree, write down this sage advice, and then don’t change how they open a sales call.

For instance, you should never call a prospect and begin the conversation by saying, “Hi, I just wanted to introduce myself…”

This kind of empty procedure offers little value to anyone and will set you up for failure because it’s like shouting, “TREAT ME LIKE A SALESPERSON!” 

It’s almost as bad as saying, “Do you have minute to talk?”

My friend, Art Sobczak (above left), has some great advice on what you should say when making such a sales call.  Art really knows his stuff so I’ll share his great advice in this blog post. 

 

Act like a salesperson and you’ll be treated like one

Remember that the first few seconds of the call are critical, so you want to spend your time wisely. The words you use–and the words you don’t use–are the key to your success.

Art remind us that one primary goal should be to make the other person feel that they’ve gained as a direct result of talking to you.  Do this right and there should be no doubt in their minds that talking to you is of benefit, now and in the future.

So, let’s be clear about three things:

1.  The other person doesn’t usually care about you, your situation, your job, the fact you’re new, or that you’ve replaced someone.

2.  All they’re really concerned about is if you can do anything for them and they don’t want to have to figure it out.

3.  This means you better make words count when the person picks up the phone and says “hello.” 

 

What to say instead of “I want to introduce myself?”

My buddy, Art Sobczak asks us to consider the following openings and notice how they efficiently and elegantly get right to the point.

“Ms. Davis, I’m Dan Douglas with Whittle Cutting Tools. We provided your company several cases of diamond blades a few months ago and if I’ve reached you at a good time, I’d like to let you know about a special we have on those blades, and few others you might have some interest in…”

Notice that this approach doesn’t even mention that a new rep is now handling the account.  You can always explain the situation later if the customer actually cares. 

Next let’s look at it from the perspective of a better relationship, where they are a customer buying fairly regularly.

“Tom, I’m Gwen Charles with Twin Financial. There’s two reasons I’m calling today. First, I wanted to let you know I’ve replaced Ken Hartley who worked with you in the past, and I’ll do my best to provide even better service that Ken did. (pause, chitchat) In order to do so, I’d like to ask you a couple of quick questions to update your account…”    

 

Never forget:  the customers needs come before yours

The fact that you’re new or that you want to use a trite sales script has nothing to do with your customer’s needs. 

When you’re on the phone, first and foremost, you’re remembered most for what you can do for them.

Thanks for the great advice, Art!

 

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Tags: art sobczak, cold calling, facebook, michael Angelo Caruso, sales training

This entry was posted on Sunday, September 2nd, 2012 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Career development, Communication, Creativity, Customer Service, Growing Your Business, Personal Development, Problem Solving, Sales and Marketing, Selling, Success, Training. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.