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Like me, I’m sure many of you get quite frustrated with all the solicitation calls you receive. Often, they come at awful times like when you’re trying to clean, and you just try to get rid of the person as quick as possible. If you do have time though, listen to what the person says. This does not necessarily mean buy their service, but rather listen to the pitch. How do they present their service? What about the pitch as a customer do you like? What do you dislike? Do they come with a hard sell, or are they just feeling you out first? What do they say that sticks in your mind as memorable and how did they make it so? Ask questions and see how they respond, especially if you can address a negative about their service. If you just say it’s about the money and you can’t afford it, how do they address the money topic? Remember all this and if possible, write it down for later. Use your experience as the customer being pitched to better your pitch when the role is reversed.
On a somewhat similar note, I received a call yesterday from a company that provides mailing labels for people that have lived in their house for 8-9 months. I believe this is the 2nd time in the past year or so that they have called me. Both times I have been intrigued by the service, but have requested they send me more info on it. Both times the salesman wanted me to start using their service free for 3 months right now and couldn’t understand why I wouldn’t want to use the service and what my reservations were. I know at times you have to have an aggressive pitch to get people to respond and act, but if this company won’t listen to my request as their potential customer, imagine the treatment I’ll receive when I have a concern over their service, a bill, etc. and they already have my money. Both times the conversations have ended like this:
Me: “Ok sir, either you can send me some information on your service as I’m not signing up now, or I’ll end this conversation.”
Them:”But sir I don’t understand”
Me (interupting) “EITHER you can send me some information on your service as I’m not signing up now, or I’ll end this conversation.”
Them:”But sir”
CLICK!…lost sale! I wonder if he ever figured out why?
I have a much simpler method…at least it works for me.
If the phone rings and the caller is an out of area caller, I do not answer. If they are a prospective customer they will leave a message.
If the phone rings and the caller is blocked as UNKNOWN CALLER, I do not answer…If they are a prospective customer, they will leave a message and I will call them back.
If the phone rings and it is a local number, I answer…99% of the time, it is either a shopper, potential customer, competitor or customer.
Lately, I have been placing my customer numbers and names in the phone so I know who is calling and answer with their name.( they are important to me). Also, do not answer for other strange calls.
If a potential customer who has their phone number blocked and has a problem with getting my voicemail, then I suppose that I might not wish to have them as a customer.
I return all calls very rapidly….
Dave, one thing I never get is frustrated from someone trying to steal my time for nothing…and when I am working or driving or otherwise tied up…that is worth a lot to me. I HATE getting stroked by anyone on their terms.
Lately, I think the competition has gotten onto this method…I recently had 2 different males call at 7:20 and 7:30 AM the same day for quotes for cleaning….I thought it was rather weird, and put 2 and 2 together in about 10 minutes and thought…I bet these guys worked for someone locally…
I plan on calling them back one of these days…
Have we lost sales from this practice?? Maybe a few…maybe not though.
Just my 2 cents.
Dave Dilts
Dave,
I agree that getting frustrated is not worth it. I rarely do, but this company does it to me for their lack of understanding the sale or whatever you would describe it as. I agree that not answering outside area numbers or restricted/unavail #’s makes things easier, but I do think you may be losing more potential customers than you think. You know your area better than I, so I could very well be wrong. In my area, I have a lot of customers call with out of area numbers (cell phones usually), restricted ID’s or even unavailable ID’s. As said though, I trust you know your area well enough that this may not be the case for you. Also, as much as I hate solicitor calls, they are important to our business sometimes which is why I try and learn from them if I do answer them. As I’ve said in a prior post, the ones that always call me that I don’t want to talk to, I just program their number in my phone as “solicitor #1,2,3,4,etc” so I know not to answer it. Like you, I do program a lot of my regulars #’s into my phone. I don’t always answer with their name, but it does affect the way you answer the phone when you already know who you’ll be talking to and usually in a good way.
ok if its out of area i will not answer it period. unless its corporate .if its that important they will leave amessage.99.9% they never leave a message and will call 5,6,7,8,9,10 times a day and never leave a message.i used to answer the call,but found out they will call back again and shoot the same thing.if u answer, then while your on the phone ,a local call comes in then you must take that call.most of the time its down time.most of us don’t have time for that or don’t want to make time for that.i have called back to see why they would repeatedly call and never leave a message and get a line of bull.to many scams. i usually like doing most of my bussines unrelated to telephone soliciting.
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