Just made my first call...

[MattL]

I'm currently working on this method my self, I have not gotten my sites to rank #1 yet so I've not made any calls or visits but here is what I'm considering doing.

David Wright mentioned dropping off a letter with all the details, I plan to do this. I will put it in one of those nice professional envelops and the top page will be a picture of the Google search results saying "here is where I am, here is where you are" and then include some information about how much traffic and leads the site is generating. I'll include a number for them to get back to me at. To make sure they receive the envelop with the information I was thinking I could leave it as a "gift" in other words I would tell the receptionist I have a gift for dr. so and so and include the envelop. There is a place near me that makes these fancy chocolate and carmel covered apples and wraps them up all nice. I'm pretty sure if I dropped that of with my envelop the dentist(owner) would get it.

 

[mattbowden]

I would suggest the following based on 14 years in teleslaes banking about 1000 a week in sterling not great but a start.

Never leave messgaes on Answer phones its spam.
Never email anything to a generic address.
Never post anything without chatting with the key decesion makers first
unless you like to get your letters in the bin.

Telesales need not be scary.


Dealing with gate keepers.

Receptionists.
Awkward to deal with will gate your calls nine times out of 10 will pass you a generic useless email address or ask you to post something.
Ask for a contact to send it on to. Never send it.
Take the contact name call back the following week you will be amazed how may times this works.
Take control of telephone convestaions.
make you call structured

Intro - friendly need not be powers sell who you are.
Pitch. Who you are what you do and why you are good at what you do.
Never slate other companies you are not interested in slating competition
Be polite but forceful. Ask questions that will help you.
How do you currently spend you advertising budget.
is it national or local.
what sort of response do you get from it.
how effective is the return vs spend.
Try and get some level of commitment.
Not a deal but can I call you back, can I email some details to you.
When would be a good time to call back.

Price: Most important of all price do not go in to low or high. Make sure your price is cost effective. Never go in low as once the low price is on the table you will not be able to raise it.

Closing.

Ask questions respond to objections have asnwer in your mind to over come objections.

Why your website is good, what you will do for the money etc.

Finally the close, never be scared to ask the question. Be polite but firm wait for buying signal (how can you tell) easy practice after many phone calls and years of doing this I still get it wrong but one thing I am certain of if I dont ask I dont get "is that something you would like to do". I am thinking on writing a e-book on telesales I did ask a few months ago but never got a response.

The other option is to get someone else to do the telesales for you and pay them a percentage of the sale.

Good luck

 

[mattbowden]

I also forgot to mention in this case rotate the times of your calls.

You will find the best time to call.

For its all day everday I just keep calling until I get someone.

using this method in the past I have sold a lot of stuff with one order in the region of 20,000. So its all about hitting the phones and making the calls. The more people you ring the bigger the chance of getting a sale

 

[mattbowden]

And finally the best bit of advice anyone ever gave me Grow Some Balls

 

[Bross]

This is great that you take action.

I'd change a few things:

Search engine specialist - A dentist will usually have no clue what this means. It's quite Gibberish for someone who probably knows nothing about the internet potential.

"Point is, these are all potential clients that you are missing out on" - Sacrifice is something that educated people don't like (Like Dentists); I'd take a softer approach:

"Search engine traffic means........XXX... This is something than can certainly automate new clients acquisition and let you focus on other things in your business".

I think this is a bit better because you give him 2 benefits - New clients and focusing on what he knows best.

But you just took action, which is incredible.

 

[Bross]

I'll add that you might wanna keep some form of maintenance, or alternatively; not sell the whole thing.

If you give it away it will probably drop in the SERPS. Which is very bad for you (reputation, professionalism, etc.).
Sales are all about the client. Future included.

 

[elitemarketer]

Have you tried outsourcing the cold calling to the dentists instead of directly calling yourself?

 

[┼blackrat┼]

Yup, dentist sites is the new black in BHW. especially in flash template monster templates.

 

[hardybents]

97 times out of 100 you will never get a Dentist on the phone.
Get the name of the office manager, get the manager on the phone. The manager is your direct connection and typically only connection to the Doc. Sell the manager, sell the Doc. The Doc doesnt care, thats why he has a manager to only bring him/her good stuff and weed out all the crap. Sell the OM

 

[Jillthetoolgirl]

Good luck to you! Great idea!

 

[SamuelCoats]

yeh itd be much better if you actually speak with the guy instead of leaving a message. goodluk

 

[hochelaga]

Nothing wrong with messages. If they call you back, awesome, if not, you just lost 30 seconds of your life, no big deal.

 

[RedMango]

As much as I hate telesales, I kinda put a little swing on it when I was younger. After getting bored of calling the local shops to sell websites, I ended up putting on some comfy shoes and walking around the shops with a leather-bound folder. Screenshots, explanations, more importantly pricing. Through the day on a Monday after 9.30am (shops are open but not too busy) try and catch the manager and say,

"Hi, I know it's a Monday and we're all busy, so I have this (hand over but keep it closed) to lend you regarding a new website for your shop. I'm visiting Competiton A, Competition B etc today and giving you a chance to take advantage of this. You're first on the list because my mom/dad/uncle/sister/etc usually shops here . Take a read through it (only a few pages) and I'll come back in an hour or so, unless you want to look at it now or I'll take it to Competition A next".

Of course they wanted to look. A leather-bound file is intriguing. Foot in the door, wham, greed takes over and they've got their credit card out. If they aren't interested, you can mockingly snort at him and turn on your heels to go to his competition.

 

[lowno]

Well, I would disagree with everyone saying leaving a voice-mail is a waste of time. Granted if you are doing this manually, I probably would agree, but this all can be automated. I personally place 5 - 10k voice mails per morning that will generate 20 - 30 inbound calls for me. All to businesses.

Just saying, there can be automation here as well.

 

[KBC-12]

but this all can be automated. I personally place 5 - 10k voice mails per morning that will generate 20 - 30 inbound calls for me. All to businesses.

How do you do this? PM me if you dont wanna post.

 

[undisput3d]

There are so many options.....keep us posted after you've made 100 calls, report them as follows:

Calls Made Total: xxx
Total Connections: xxxx
No Answer/Answering Machine: xxxx
Left Message with receptionist: xxxx
Hang Ups: xxxx
Call Backs: xxxx
Not Interested (reason): xxx
Sales: xxxxx

There you will know how you are doing and what needs to be tweaked...welcome to the world of sales

This is fantastic. Call statistics and performance tracking. Is there a framework or tool for this. Maybe even software that you can recommend. Of course I am off to Google this, but would appreciate any pointers...

 

[Optic88]

Have you gotten any clients yet?

 

[hammed]

Not trying to hijack the thread but have a question... found a niche, made wordpress site (looks great) and started out on page 2... since it's fallen to page 5... what can I do to increase rank to first page with a site like this?

 

[blackma]

Great call. But I would consider visiting him. Bring your laptop and show him what you mean.

 

[thedon23]

Well, since someone bumped this thread a week ago, I'll bring it back. I never got a call back from that dentist. I got caught up with school and never tried again. Site is still sitting around, dropped in the engines a bit. I'm using Scrapeboxing to get my rankings up high.

This time going to go hardcore. I have a friend of mine in sales and he is gonna help me sell it. I've had this thing sitting around too long; I feel like all the hours I put in are going to waste. I'll keep you guys posted on my progress.