Prospective customers will only allow cold callers a few seconds to make their sales pitch count. With that knowledge in mind, effective telemarketing call introductions make the difference between success and failure.
Customers don’t care about your products, your website, your brochures, your people and pretty much anything about you. They only care about one thing. Themselves.
Customers have one thing that they’re considering when you engage with them, namely the ‘What’s in it for me?’ If you’re engaging with them on the right basis, they want to know how you can help them to remove a challenge they have. They want to know how you can provide something that makes them more money, reduces costs, improves productivity, and makes them feel better or look better (to their peers, friends and colleagues).
It’s simple. Yet why do so many cold callers still resort to using outdated scripted and over-salesy call intros like…..?
How are you today? I’m calling to introduce my products to you. I’m calling to see if you have a need for…. We’re manufacturers of XYZ. We specialise in the production and distribution of ….. Bla bla bla.
The problem is this. This outmoded kind of telemarketing intro sounds like the last 20 cold calls the prospect received and the next 20 that the prospect will have to endure. So, to stop them dismissing you and to change the outcome, you have to change the input. If your call success ratios are low using this technique, change it. And change it to something that gives you a chance of the prospect staying on the line for more that the ‘How are you….’ bit of the call.
It’s about rapport and building a compelling reason for them to listen from the get-go. It isn’t complicated and the example below illustrates the point. I listened to this call at a client a few weeks back and the conversation went something like this:
Caller: Hi John, it’s Mary calling from ABC Protective Wear Ltd, I think you may have heard of us.
Prospect: Er possibly
Caller: Well we’re manufacturers and distributors of protective equipment for the oil and gas industry and the reason for my call today John is to introduce my products to you, to see if you have any need for protective wear and if you have any projects that might involve safety equipment.
Now, I probably don’t need to tell you the result of this particular call. It wasn’t a sale or an appointment.
After the call, I asked one question. Why do your clients need the protective equipment you’re selling on this call? The answer was this. Because a lot of the guys on the rigs are panicking about the risk of explosion especially in confined places. I then asked a follow-up question which was. If that’s the case, why don’t you start your call with something like this?
Caller: Hi John, Hi John, it’s Mary from ABC Protective Wear. I don’t know if this is relevant for you but we’re doing a lot of work with the guys on the rigs like BP who are really worried about the risk of explosion especially in confined places…..
It isn’t fool proof and the above can even be enhanced in many ways. However, it is a more compelling call intro and more likely to keep the prospect on the phone and engaged.
So, before you jump in and trot out the same old tired telemarketing call scripts, think about what your customer wants. Consider making your call introductions more engaging and based on client needs rather than what you sell.
If you’d like to find out how GSA Business Development can help Generate Growth for your Business or book one of our new business development and marketing strategy workshops, contact us now on 0845 658 8192 or send us an email.
