Archive for the 'School of Selling' Category

Scribe SEO

Auto Date Thursday, April 28th, 2011

Chicago Vacation Packages
Chicago vacation packages are definitely the lone way to go if you find yourself hunting to help save cash on your trip. Chicago vacation packages will handle every little thing from airfare to inn and in some cases a car leasing. It is possible to visit the voyage adviser in order to obtain your own holiday package, however you will certainly probably have to spend greater than you really should because of the real estate agent’s bill. Then again, you may use the actual website Travelocity and not have to present back any of your financial savings inside the form of an broker charge. Easy as well as without charge to make use of, they permit anyone to purchase a good vacation package and save the actual maximum sum of funds possible. That may be guaranteed to make the retreat extremely enjoyable. For more information with regards to Chicago vacation packages, go to http://www.travelocity.com/deals-d5434-illinois-chicago-vacations. Copyright 2011.

Scribe SEO
You’ll find several specific principals to go by in order to make sure your blog site is going to be noticed: keyword density, title tags, meta descriptions not to mention linkbuilding. Luckily, for any blogger that desires to always make sure that they’re going to be discovered through search you will find there’s Scribe SEO. Scribe SEO is known as a plug in which is needed for Wordpress, Joomla !, as well as Drupal designed to try to make absolutely certain of the fact that your current content is considered to be optimized for the purpose of search. This plug in works on the subject of 3 areas of SEO: Keywords, Content and Links. For example, every time you sign back into the back end of your web site; you will encounter the Scribe Keyword Research field for you to enter just what exactly your topic of the entry will be and it will offer you keyword and key phrase strategies to improve your site.

Foundation Repair Dallas
Foundation repair Dallas costs can vary coming from just a few hundred or so bucks, to over $20,000 depending on the severity of the damage and fixes essential. For those who have unequal flooring surfaces, damaged surfaces, or in case your doorways are getting caught up or not shutting effectively you might have base troubles and need vehicle repairs. To become effectively knowledgeable you should possess a architectural industrial engineer do a great examination of the groundwork to determine precisely what fixes need to be performed. This may cost between $300 to be able to $800.

Cheap Digital Cameras that Come with the Best Features

Auto Date Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010

With hastily changing technology along with significant developments, digital cameras are becoming more affordable by the day. While there are many pricey models to be had with remarkable capabilities, cheap digital cameras that come with plenty of functions can also be picked up by those who are not very much in this field but simply want to freeze their moments whilst travelling or during exceptional occasions.
Discount Codes

Amongst the greatest inexpensive digital cameras is the Nikon-Coolpix-S8000 which costs approximately $170. This novice’s camera comes with an amazing resolution of 12.4 megapixels along with a 5x optical zoom. This camera comes with a 3″ display and a CCD .3″ photo sensor. In case you are looking at capturing photographs from close-range, then this is a good choice. Keeping the inexperienced people in mind, the camera comes with a category for every mode for the advantage of the user, as he or she could spin the knob for the chosen screen-selection. dcmeuk2

Canon-Powershot-A470 is one more reasonably priced digital camera which comes with a splendid functions listing for a reasonable price of under $80. You also have alternatives of buying this camera in a range of colors, and the price is certainly an aspect that appears splendid. This affordable camera does provide fair zooming preferences as well as fairly satisfactory resolution, taking into account the cost.

The Sony-CyberShot-DSC-W55 costing about $210 is one of the best reasonably priced digital cameras available. This camera comes with a variety of functions that aren’t offered in a majority of the reasonable cameras. The camera’s zoom aspect does function rather well, again taking into consideration the price-tag of the camera. It has a resolution of 10 megapixels along with a 2.7 inch screen. However, non-traditional resolutions apart from 5 MP are not accessed in this unit.

Getting Real Interviews at Job Fairs

Auto Date Thursday, February 4th, 2010

Standing out at a Job Faire can make a difference in your job hunt. Career Fairs are starting to pick up, and Dice is running some nice ones, called Targeted Job Fairs. At a SF Bay Area Career Faire in January, 10 companies as showing up, and a major job search company has 82 job fairs scheduled for this year across the States.

