Thanks everyone for their valuable contribution. There are a few things i can share.
1) One of the key elements of a sales cycle is building rapport. Telemarketing has huge disadvantages when compared with face to face sales. Since there's no physical interaction, you will be prejudged by the tone of your voice, the way you speak and whether you have an accent or not.
If your voice is not enthusiastic (monotone) or if you are talking fast, pause often, have a thick accent, you will suffer big time. Talk slowly but still sound energetic, cheerful. The person on the other side should understand clearly what you are talking about. They should not "pick" a few words out of the whole sentence. Nobody likes to talk with a stranger over the phone especially if it's nearly impossible to understand what he/she is talking about.
2) Be and sound confident and authoritative. This will help you get their focus on you if you got them at the right time. To successfully close any sales, you should make them "listen" to you first. If they don't listen, they won't understand a word you are saying. Doesn't matter if you are selling a dollar for 50 cents, you will get a "no".
3) The sales cycle always starts with the first impression. Because you are the one whois aprroaching them, cold calls have a huge disadvantage. To sell anything to anyone, you have to go through certain steps to make the sale. So, what are these steps then?
Meet & greet. This is your disadvantage with a phone call. They will have their guards on because they never asked for an interaction so basically you are invading their personal space. To overcome this, you should be polite and sound friendly so that you can take their guards down and soften the transition.
4) Every step should transition smoothly otherwise it will feel weird. This will not only feel awkward, it also will make you struggle and cause objections. People who freeze or pause constantly are actually the ones who are having problems in transition. Sounding authoritative and confident, will earn you the valuable seconds to get the person's attention.
5) After meet & greet, the next phase is building rapport. To do that, you have to earn their "respect". If they don't respect you, then they won't really listen to you therefore you wont make a sale. But how can a person respect you if they don't know you? Not that hard actually. Studies show that a person's subconscious decides in "10" seconds if they want to do business with you or not.
Be respectful. Use this line after the opening : Hi, this is ....... from ..... I would like to speak with Mr/Ms.....DID I CATCH YOU AT A GOOD TIME?
Now 9/10 this question will earn you the respect that you are looking for. Because you are showing respect to the person, you will get it back automatically. If the answer is "Uhm, what is this about?" That means you got the attention and the person is trying to make a decision whether he/she should shake you off or forward you to the appropriate person in charge. If the answer is no, then ask what the most appropriate time is to give a call back. Now, you earned the right and approval to call back
Don't forget that almost 99% of the gatekeepers will NOT be willing to take responsibility of not forwarding a very important phone call to the person in charge. You should use this to your advantage.
6) Time is money so you should use the time accordingly. You have only so many hours to make phone calls every day. Therefore, you should reach the decision maker as soon as possible. To make this happen, you have to think outside the box and be creative. The main reason why many people fail at sales is because they can't break the defense mechanism. I have a great tactic that will get you the decision maker 10/10 ! especially in restaurant or small business owner related sales.
For this to be successful, you either need another person or your timing should be excellent. Here's the secret : "CALL YOUR PROSPECT OR MAKE SOMEONE CALL AS A PISSED OFF CUSTOMER!"
Think about it. When is it normal to ask for the person in charge, a manager or the owner? When you want to complain about something you are not happy with
If you are living in the states, you will know that pissed of customers asking for a supervisor is a common thing and if you insist, you will always get the name of someone up in the management chain. The smaller the business, the better this works. Especially with restaurants, haircutters, small retail shops, you will have a HUGE success. The reason is upto your imagination. Just work the website if they have one or come up with something that will make sense.
7) Now its time to convince the decision maker to sell your pitch to get an appointment. Be precise and get to the point quick. Don't get in too much detail because you don't want to give away everything. You just want to peak their interest to get an appointment. You should at least offer two features with two benefits with your sales pitch. Once you make them curious enough, you will have the chance to meet face to face and close the sale.
8) But how do you get the appointment? Like the sales cycle, scheduling an appointment is a close by itself. One of the best methods to get an appointment is: "Assumptive closing". This technique is all about avoiding a " yes or no" answer. You don't want to hear a no, right? Then you should avoid it!
A good example would be : " So, Mr customer, would tomorrow 2 pm or 4 pm be a good time to schedule an appointment?".
Never say : " Would you like me to come or, are you interested in a face to face... etc". By doing this, you are avoiding the objection without even it happens. A typical answer would be 2pm, 4pm or whatever the day/time he is available.
Sales is all about walking the prospect through the phases avoiding the objections and handling them however you can, till you close the sale. And each objection takes you one step away from the sale. Each approval takes you one step closer to the sale.
I know this post is way too long than i expected and there are so many things that i can talk about but i don't want this post to become a novel. Study the sales techniques, make lots of practice and you will become much better in a few months. But, whatever happens, don't give up and keep trying. Have a great weekend everyone!
