My phone rang at precisely 9:45 am on Tuesday, much as it had for the last 11 Tuesdays. The caller ID gave me a look as if to say “There’s some stank on the other end of the line Uncle Paul”. I let it go into voice mail and prepared myself for the second wave of the attack!
3 minutes later, my blackberry goes off and I get to look at the same email I’ve looked at for the last 11 Tuesdays. “Rain man” likes to use “Re” in the subject line to give it the illusion that we’ve communicated. I couldn’t tell you what it says after that because its right about that time that I point my gun sideways and send that email to the Isle of Misfit Ploys! (Pretty cool how I didn’t say deleted, huh?)
It made me think of how many times a day we condition a prospect to say “NO” to us or at the very least let them see us coming from 100 miles away. Either way, those are some angry waters to sail into my friend!
I’ve compiled a quick, easy to read list of things that you need to be careful of to avoid conditioning prospects to reject you!
1) Calling on the same day and time each week: Be careful not to schedule your follow up in your CRM in a manner that makes you predictable. The only time I would break that rule is if I know definitively that Ms Prospect is always in the office and always answers her phone on that specific day and time.
2) Using the same venue all the time. If you use nothing but the phone, you are going to bore the hell out of someone real quick. Same with email or any other venue. Change it up, mix it up. Do you know, everyone has their preferred method of communication? Why would you limit yourself by clinging to only one?
3) Using the same weak message on all “touches” (calls, emails etc). Nothing gets a yawn out of someone faster than a message that lacks impact. It was the great Jack Welch who said “Your job is to never be boring. If you are boring, slap yourself” Realize that when you call or email in bulk, you become robotic. Take some time to think about your message and more importantly, trade shoes with the prospect. What kind of things would catch your interest if you were the buyer of your service? What kind of opportunities are there (through your product or service) for the prospect to sell more, be more profitable, have a better image, have happier customers & shareholders, have quicker to market turn times, greater efficiencies. Get more market share, lower employee turnover etc. Talking about those things sound so much better than some overused “cheese”!
4) Over persistence! Wendy Cole from Time Magazine tells us that the average American is interrupted 56 times per day and research from Basex tells us we each lose approximately 2.1 hours daily to those interruptions. If you are calling a prospect to the point of obsession you are positioning yourself right smack in the middle of all that noise! Additionally, you are begging for a no on a platter. Why? Because you just became one more interruption. Don’t fool yourself with limiting self talk that hints of people liking persistence. Actually, that’s not true. I meant to say . . . don’t confuse persistence with being a pain in the ass!
5) When engaging a prospect, avoid a “No” question. A “No” question is any question that could be answered with either a Yes or No. Studies have shown that people will default to No more often than Yes simply because its safer and get’s you off the phone quicker! By the way, I heard that and you know damn well what I’m talking about. I heard you say “Everybody knows about No questions” Fair enough, but riddle me this muchacho, why are so many people asking them when its supposed to be “Sales 101”? Guess knowing aint doing, huh?
6) Demonstrating a lack of preparation: I know for a fact that there are people who feel you should just get on the phone and call. Kind of the Nike “Just Do It” thing. They will tell you that you don’t need to prepare and it’s simply a numbers game. I believe that the quality of our relationships, rest in the quality of our communication. The quality of our communication rests in our ability to ask intelligent questions. If I don’t have at least a basic (let me take a quick trip to Google) knowledge, you can’t possibly deliver the proper impact (certainly not the same level of impact) had I done the basic research. I can tell you from being on the receiving end of poorly executed calls that it is rather disrespectful to call anyone, let alone someone at the VP level or higher and not know a damn thing about them or their company. I’ve interviewed several high level decision makers and have quickly discovered they share my impatience with anyone who couldn’t bother to be prepared. Way to differentiate dude!
7) Using clichéd rebuttals: When you spew things like “That’s exactly what the ABC Company said and now they’re my best customer” or any cute variation of “Feel, Felt and Find” you need to understand that you will usually illicit a response that’s less than favorable.
8) Being too good at your game! Yep, you read it correctly! I’m talking about those who can handle objections so well that they manipulate a prospect into a “Yes” when all it is a prolonged “Screw you”. Nothing wrong with some respectful persistence. Nothing wrong with presenting a compelling argument. Just understand that if you push it beyond that you may lose lots of time on a “No” you could have had on the front end.
Let me leave you with a final thought:
When times are tough, we can easily panic and approach business without something experts call “thinking”. Make sure you slow down, take a deep breath and be more deliberate and intentional about your hunting habits.
Otherwise, you might just be conditioning your prospect to give you the boot!