How do you get to the real interviews at a Job Fair? The rivalry can be substantial, but you can help yourself stick out from the crowd with early preparation. At AA-Careers, we have a straight-forward six-step process to get ready. Plan to go? Here’s how to prepare:

First, research the companies that are going and pick your objectives. Use the World Wide Web to research the companies that are there before you even decide to go. Go to their sites and see if they have their job openings posted. Pick a rational number to target, and get ready to spend an hour researching each one. It’s hard to do more than seven in a day, and five or six is a much more reasonable target. For each hiring company, you want to know: recent news, key product lines, and contacts you know. Try to see if you know anyone at the target companies. You should end up with a page or two of research for each company/job.

Second, if there are job postings on the web, read them to see what the hiring manager is looking for. Create a mapping of your accomplishments and skills to the prerequisites of the job. Make the terminology match. If the hiring organization calls customers "clients", your resume should do the same thing. The achievements should be written in the style of the hiring organization.

Third, create a ‘short sales pitch’ for each likely company/position combination. Write down a 90 second ‘thumbnail’ that you can repeat verbally showing why you are a fantastic prospect for that position. You’ll use this in your resume and when you meet people at the job kiosk.

Fourth, modify your resume for each job type. The objective on your resume should exactly match the job you’re aiming for. The executive summary should be a written form of your “mini sales pitch” for the job. Then choose the accomplishments and skills that most clearly match the job description. Especially at a Job Faire, the purpose of your resume is a sales tool for you – to get you on-site job interviews. It should be obvious to see that you’re a match based on your resume.

Fifth, dress and prepare as if you’re doing on-site interviews. Dress nicely and be fittingly groomed. Don’t over do-it (this isn’t a date!) and don’t underdress (no jeans or t-shirts, no matter how much you paid for them). Avoid strong cologne or perfume.

Finally, rehearse your ‘mini-sales-pitch’. Collect your research and the resume for each spot - bring a couple of copies for each – and put each in a distinctly marked folder. Keep them in a lightweight briefcase or folio.

Remember to smile, and good hunting!

How to Excel at a Job Faire

Auto Date Thursday, January 28th, 2010

Standing out at a Job Faire can make a difference in your job search. Career Fairs are starting to pick up, and Dice is running some nice ones, called Targeted Job Fairs. At a Bay Area Job Faire in January, 10 companies as showing up, and a major job search company has 82 job faires scheduled for 2010 across the US.

How do you stand out at a Career Faire? The rivalry can be significant, but you can help yourself stick out from the gang with advance planning. At AA-Careers, we have a simplified step-by-step process to get ready. Plan to go? Here’s how to prepare:

First, research the organizations that are going and pick your objectives. Use the web to check out the companies that are there before you even decide to go. Go to their web sites and see if they have their jobs listed. Pick a rational number to target, and get ready to spend about an hour researching each one. It’s hard to do more than eight in a day, and five or six is a much more reasonable target. For each company, you want to know: recent news, key product lines, and contacts you know. Try to see if you know anyone at the target companies. You should end up with a page or two of research for each company/job.

Second, if there are job postings on the web, read them to see what the organization is looking for. Create a mapping of your achievements and skills to the prerequisites of the job. Make the language match. If the hiring organization calls customers "clients", your resume should do the same thing. The achievements should be written in the style of the hiring organization.

Third, create a ‘thumbnail sales pitch’ for each potential organization/position combination. Write down a 90 second ‘thumbnail’ that you can repeat verbally depicting why you are a key candidate for that position. You’ll use this in your resume and when you meet the team from the company at the job stall.

Fourth, modify your resume for each opportunity. The objective on your resume should exactly match the position you’re aiming for. The executive summary should be a written form of your “mini sales pitch” for the job. Then choose the accomplishments and skills that most clearly match the job prerequisites. Especially at a Job Fair, the purpose of your resume is a sales tool for you – to get you on-site job interviews. It should be quick to see that you’re a match based on your resume.

