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Sales and Sales Training Article Directory
By Jacques Werth, President High Probability Selling Cold Calling is very stressful for both the prospect and the salesperson. It results in a very high level of rejection and repeated failures.
Both of those causes of stress can be almost entirely eliminated when you can turn cold calling into 'warm calling.' Most people who use the term 'Cold Calling' believe that almost all telephone prospecting is cold calling. As the name implies, you call each prospect and try to sell your way into an appointment. That intention to sell the appointment causes negative reactions and annoyance. Perhaps, if a prospect sounds 'interested,' you will try a second call and again try to sell an appointment. That's the kind of prospecting that most salespeople do- and they hate it, as do most prospects. Because you're pushing so hard for the appointment, you create a lot of resistance. That resistance creates rejection; most prospects don't want you to call them again. Therefore, very few prospects will get that second call, and far less will take a third call. If you do manage to get prospects interested, and get some appointments, you'll only close a very small percentage. Prospects who are merely 'interested' seldom buy.
Just because you want to sell now doesn't mean that the prospect wants to buy now. However, some portion of your market does want to buy now; most of those prospects are turned off by the pressure and persuasion of the cold calling approach. A High Probability Prospect (HPP) is someone who needs, wants, and can afford to buy your product or service, now. There are more HPPs than you can ever find the time to meet with, yet most salespeople don't know they exist. People become HPPs in their own time, for their own reasons. It's seldom because you convinced them that they have an urgent need for your product or service during a prospecting call. In High Probability Prospecting, we call our prospecting list every three to four weeks. Most of the sales are made to people after they have heard several prospecting offers. Only the first call you make to a prospect is a 'cold call.' Each subsequent call to each prospect is a 'warm call.'
Each time you call your targeted prospecting list, you'll get better results than the last time you called that list - if you're not trying to sell appointments. That is because you have become their top-of-mind provider of your type of products and services. And, when they are ready to buy, they will think of you first. Each HPP call takes an average of 35 seconds; it's easy to make upwards of 50 dials per hour. The objective is to determine whether each person you talk to *wants* what you're selling, now. If not, just say 'Okay, good bye,' and call the next prospect. The willingness to take 'No' for an answer and terminate the call immediately eliminates stress for both parties. Most of those who say 'Yes,' without being persuaded, will also buy without being persuaded. Those who don't say 'Yes' today are more likely to say 'Yes,' the next time that you call.
I know you have heard the expression, "Nothing happens 'til a sale is made", and if you have been in business for more than a week - you know it's true.
The 75 articles below plus those available via our new internal search engine (link in the nav bar)will provide you with information about business problems and their solutions, legal issues, online strategies, travel and leisure, family and parenting issues, and personal development - along with many others.
The 75 or so articles below were purchased by us from a reliable resource, and added in this directory, separate from those in the Selected Newsletter Articles area, to offer an additional targeted content around sales and sales training - since nothing does happen ...
How to Tame the Sales Monster
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