Don't Make Sales Reps Schedule Appointments

By, Brian Grinonneau

Having sales pros cold call and prospect is like having a star baseball player stock the concession stand. It’s a lousy use of talent and terrible waste of money. Sales stars shine when selling. Let them sell!

A sales super achiever wants to meet with prospects, determine a fit, suggest solutions and close the deal. It feeds his competitive nature. It assuages the hunger to perform.

A sales super achiever hates making endless calls to find the right prospect with whom to meet. The process dampens the spirit and kills motivation.

Those who think a salesman should be a prospector and sales genius can stop here. The paradigm shifted a few turns back.

In today’s sales world, an account rep must exploit strength--not work on weakness. Forget about a well-rounded rep, focus on a super star that closes the deal and brings home fists full of cash.

Appointment setting, telemarketing companies will set any sales staff on a course for success. Highly qualified sales appointments are scheduled with those who have an interest in your solution and have the ability to buy from you; appointments that are the result painstaking prospecting and hours of dialing.

A December 2007 MaSM study found that appointment setting firms can double the productivity of a sales staff because it can concentrate only on selling and not the mundane associated tasks. When qualified sales appointments are scheduled, closing ratios climb and cash flow improves.

Don’t make sales reps schedule their own sales appointments. They hate doing it and aren’t very good at it. Leave the job to professionals who love doing it and are good at it. Sales stars shine when selling. Let them sell!

8 Powerful B2B Sales Lead Generation Techniques To Help You Reach Your Sales Prospects

By M. H. "Mac" McIntosh, President, Mac McIntosh Incorporated

Most of the fastest growing B2B companies do not rely solely on just one sales lead generation method. Sat Feb 3, 2007

Most of the fastest growing B2B companies do not rely solely on just one sales lead generation method. They have a complete arsenal of sales lead generation tools at their fingertips, that they can use at any given time.Here are my eight proven B2B sales leads generation techniques gleaned from helping over 170 B2B companies reach their sales prospects:

1. Sales lead generation using relationship marketing

Relationship Marketing is the approach underlying all of the "sales-lead-generation-success" methods. Relationship marketing simply refers to cultivating a personal, sales-winning relationship with your prospects. It’s about developing longer-term relationships with customers rather than individual transactions. During my 20+ years of experience in B2B sales lead generation, I've discovered the key to picking up sales others leave on the table is to keep in touch with your prospects via a series of ongoing communications and offers throughout your prospective customers' consideration processes.

2. Sales lead generation through complementary partner referrals

By joining forces with complementary partners, you can instantly multiply your sales lead generation pool and make it easier for companies to engage in doing business with you. Out of all the sales lead generation programs available to you, complementary partner referral programs can generate the highest qualified B2B sales leads.

3. Sales lead generation using search engine optimization and Internet marketing strategies

Business buyers are more sophisticated and getting harder to reach than ever. Studies show that about 90% of business buyers start with research on the Internet, therefore it’s critical to have a well-tuned sales lead generation program that includes search engine optimization (SEO)/Internet marketing strategies to attract prospects at the beginning of their buying cycle.

4. Sales lead generation via telemarketing

Even though many people despise the thought of telemarketing, when executed properly it is a very effective sales lead generation tool. Telemarketing is a personal marketing and sales lead generation technique that offers a cost-effective, efficient alternative to field selling. However, it can be significantly more expensive than direct mail or email. By including telemarketing in your B2B sales lead generation marketing plan, you can reach up to thirty decision-makers a day at a cost of $15 to $20 per contact. In contrast, with field sales you can reach only four or five decision-makers a day at an average cost of $392 or more per contact. Direct mail may cost as little as a dollar, and email is often much less. However, if you consistently prospect and nurture leads via phone, you will consistently generate qualified sales leads.

5. Sales lead generation with email publications

By creating your own email newsletter, you could send out industry news and tips to suspects in your market. Since you will be on your prospects’ minds more often than your competition, eventually, your sales leads will turn into actual sales. If you subscribe to my e-newsletter, Sales Lead Report, you will see an example of an email publication that keeps my name and business in front of over 8,000 people every month.