Fifth, rehearse your ‘mini-sales-pitch’. Collect your research and the resume for each spot - bring a couple of copies for each – and put each in a intelligibly tagged folder. Keep them in a light briefcase or folio.

Finally, dress and prepare as if you’re doing on-site interviews. Dress well and be well groomed. Avoid strong cologne or perfume…use any cologne or scent sparingly, if at all.

Remember to smile, and good hunting!

Micro Niche Finder User Comments - a Brief Run over

Auto Date Wednesday, November 18th, 2009

Affiliate marketing is similar to a consignment store. You promote the various items goods and services on your web site in return, you receive a commission from each lead. There isn’t as much time and effort involved, very low overheads, it works twenty-four hours a day, and it is simple to pick up. To get started, you must determine which items or niche area you’d like to work in. A method of doing this is, find out what specific solutions to a given problem a specific set of interenet users are experiencing, and then what solutions are on offer to help them. An efficient way of accomplishing this is looking for specific sets of long tail keywords; there are fewer searches for these as a rule, however they will convert far more into sales.

These lucrative keywords can be rooted out by using programs like Micro Niche Finder. The information generated by this computer program or analogous applications or services can give you associated terms in a list format giving worthwhile information to get a head-start when it comes to placing on an internet based search.

Additional data is supplied from the application, for example search frequency, the number of competing web sites, even competitor details. Last but not least, Micro Niche Finder information should help in finding the best domain, content for your website, and identify suitable items to market.

Construction of a website is the next step; yet it will take more than simply that. Getting the best ranking on web based search engines involves the fine tuning of your website. Products like SEO Elite should make this simpler. This program examines the internet sites of your rivals and will advise you exactly what you must do to receive good rankings in the search engine listings.

In SEO Elite the data supplied by the program suggests where you should find appropriate links, what words to concentrate on, and even an extensive listing of sites to submit articles to refer to. Briefly, Seo Elite information is similar to the information you would get when you confer with a practised SEO specialist.

Once you know which niche you want to focus on, set up your product promotion, and your site is completed, then you are ready to get your internet site up in the search results. You will collect a steady pay check and question why you did not think of this before!

Building Relationships

Auto Date Tuesday, May 20th, 2008

Don’t you get a little weary listening to all the experts trumpeting, then droning on-and-on that ‘it’s all about relationships.’ It troubles me since no one has taken time to analyze what it takes in developing quality long-term relationships. It’s important because all of us count on our referral network in one way or another as a lead source. And as we know, getting a referral is the surest way to a new customer.

Ask yourself, has anyone bothered helping you understand what it takes to build and maintain a quality relationship?

Consider building quality relationships as a PROCESS. Yes, think of it as a step-by-step sequence that takes time and patience with a long-term goal in mind because we never know where the next referral will come from. If you think you can do it in one or two ‘touches’ you are totally delusional! It takes continuous positive experiences over time.

1st Stage - Acquaintance

When we meet someone for the first time we want to be friendly, cordial and above all genuine. Nobody likes a phony. People today have a natural resistance to accepting anyone into their ‘circle of friends’ as Robert De Nero said in the movie “Meet the Fokkers.” A little kindness and spirit of friendliness never hurt any budding acquaintance. Certainly asking non-threatening questions is a great way to break the ice and serves as a starting point. Taking a real and sincere interest in the acquaintance’s answers shows you are listening, paying attention to what they are saying and forms a position from which any subsequent dialogues, ‘touches’ and contacts can be initiated. And it helps if you remember some defining comment the acquaintance made to you which demonstrates you found something significant and impressive about them in the initial conversation.

2nd Stage - Connection

There is somewhat of a quantum leap from acquaintance to connection. It requires us to be easy to communicate with and understand. At this Stage something almost surreal happens when a bond and a commonality gets identified between both parties. This could be something as simple as growing up in the same city, having a common friend or having worked in the same company in the past. At this Stage both parties realize they are no longer total strangers to each other, rather they have one or many things in common.

