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Maddie Hollis | 
02nd Nov 2011 at 12:37 | 288 views | 
1 comments(s)
How do you go about Appointment Setting?
Pretty much every company needs to sell in one way or another, and there are obviously many different ways to sell. For many of us though, we need to get in front of a potential client to be able to explain and describe the product or service we have to offer. The process of Appointment Booking is getting someone who may have never heard of your product or service to agree to meet with you to discuss it. So how do you get a complete stranger to agree to sit down with you, (either face to face or over the telephone), for possibly an hour or so to discuss your product or service?
Here are 10 basic steps:
Source the data to call: Either using data you have already got, or by buying in data that has been reviewed to show target companies that you want to focus on.
Check data: The data is absolutely key, if you haven’t got the right data, you could end up wasting a huge amount of time either phoning the wrong type...
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Victoria Moffatt | 08th Feb 2011 at 14:29 | 416 views | 0 comments(s)
What is Cold Calling?
Telephone Cold calling is the process of approaching prospective customers or clients using the telephone, who were not expecting a call. The term cold calling is used because the person receiving the call has had no previous relationship with the cold caller and therefore is not expecting a call.
Cold Calling is a form of marketing and therefore the aim is essentially to build new relationships with contacts and ultimately increase product and/or service sales. Once the first call is complete, and the contact is interested, future calls are not perceived to be cold calls but rather telemarketing/relationship building or Client Relationship Management. Telemarketing however can include cold calling.
Unfortunately there is sometimes a negative stigma attached to cold calling mainly because it has been used as a numbers game. Cold calling really grew in the late 90’s and now many people hate being on the receiving end of a cold caller. As it was...
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Victoria Moffatt | 10th Jan 2011 at 19:05 | 404 views | 6 comments(s)
What is Telemarketing?
Well, put simply, it is marketing that is done over the telephone. At The Swan Company, we define it as:
The action or business of increasing your sales by the perspicacious* use of telephone calling.
*Acutely perceptive, understanding and able to judge things accurately. Insightful and wise.
An easy way to understand this is to think about all the different activities that you would normally associate with marketing e.g.
Advertising
Brand awareness
Promotion
Market research
Communications
Selling products and/or services, etc.
Now think about whether any of these activities can be done on the telephone. The answer is that most of the usual marketing activities can also be completed on the telephone. While many marketing tools such as leaflets/posters and banners have a blanket approach, telling the same story to everyone, when speaking directly to a person on the phone, the message can be refin...
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Margaret MacKenzie | 09th Jul 2010 at 10:37 | 786 views | 1 comments(s)
Cold Calling - Fear of Objection
An objection is not a rejection; it is simply a request for more information. - Bo Bennett.
You have overcome your fear of rejection, made that call and are now actually speaking to your prospect. Now is not the time for a stunned silence, (precipitated by the shock of actually getting through), but a chance to start building the relationship you want. Don’t be embarrassed about the fact that you are selling something, but do be honest about it. There is very little more irritating in life, than callers who say ‘I’m not trying to sell you anything’, when it is patently obvious that they are.
You gather your wits, you explain why you have called and, (because you understand the value of questioning in a sales call), you have asked your prospect some pertinent questions and listened to the response. You would now like to make an appointment, in order to explain your solution to the prospect’s problem in more de...
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Margaret MacKenzie | 24th Jun 2010 at 14:29 | 433 views | 1 comments(s)
Cold Calling - Fear of Rejection
“A rejection is nothing more than a necessary step in the pursuit of success”. Bo Bennett
The main obstacle to making sales calls for oneself is fear. Fear of rejection. From the first school disco onwards, the thought of being left out and not wanted haunts all but the most self-assured amongst us. Do you remember how the school dances started? All the boys on one side of the hall, looking at their shoes or watches; all the girls on the other pretending not to look. Every one too scared to make the first move, for fear of being rejected.
It is exactly this fear that drives you away from the telephone and to clean behind the office fridge, (or whatever your favourite displacement activity is). It is not an easy thing to overcome. So how can we change how you look at rejection? How can we make it a good thing?
Bo Bennett has the right idea. Given that you cannot hope to make a hundred appointments from a hundred calls, you ...
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Victoria Moffatt | 06th Apr 2010 at 14:36 | 341 views | 1 comments(s)
Cold Calling - Do you need to change your attitude?
Believe in what you are selling. Believe you have a right to make that call. If you think that the person you are calling is going to see you as a nuisance caller, the chances are that they will. If you believe in your product or service and can identify the problem that it can solve for your potential customer, then the message conveyed to the customer is that you can provide the solution. The only way you can do this is by using your listening skills. A conversation is a two-way process, and it is as important that you ask the right questions to find out what your prospect needs as it is that you listen carefully to the answers. This can mean that you actually help your prospect to identify the problem, and are then ideally placed to recommend your solution. The more you know about your prospect before you make the call, the more targeted your questions can be.
Many people hate making sales calls, as they think that all p...
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