6. Sales Lead Generation With Direct Mail

There is an entire industry of people like Dan Kennedy, Bob Bly, and Bill Glazer who are dedicated to business-to-business selling through direct marketing. Sales letters can be an excellent sales lead generation method. But, most sales and business professionals do not know how to use this lead generation technique effectively and efficiently.The complaint is a common one among B2B companies that depend on direct mail and direct response marketing as their only sales lead generation program: "I'm sick of spending a fortune to send out thousands of full-color catalogs and direct-mail pieces only to get a measly 1% response rate. How can I cut costs and find a more practical way to get my target market to respond to my direct mail or catalogs?"My clients have found that the best place to start revamping their direct response marketing is by determining who their best customers are, then trying to target their database marketing efforts at companies and individuals who are similar in nature.

7. Sales Lead Generation Using Print Advertising

When done correctly, print advertising can be a highly effective sales lead generation activity. When using print advertising as your B2B sales leads generation method, you must remember to focus your advertising's message on the benefits and applications of your products or services. Then let the layout and design of your ads enhance your company's image. And, don’t forget to only use publications that deliver messages directly to your targeted audience.

8. Sales Lead generation via Event Marketing

Whether you do it live, through the telephone (teleseminars) or via the Web (webinars), seminars and workshops are a great sales lead generation tool. People who attend your seminar have an interest in the information you are presenting and a need for your product or service. The goal: Connect with customers in a meaningful wayBy using these eight proven B2B sales leads generation methods gleaned from helping over 170 B2B companies reach their prospects, you will capture more sales-ready opportunities for your salespeople to turn into new business, meaning greater sales revenue and profits for your company.

_________________________________________________________

M. H. "Mac" McIntosh is described by many as America's leading authority on inquiry handling and sales lead management. He is president of Mac McIntosh Incorporated, a sales and marketing consulting firm specializing in helping companies get more high-quality sales leads and turn them into sales. To request a free subscription to his newsletter, Sales Lead Report, contact him at: Mac McIntosh, Inc., 601 Pendar Rd. North Kingstown, RI 0-2852-6620

Phone: 800-944-5553 or 401-294-7730. Fax: 800-944-5513.

Email: mcintosh@salesleadexperts.com Web: http://www.salesleadexperts.com/

Attributes of Top Telemarketers

There are specific attributes the top telemarketing sales appointment setter’s posses. Without these traits, they fall into the “also ran” pack of telephone callers who will help your business to the extent a blind squirrel finds an acorn.

Using a phone to convey value and set an appointment with a qualified decision maker is a skill that is inherent. Learning it is hard, at best. That’s why enlightened sales management separates appointment setting from selling. The skill sets are very different.

Whether you run an in-house call center or outsource appointment setting here are the traits your telemarketer must have:

1. Intelligent. Not MENSA Society smarts, but knowing the regional difference between Kankakee and Poughkeepsie is nice.

2. Conversationalist. The ability to engage in intelligent discourse about the prospects’ business, hobbies, family or pets.

3. Quick thinker. Must be able to react quickly to the hundreds of verbal curve balls that are pitched every day. The answers are not on the script.

4. Driven. The desire to dial and dial again when most prospects tell you no. Substitute the description Fearless in this category.

5. Meticulous. A carefully constructed note about conversations and follow-up activities is the difference between success and abject failure.

6. Punctual. Time waits for no man. Calls to prospects are carefully planned and coordinated and must be made during assigned periods.

7. Proud. The deep-seated conviction that an entire deal is built on the foundation of the first telemarketing call.

8. Competitive. An innate need to win—to set more appointments and make more money for the company.

Finding top sales appointment setters isn’t easy work. They come in many shapes and sizes and from all walks of life. Use the list above to qualify and put the right telemarketers to work for you. It’ll mean the difference between beating sales projections and struggling to make budget.

6 Ways You Can Use Telemarketing as Part of Your Business Growth Strategy

By Keith Longmire

Mention telemarketing to many small business owners and managers and you are likely to see uncertainty, doubt and confusion. Many of them confuse telemarketing with telesales. The latter is tainted by the cold-calling, pressure tactics used by some companies to sell everything from timeshare holidays to kitchens and garden furniture. The only similarity between telemarketing and telesales is that they both use the telephone as a communication medium.