Step 3 - Mutuality of Purpose

Do we have a common goal in mind, namely do we share the values providing quality service, being responsive and recognized as a reputable salesperson. Is there a ‘meeting of the minds’ as it were in how we conduct ourselves and our business affairs - specifically with honesty and integrity. Do we have the same objectives, such as resolving an issue or eliminating a problem. Is there a way either we or they can help another customer or friend. In my experience acquaintances and connections do not advance to this stage because they have not let each other know how they can help each other. In selling we call this relationship-focused purposefulness.

Be mindful I’m not talking about winning a popularity contest. It was Abe Lincoln who said, “You can’t please all the people all the time.” However one thing you can do which influences potential relationships and referrals is to be a pleasant, polite and professional individual.

4th Stage - Relationship

What determines if our acquaintances, connections and mutually purposeful contacts will ever mature to a relationship is based on trust. However, much more significantly, we will advance to this stage when we have demonstrated long standing competence and achieved a level of respect that only gets established when we act and perform in a consistent manner. Consistency is the touchstone leading people to feel comfortable around us. And one of the ways they feel at ease is knowing we will be the same as last time - friendly, respectful and trustworthy. Could you count on them if a situation or opportunity arose requiring their experience, background or assistance? Those wise in the relationship building process know that a little trial or test in one area is at least an indicator of what that person would be like in a more complex situation. Frankly, if we live up to our word and conclusively show we know what we’re talking about and what we are doing, we have reached that Stage called relationship.

5th Stage - Maintenance

Let’s not take our relationships for granted nor ever forget we are only as good as our last sale. A relationship can be compromised when we muff an opportunity that has been referred to us. And when it does the prior relationship may be in serious jeopardy. If we do a less than a quality job that word gets back to our referral source, then they may begin to doubt our competency and possibly no longer have a positive impression of us. They may eventually disregard us down stream as a viable supplier of goods and services.

Conclusion

After more than thirty years of building relationships I have come to the conclusion that the PROCESS is incredibly similar to what excellent sales people do. And just in case you think you are not in sales, be mindful of what Robert Louis Stevenson once noted, “Everyone makes a living by selling something.”

It is fascinating to me that Americans are an impatient lot. The Point? I believe it is virtually impossible to jump from Stage 1 - Acquaintance to Stage 5 - Maintenance in a single contact event. It takes time and patience to build a relationship. It can’t be done in one ‘touch’. While it may take many interactions, nonetheless it can be accomplished in fewer ‘touches’ when the first three Stages occur in a short time span.

Now you know why I call it “building a relationship”. It’s like building a house; you can’t put the roof on until the concrete pad is down and the walls are up. It requires us to be trustworthy, honest, credible and competent. And don’t fool yourself, the test of these goes through a gestation and maturation cycle during each of the Stages.

So if you are intent on building quality relationships, and in selling it is vital we do, then appreciate where you are in the Stages mentioned above with everyone with whom you are attempting to cultivate a relationship. Trying to move the PROCESS too quickly will probably cause indigestion from too much too fast. Give it time and let the Stages play out; in so doing both parties will have a much clearer sense of each other and how each can become a trusted referral source to the other. Above all abiding by the above PROCESS will assist in getting us to our goal of quality long-term relationships.

Don McNamara - EzineArticles Expert Author

Don McNamara is a Certified Management Consultant (CMC) and is President of Heritage Associates, Inc. http://www.heritage-associates.net

Heritage Associates is a full service sales management consulting, training and coaching company. Don also speaks and writes on the art and science of superior sales management and top sales performance.

With over 30 years sales experience from the field level to executive sales management, in his career he has been an individual contributor, corporate sales training manager, regional manager, national sales manager and vice president of sales. Don is a member of the Institute of Management Consultants, where he serves as Professional Development Chair and the National Speakers Association.

