Pick up that Phone and Sell It

SYNOPSIS IN POINT FORM

• There are various aspects of telemarketing such as telesales, inbound, teleprospecting and tele-surveying
• Telemarketing needn’t be your main sales method, it may compliment your other marketing efforts
• It may be very useful to test the market before launching new products and services
• Many low profit sales meetings may be handled over the phone rather than face to face
• Telesales may also support and strengthen your sales meetings processes
• Online and offline shops may also introduce a small telemarketing sales channel
• Train one or more of your staff to do this in their spare time or intermittently when needed
• Write out a detailed well thought script before you start, which should be followed
• Try to give an incentive to clients such as a discount, a gift or an award
• Talk slowly, clearly, loudly, take your time, pause and let the customer talk. Tone should be firm, smart, polite, professional and friendly, but not over-friendly

FULL ARTICLE

Telemarketing has now been around for decades, however it is still often overlooked by many businesses. It does not need to be your main sales channel, neither the main focus of your business development. It can sometimes be effectively incorporated into your various sales and other communication methods and can be very useful to test new products and services and to obtain instant feedback from prospective customers.

Telemarketing does not solely consist of telesales, which is purely the outbound sales application of it. There is also the inbound equivalent where incoming sales related calls are received and handled. It also consists of teleprospecting which is a wider term utilised for getting to know the market better and also speaking with prospective clients to obtain general trends, besides affecting sales. While tele-surveying is the use of the telephone to conduct surveys and polls.

So although any marketing term starting with the prefix ‘tele’ usually evokes large call centres churning out thousands of unsolicited calls every day, there is a completely other side to it all. Telemarking in its many forms may be reinforced within your sales and communication processes, enabling you to operate your business much more efficiently.

Before you embark and launch a new project and establish all details and pricing, get someone to make a series of sales phone calls to get some feedback. Just a few hours work can save you weeks if not months of readjusting your product line or operation.

Before wasting entire days and big budgets in driving, parking and meeting after meeting for a possible outcome resulting in a sale of a few hundred euros, stop to consider how much more efficient and cost effective you would be by doing all this over the phone.

If you are simply renewing a membership or a subscription of sorts, might it not be so much easier to do it over the phone?

Even with bigger, more complex sales which normally merit a meeting, your sales strategy could very easily include a small exploratory sales pitch over the phone, following your obtaining of an appointment. This may start off poised simply as a quick telephone reconfirmation, which is then strategically used to reaffirm, qualify and quantify the client’s true interests, enabling you to act accordingly and in some cases even to abandon the meeting and to deal with the matter entirely over the phone.

With businesses selling products and simply waiting for the phone to ring, or for an order to come in electronically, this can also sometimes be an option. With traditionally passive offline and online shops there are many which could incorporate a small telemarketing function with specific items and aimed at a specific audience. Admittedly certain products are more suitable to be sold over the phone than others, but you would be surprised how many may be effectively marketed in this manner. And if you feel that the message cannot be properly transmitted over the phone, then it might just be a question of lack of the necessary expertise.

One of the best ways of going about it is to train somebody within your organisation at being adept in this function. It is neither hard nor is it easy. It is one of those things which simply has to be assigned to the right person. Similar to face to face dealings, some people are very comfortable with it, while others are not and would therefore be the wrong candidates for such training.

Some form of useful telemarketing can then be attempted in parallel with other sales efforts from time to time. You can also start off the frequent process of interviewing customers, non-customers, suppliers and more, over the phone on specific issues which are important to the success of your business. This is particularly useful to guide you before making any important decision such as introducing new stock or services.

Although you may very easily source or obtain your base data to call people totally at random, it is always preferable to have your own contact data and focus on this.

Always give your audience a very good reason for them to listen to you. This could come in the form of a gift, a discount, or another form of incentive, which may only be awarded upon a sale, but which is reserved specifically for customers purchasing over the phone. Before you start selling your wares ensure that you are talking to them at a good and convenient time. Never try to force yourself on someone at the wrong time. If the time happens to be unsuitable, then take the opportunity of fixing a future telephone appointment. This will already help you advance one step in the right direction, as the customer will be expecting and agreed to your next call.

Talk slowly, clearly, relatively loudly, take your time, pause and then pause again. Ask as many questions as possible, inciting the customer to open up to you. Smiling too makes a big difference to your tone and is often felt by the customer. Be firm, smart, polite, professional and friendly, but not over-friendly, making it that much easier for the client to pull out.

One of the most important techniques is to encourage and to let the customer talk. The more the customer talks and the less you do, the more involved the customer feels. Never engage in a boring monotone monologue which nobody will ever listen to.

If the customer is being negative, the very worst thing you could do is to try and stop them. On the contrary, let them release all their negativity rather than harbour it within them.

Most important of all, before you attempt any interaction over the phone, you must always first write out a precise script, indicating word for word the ideal verbal scenario and sequence of the conversation. A script however is never to be read out in repetitive fashion, but used as a general guideline of where you would like to go.

It can also be very rewarding, both for your personnel as well as for the customer, to introduce a secondary target. Each time a sale is not concluded, then at least another productive objective is achieved. This could include obtaining vital additional data on the customer, registering the customer on your website, or to receive a newsletter, or Liking your FB page, or entering into a competition or loyalty scheme.

We all work in environments with several phones placed right in front of us. But we rarely use them to their full potential.