Here are 6 reasons why you should be using telemarketing in your small business marketing mix:
Appointment setting - the overriding role of marketing is to gain opportunities for your sales people. The best opportunities stem from face to face meetings. Telemarketing is proven to deliver high quality appointments with specifically targeted, pre-qualified decision makers. In preparing your appointments a good telemarketer will have had numerous contacts with your prospects’ decision makers. They will have built up a rapport and set expectations so that your appointments are geared for maximum results before you get to meet the client.

Lead generation - telemarketing for lead generation is a less in-depth process than appointment setting. The objective is normally to contact a prospect, gauge potential level of interest and to provide you with a profiled database of leads. You may follow up the contacts yourself or you may choose to commission a telemarketer to set appointments with the best prospects.

Database building and cleansing - most companies acquire extensive lists of contacts and prospects. Telemarketing is an excellent way of reviewing, updating and building your contact database.

Follow up - if I had to pick one key to successful small business marketing it would have to be a comprehensive, robust follow-up process. In the normal course of business just about every one of your staff will make contacts and maybe receive enquiries about your company. In a marketing sense, every such contact is manna from heaven. Following up every contact has been shown to improve sales in company after company. Telemarketers can provide a truly professional service in contact follow-up further multiplying the benefits of following up.

Customer Information- most small business owners that think of telemarketing tend to think of it as a tool for accessing new customers. However, just about any marketing book you read will tell you it is between 6 and 12 times easier/cheaper/more profitable to sell to existing customers than it is to gain a new one. Telemarketing to your existing customer base is an excellent way to inform them of all your products and services.

Customer reactivation - do you know why old customers have stopped buying from you? You should. Often it is simply because they have not had any contact with you for some extended period. Sometimes it is because they didn’t know that you supplied the particular service they needed. So they look elsewhere. And eventually stop buying from you altogether. Telemarketing is a superb way to make contact with customers as soon as they stop being customers. Sometimes that is all that is required to bring them back into the fold. At the very least you owe it to yourself to know why your customers are leaving. It is the first stage of making sure they don’t leave you at all.

Six ways you can use telemarketing to boost your business. And don’t let anyone persuade you it is expensive. Telemarketing is the ultimate modern cottage industry. All you need is some training, the right attitude and a telephone. You can instantly set up as a telemarketer. And if you are any good you can quickly use telemarketing to sell your own services. Not surprisingly then, there are thousands of small telemarketing businesses many of them absolutely excellent. There are, of course, others that are not so good. With that much competition you can get some outstanding telemarketing services for a very reasonable price. Your challenge is to find the ones that are right for you. Practically any small business is capable of outstanding growth. Breakthrough Business Growth is dedicated to making proven small business growth solutions accessible to all business owners.

http://www.jkl-small-business-marketing-solutions.com Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Keith_Longmire

The Reality of Telemarketing

Forget what you think telemarketing is and embrace the reality that it is used by the largest companies in the world to introduce new products, gauge customer satisfaction and schedule qualified sales appointments.

Today’s telemarketing is the purest form of direct marketing and direct marketing is the shortest distance between two points for business success. With the overload of messages crashing into consumers, a clear voice that rises above the din must be found. Telemarketing is that voice.

To be sure, there are a few firms that still practice boiler room telemarketing tactics of days gone by. The majority, however, are professional organizations committed to your complete success.

When hiring a telemarketing firm, look for very specific attributes:

• Knowledgeable, well-spoken company representatives

• Expertise in telling your story

• Excellence in building the right list of qualified prospects to call

• No long-term contract

• A non-disclosure, confidentiality agreement

• Clear and understandable campaign reporting

• Open, meaningful communication

• Establishment of goals and measurement tools

• Interaction between your sales and management team and the professional telemarketers

• Pricing that is clear and fair

• The ability to analyze, test and refocus campaigns for your maximum result

If you sell any product or service, and want to put it in the hands of your best prospects, you should use telemarketing professionals. If you have a customer base and want to build loyalty and repeat business you should use telemarketing professionals. The investment will pay for itself many times over and become the centerpiece of your direct marketing strategy.

Sales Appointment Setting: What You Should Expect

A sales appointment setting, telemarketing or telesales firm can bring you more business than you ever thought possible. The best campaigns include a great list of prospects to call, a trained, professional calling staff and strict procedures for following up on leads.