For a free e-newsletter contact Don McNamara at djmcn@heritage-associates.net or by phone (949) 230-4363.

Cross Selling

Auto Date Friday, May 16th, 2008

When I was sixteen and still at school, I worked in a department store on a Saturday. Cross selling was made easy for me then. For a while I worked in the menswear department. Someone came in to buy a shirt, and because all the related goods were displayed next to each other it was straightforward to ask whether the customer wanted a pair of cuff-links or a new tie to go with the shirt. If they bought a tie, the next cross sale was to suggest they also buy a spot-cleaner for the tie. A friend of mine worked Saturdays in a DIY store. Similar rules applied. Someone bought a tin of paint, and the cross sale opportunities were perhaps a paint brush; a brush cleaner; or even one of those implements to help keep lines straight. The basic rule to cross-selling then were - if you have a number of products to sell, group them together so that the customer doesn’t have too much of an effort in seeing the relationship between your products. That’s not to say that it will happen. Often the customer needs to be told about the relationship and have the idea planted verbally that they could buy more than what they originally came in for.

40 years later and the same rules apply. Trading on the Web has even made it possible to display not only your own diverse product range on the same page, but also relationships and partnerships with other companies. Yet research shows that simply because goods are displayed together does not hugely increase buyer behaviour.

Cross-selling from the sixties has evolved into CRM (customer relationship management) in the 21st Century. The theory is that the more products organisations sell to customer; the lower is the probability that the customer will buy elsewhere, and the more profitable that customer relationship will be.

CRM systems make it easy for the salesperson to identify additional sales opportunities. The first product a customer buys adds to the customer database of knowledge the company has about the buying habits and profile of the customer. If it’s a really sophisticated CRM system it will flag up to the salesperson cross-selling opportunities, and in some cases even provide the salesperson with the words to say.

Yet once again, research shows that even giving salespeople the words to say has increased cross-selling by only a very small percentage. Why?

Simple - selling is still very much a human face to face activity, and as such buyers are motivated by emotional feelings as much as by logic. The logical relationship between products and services can be totally overridden by the feeling that you are being sold to or that the salesperson is being less then honest in his or her desire to sell you something you didn’t appear to want at the outset.

Retailing should be relatively easy. Your goods are on display. The customer buys something and the relationship between the other products on display is understandable to you both. Therefore a confident suggestion about the relationship often works.

• If your business is more complicated, or your goods are not in the customer’s face (you might not have retail premises) then you need two things:

A story which includes your full range and explains how they are related, and/or
Customer databases which highlights the relationship - but which should still rely on the story in point 1.

• If you have a database be careful about telling the customer how much you know about them. Imagine you buy your cigars at the same tobacconist every week to be told - ‘I see that you’ve bought our product seven times this year, and yet my database reveals that you don’t smoke’.

No matter what you know about the customer it’s still better to have them tell you verbally in answer to a question. All of us like talking about ourselves, no matter how much the other person already knows about us.

It is clear that in a competitive marketplace it will be the people who can sell more to each customer and effectively stop the customer buying from the competition who will survive. The future appears to be that in marketplace where the rules of specialism seem no longer to apply that your specialism could become a competitor’s cross-sell. So we either form commercial relationships with other supplies, or we run the risk of them supplying our specialism.

I was in a German coffee-shop in the UK the other day that also sold clothes and kitchen accessories. I haven’t worked out the relationship or indeed the story - but people were buying. Cross-selling has moved into a new arena!

Frank provides individuals and organizations with consultancy in the fields of selling; organisational change management, performance improvement, developing managers as sales coaches, and teaching charismatic leadership behaviours and presentation skills to senior and executive managers. In addition he is recognised as a leading authority on sales and sales management development using the Coaching Sales Champions programmes he has developed over a period of twenty years as the vehicle for individual and organisational improvement. He strongly believes that whether we work in the public or private sector; whether our organisation is commercial or non-commercial; that we are all in sales. His favourite quote, which has become his maxim is from Robert Louis Stevenson - ‘Everything in live is selling’.

