Cold Calling Sucks - But It Works

[Full Throttle]

I know a guy that has started to send cards before he makes his cold calls to let them know he'll be calling on them at a certain date / time.

Now most of the time people still ignore him or have their guard up. But sometimes they're more open. For example he might say something like, "This is Darien calling, did you get the card I sent you last week?" He has found that something as simple as that card has helped him get in the door and helped lower their guard a little bit.

Of course it won't work for everyone. But we're just trying to improve our numbers a little bit, right?

Avoidance activity. Plus, it can get expensive. Unless you want to bail out the postal service or greeting card companies, I would skip this step. I tested the warm up letter/card versus the no warm up letter/card and the results were identical.

 

[benfitts]

Avoidance activity. Plus, it can get expensive. Unless you want to bail out the postal service or greeting card companies, I would skip this step. I tested the warm up letter/card versus the no warm up letter/card and the results were identical.

I hate cold calling myself. Only used feedback a friend provided.

I'm an seo / internet lead guy.

 

[pcbinsurance]

You have quite a resume there:

*SEO Guy
*Internet Lead Guy
*Custom Greeting Card Guy
*Medicare Instructor Guy

Any other "guy" titles we need to know about?

 

[Justin Bilyj]

Avoidance activity. Plus, it can get expensive. Unless you want to bail out the postal service or greeting card companies, I would skip this step. I tested the warm up letter/card versus the no warm up letter/card and the results were identical.

I hold your opinion high amongst members here, and I respect your experience a ton, but do you think it might be you?
I remember you used to say your kinda akward and have less ease going b2b than most so I am not trying to fight or anything.

Whenever I think of doing a pre-approach something I always think back to your advice....makes no difference, and I just wonder....

 

[benfitts]

You have quite a resume there:

*SEO Guy
*Internet Lead Guy
*Custom Greeting Card Guy
*Medicare Instructor Guy

Any other "guy" titles we need to know about?

Good question.

I have been an internet guy since 1993. As someone working in the industry since 1995-1996 I do have an extensive resume. In those early days of working for companies they didn't have a team of web people. They had ONE. You had to have a broad skillset or develop one.

My main business is the greeting card business which I promote online mostly and am currently learning how to promote offline. Our business is the "Netflix of Greeting Cards" so it's a great fit for online promotion.

Medicare Instructors came to me because of my card business. They asked how we got ranked high in Google. This ended up with them wanting help with their new web site and SEO.

 

[VolAgent]

I hold your opinion high amongst members here, and I respect your experience a ton, but do you think it might be you?
I remember you used to say your kinda akward and have less ease going b2b than most so I am not trying to fight or anything.

Whenever I think of doing a pre-approach something I always think back to your advice....makes no difference, and I just wonder....

I never did it to the same extent that I'm sure Full Throttle did, but when I did a small amount of them, it seemed to make no difference.

I wager your dentist friend is the exception. I can't believe someone who uses a gatekeeper to screen phone calls and drop-ins is not going to use the same gatekeeper to sort the mail.

 

[Chazm]

I hold your opinion high amongst members here, and I respect your experience a ton, but do you think it might be you?
I remember you used to say your kinda akward and have less ease going b2b than most so I am not trying to fight or anything.

Whenever I think of doing a pre-approach something I always think back to your advice....makes no difference, and I just wonder....

I've done it too and it was a big waste of time and money. Avoidance activity is exactly what it is

 

[rousemark]

I've done it too and it was a big waste of time and money. Avoidance activity is exactly what it is

It is 12 Noon. I am sitting in my recliner, still in my pajamas, reading the forum threads. Is this avoidance activity?

 

[Chazm]

It is 12 Noon. I am sitting in my recliner, still in my pajamas, reading the forum threads. Is this avoidance activity?

Lol not saying I don't do the same thing but if we did this when we first started we would have been broke. Come to think of it, I did do it and I was broke

 

[JacquesWerth]

The averages of the agents we train make:
67 Dials per hour.
9 Prospecting Offers per hour.
1 Appointment per 55 Offers.
and they close 34 % to 74% of appointments.

There are considerable variations depending on the type of products they sell, the quality and demographics of their prospecting lists, and their sales competence.

If their software has a phone dialer, and their computer has a modem, it can improve the dial rate (and everything else) by about 20%