Appointment setters will:

· Make twice as many calls as your average sales rep
· Set an average of (1) qualified appointment per hour
· Disqualify those that will waste your time and effort
· Double the productivity of your sales staff
· Help build a prospect data base
· Provide valuable feedback about your position in the marketplace
· Bring you a strong ROI
· Obtain referrals
· Reduce sales management headaches
· Help you make more money

Appointment setters will not:

· Close the deal--They set the stage and let your pros shine
· Force sales reps to attend scheduled appointments
· Improve a salesperson's presentation skills
· Turn a poor prospect list into a good one
· Provide vast product or service detail--They spark interest

Your success depends on getting in front of the prospect that has the interest and authority to make a buying decision and for that reason you have to learn more about how a professional sales appointment setting firm can help. Those who do make more money quicker than they ever thought possible

Call Centers: Inhouse or Outsource?

If you are running sales appointment setting and lead generation services in-house, you are leaving money on the table. That’s why some of the biggest companies in the world like Microsoft and Wal-Mart outsource some, or all of their call center functions to professional appointment setting firms like ours. We help you make more money.

Call center outsourcing vs. in-house call center activities:

• In-house call centers can’t afford to pay appointment setters enough and performance suffers because of that. We pay our professionals well.


• MaSM talks to the right people at the right time. It isn’t about more calls it’s about meaningful conversations that turn into sales.


• You need qualified sales appointments set for your staff—not an unlimited number but one that allows your reps to present, negotiate and close.


• Appointment setters function much better when working on your project 2-4 hours a day, not 8. It becomes a case of diminishing returns.


• Provides a significant return on investment that is trackable.


• MaSM professionals dial the phone three times more often than most in-house call centers scheduling many more qualified appointments.


• Focuses on disqualifying poor prospects to maximize your closing ratio.


• Allows you to do what you do best: close deals.


• Drives new revenue without having to expand or provide additional office space, computers, telephones or employees.


• Gives you the ability to have trained, skilled and experienced personnel to fulfill your call center needs with the ability to utilize appointment setting; phone sales; lead generation and lead qualifying; list and database scrubbing; database building; surveys; market research; seminar registration and fundraising.

If you have you’re an in-house telemarketing department, we ask that you run a test campaign with MaSM. We are confident that you will be pleasantly surprised with the outcome—you’ll make more money in less time.

Sales Appointment Setting: It's Ugly Out There

Sales appointment setting is an ugly process. Picking up a phone and convincing someone you don’t know to spend time with you sends cold chills down your spine no matter the thickness of your skin. Is it really any wonder cold calling ranks number one with a bullet on the most hated list for salespeople?

Fear and loathing of prospecting and cold calling has killed a bright future for many a shining salesperson. A lack of prospecting leads to a lack of appointments and a lack of new sales. There is only so much you can do with referrals and the accounts divvied up when Joe in the corner office retired.

Weak sales managers, and there are a lot of them, stand over their minions forcing them to do what they hate, call and call more. The basic premise is right that more calls will ultimately lead to more sales, but the methodology is all wrong. It isn’t just quantity; it is quality that counts. Garbage in, garbage out.

Strong sales managers know account execs have to talk to prospects with a problem to solve—those who will invite you to meet them and help make their pain go away. They also know one of the best ways to get in front of these prospects is to use the services of a professional sales appointment setting firm. It makes sense on a whole lot of levels. These pros will dial the phone three times more often than your in-house reps, have more conversations and schedule dozens of high-quality appointments, fast. They use the right lists, use the right words and make your top sales reps twice as productive.

Those who don’t consider outsourcing appointment setting are leaving money on the table. They think that given time, sales reps will learn to make cold calls and set appointments with the accounts you want most. That same line of antiquated thinking would suggest you should always be working on your weaknesses.
Wrong! Work on your strength and find professionals to take care of the shortcomings.

Sales appointment setting firms will bring you a trackable, meaningful ROI. They bring waves of new revenue, build morale, reduce management oversight and let sales reps do what they do best, present, negotiate and close deals.

Outsource cold calling and appointment setting to those that do it best—the ones that don’t think the process is ugly or painful but rather enjoy setting the table for your sales team.