Frank was a founding member of the Sales Qualification Board (UK), and the Financial Services Lead Bodies Group (UK) - both organisations set up in the nineties to determine and publish standards for salespeople and sales managers in the UK.

frank@salisburypartnership.co.uk

Order Takers vs. Sales Professionals

Auto Date Wednesday, April 30th, 2008

As business owners we all know that in a ideal world prospects would just pick up the phone and give us an order - but for most of us sales is not like that! Yes it would be utopia however have you considered the difference between order takers and sales professionals? Firstly they are two completely different animals. Lets face facts order takers are less likely to be skilled in sales technique. This includes the ability to easily up sell, cross sell or add on services. Order takers are by there very nature just waiting for the phone to ring and do not work on a pro active basis. If we left everything to the client then so many additional products would never have been sold.

Before I am told that they probably were sold something that they didn’t want, lets examine the motivation for buying. If you were looking at purchasing software to run on a Windows based platform maybe it would be important to ensure that it worked with every release or version of the software. Some companies still have Windows 98 and have not (for whatever reason) upgraded to XP. If this particular prospect came through and presented the company with an order and found out later that the software was incompatible with Windows XP it is my belief that they would have expected the seller to let them know prior to purchase. The same could be said for printers. Imagine an real estate agency that wanted to print thousands of property particulars. If they bought a bottom of the range ink jet printer as opposed to a colour laser they would possibly be feeling cheated when the printer just didn’t meet expectations.

Salespeople are taught (or should be) to manage expectations and recommend appropriate products and services. Money is tight for everyone (I think it always has been) and I believe that nobody is tricked into buying something that they don’t want by some smooth talking sales person. Unfortunately apart form the very basic advice that may be given at the point of purchase most order takers won’t even recognise an opportunity. That could be an expensive mistake if you were considering the value that the prospect brings over the buying cycle. For many companies this is measured in years. A bookstore can attract buyers whose buying pattern is measured in years (say 5 years at 12 purchases per year). A trained salesperson will recognise this and ensure that they are helped with the current order and try to anticipate future buying habits. Some of the big companies on the internet have employed this - when you order a book another window may popup suggesting other books to purchase thus increasing the order value at the point of purchase.

Lastly remember this, order takers shine when the market is buoyant in a declining market sales people have built solid relationships that they leverage and still make or exceed targets - the choice is yours.

© The Sales Academy 2005.

You may include this article in your ezine or on your website or distribute it to others, provided you include the copyright statement and the bio information tag line found at the end of this article.

Mike Palman, is a Global Master Sales Coach and Author. Mike helps people and businesses do more, do it better and get results that they want. Mike had a successful career in sales for over 25 years and now helps other salespeople get the sales edge. Mike lives in both the UK and South Africa.
For more articles by Mike Palman, visit http://www.thesalesacademy.com

The Sales Training Series: Know What You’re Selling

Auto Date Monday, April 28th, 2008

No, You Don’t Know What You Are Selling - Yet!

You know your product, its features and its benefits. You have a well-rounded presentation that explains all of this, complete with visual aids. So why waste a prospect’s time with chitchat? Shouldn’t you launch straight into your presentation?

No, you shouldn’t, and here’s why. No matter how good it is, your generic presentation casts your product or service as a commodity, not as a solution to the particular customer. Customers don’t care about your products; they care about their own problems and opportunities. They want to know that you understand their problems before you start talking about how your wares can “solve” them.

You think you have a cool product presentation? So does every competitor you’ve got.

When salespeople understand their customer’s needs before presenting their products, the presentation can be tailored to hit specific hot buttons. This also avoids many objections that commonly arise later in the sales cycle.

To find out “what to sell,” you need to exercise good questioning skills and gather information about the customer. The things you want to know fall into four categories:

Need: Ask open-ended questions to uncover problems and opportunities likely to be addressed by your products and service. Examples: “What is the biggest problem with the current method you’re using?” “What are the consequences of not solving this problem?”

Company Issues: What is the customer’s company or department trying to accomplish with this buying decision and why is it important? “What goals has your company set regarding this?” “What will it mean to the company if you are successful?”

Personal Issues: What’s at stake for the customer himself/herself - professionally or personally? “What will it mean to you if these goals are achieved?”

Money Issues: Find out about the budget that exists for the purchase or how the expenditure would be justified. “What kind of budget have you established for this project?” Or, “What areas would you look at to justify a purchase like this?”

Once you know this, you are in a position to present your product as a solution, not just one more alternative in a sea of commodities. Instead of a classic data dump, your presentation now can be aimed at specific needs that this customer actually cares about.

In The Field:

Why do so many salespeople launch straight into their product presentations before investigating their customers’ needs? Usually it’s because they’re flying by the seat of their pants. They lack a strategic framework to follow throughout the entire sales cycle. Sadly, delivering a canned presentation is all they really know how to do.

An account executive with Delta Industrial in Minneapolis, MN, recently summed up the advantages of adopting a coherent, unified, step-by-step approach to the sales process. “The most important thing the Action Selling Sales Training has done for me,” he said, “is to really make me think and strategize about what I am trying to accomplish in every sales call in order to move the process forward.”

Duane Sparks is chairman and founder of The Sales Board, a Minneapolis-based sales training company that has trained and certified more than 200,000 salespeople in the system and skills of Action Selling. He has personally facilitated more than 300 Action Selling training sessions.

In a 30-year career as a salesperson and sales manager, Duane has sold products ranging from office equipment to insurance. He was the top salesperson at every company he ever worked for. He developed Action Selling Sales Training while owner of one of the largest computer marketers in the United States. Even in the roaring computer business of the 1980’s, his company grew six times faster than the industry norm, differentiating itself not by the products offered but by the way it sold them. Duane founded The Sales Board in 1990 to teach the skills of Action Selling to others.

Contact The Sales Board for more sales information or sales training that’s been documented and research-proven to help you sell more! 1-800-232-3485

With Less Telemarketing Aimed At Homes Are Prospects More Receptive At Work?

Auto Date Tuesday, April 22nd, 2008

An emotional boiling point was reached in the anti-telemarketing hysteria that came over America about a decade ago.

This spilled over into legislation providing for the establishment of the Do Not Call Registry, enabling tens of millions of people to opt-out of receiving unwanted sales calls at home.

Now that this legislation has been in effect for a number of years, and there are fewer unwanted calls being made and received, are consumers becoming more receptive to cold calls received at work?

Or, are they just as prickly about being pitched at their desks as they are at their dining room tables?

While there isn’t a scientific answer to this question, there is an anecdotal one that comes from the annals of door-to-door selling.

Crews that are deployed in residential neighborhoods are often instructed to knock on doors where signs are posted that warn, “No Solicitors.” This seems strange, doesn’t it?

Here’s the logic: People who hide behind such signs have so little sales resistance that they have to announce it to the whole world. And to whom would you prefer to sell, to those who are the most resistant or the least?

Ironically, those who logged their names onto the Do Not Call Registry are perhaps the very easiest to sell also, wherever they are situated, in the workplace or at home.

Their location may be irrelevant.

At the same time, because they haven’t been practicing saying no at home, you might infer they’re rusty at slamming the electronic door in the faces of telemarketers.

Thus in this battle of wills, the advantage may have shifted once more to those who dial and smile.

Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of www.Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone®, You Can Sell Anything By Telephone! and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service, and the audio program, “The Law of Large Numbers: How To Make Success Inevitable,” published by Nightingale-Conant. He is a frequent guest on radio and television, worldwide. A Ph.D. from USC’s Annenberg School, a Loyola lawyer, and an MBA from the Peter F. Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. He holds the rank of Shodan, 1st Degree Black Belt in Kenpo Karate. He is headquartered in Glendale, California, and he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com