7 Cold Calling Secrets Even The Sales Gurus Don’t Know

By Ari Galper, Founder of Unlock The Game

More and more e-mails are arriving in my in-box from people who hate cold calling. Here’s what they’re saying:

• “Cold calling terrifies me.”

• “The phone feels like a 10,000-pound weight.”

• “Every time I have to make a cold call, I freeze up.”

• “I feel like a fraud when I’m cold calling.”

• “I can’t take the rejection when I do cold calling. It just kills me.”

• “I’ve gone from top producer to ‘hermit’ because of my mental brick wall when it comes to cold calling.”

Cold calling the old way is a painful struggle.

But you can make it a productive and positive experience by changing your mindset and cold calling the new way.

To show you what I mean, here are 7 cold calling ideas that even the sales gurus don’t know.

1. Change Your Mental Objective Before You Make the Call

If you’re like most people who make cold calls, you’re hoping to make a sale — or at least an appointment — before you even pick up the phone.

The problem is, the people you call somehow always pick up on your mindset immediately.

They sense that you’re focused on your goals and interests, rather than on finding out what they might need or want.

This short-circuits the whole process of communication and trust-building.

Here’s the benefit of changing your mental objective before you make the call: it takes away the frenzy of working yourself up mentally to pick up the phone.

All the feelings of rejection and fear come from us getting wrapped up in our expectations and hoping for an outcome when it’s premature to even be thinking about an outcome.

So try this. Practice shifting your mental focus to thinking, “When I make this call, I’m going to build a conversation so that a level of trust can emerge allowing us to exchange information back and forth so we can both determine if there’s a fit or not.”

2. Understand the Mindset of the Person You’re Calling

Let’s say you’re at your office and you’re working away.

Your phone rings and someone says, “Hello, my name’s Mark. I’m with Financial Solutions International. We offer a broad array of financial solutions. Do you have a few minutes?”

What would go through your mind?

Probably something like this: “Uh-oh, another salesperson. I’m about to be sold something. How fast can I get this person off the phone?”

In other words, it’s basically over at “Hello,” and you end up rejected.

The moment you use the old cold calling approach — the traditional pitch about who you are and what you have to offer, which all the sales gurus have been teaching for years — you trigger the negative “salesperson” stereotype in the mind of the person you’ve called, and that means immediate rejection.

I call it “The Wall.”

The problem is with how you’re selling, not what you’re selling.

This is an area that’s been ignored in the world of selling.

We’ve all been trained to try to push prospects into a “yes” response on the first call. But that creates sales pressure.

But, if you learn to really understand and put yourself in the mindset of the person you call, you’ll find it easier to avoid triggering The Wall.

It’s that fear of rejection that makes cold calling so frightening.

Instead, start thinking about language that will engage people and not language that will

trigger rejection.

3. Identify a Core Problem That You Can Solve

We’ve all learned that when we begin a conversation with a prospect, we should talk about ourselves, our product, and our solution. Then we sort of hope that the person connects with what we’ve just told them. Right?

But when you offer your pitch or your solution without first involving your prospect by talking about a core problem that they might be having, you’re talking about yourself, not them.

And that’s a problem.

Prospects connect when they feel that you understand their issues before you start to talk about your solutions.

When people feel understood, they don’t put up The Wall. They remain open to talking with you.

Here’s an example based on my own experience. I offer Unlock The Game™ as a new approach in selling. When I call a vice president of sales, I would never start out with, “Hi, my name is Ari, I’m with Unlock The Game, and I offer the newest technique in selling, and I wonder if you have a few minutes to talk now.”

Instead, I wouldn’t even pick up the phone without first identifying one or more problems that I know VPs often have with their sales teams. Problems that Unlock The Game™ can solve.

For example, one common problem is when sales teams and salespeople spend time chasing prospects who have no intention of buying.

So I would start by asking, “Are you grappling with issues around your sales team chasing prospects who lead them on without any intention of buying?”

So, come up with two or three specific core problems that your product or service solves. (Avoid generic problem phrases like “cut costs” or “increase revenue.” They’re too vague.)

4. Start With a Dialogue, Not a Presentation

Let’s return to the goal of a cold call, which is to create a two-way dialogue engaging prospects in a conversation.

We’re not trying to set the person up for a yes or no. That’s the old way of cold calling.

This new cold calling approach is designed to engage people in a natural conversation. The kind you might have with a friend. This lets you both of you decide whether it’s worth your time to pursue the conversation further.

The key here is never to assume beforehand that your prospect should buy what you have to offer, even if they’re a 100 percent fit with the profile of the “perfect customer.”

If you go into the call with that assumption, prospects will pick up on it and The Wall will go up, no matter how sincere you are.

Avoid assuming anything about making a sale before you make a call.

For one thing, you have no idea whether prospects can buy what you have because you know nothing about their priorities, their decisionmaking process, their budget, etc.

If you assume that you’re going to sell them something on that first call, you’re setting yourself up for failure. That’s the core problem with traditional old-style cold calling.

Stay focused on opening a dialogue and determining if it makes sense to continue the conversation.

5. Start With Your Core Problem Question

Once you know what problems you solve, you also know exactly what to say when you make a call. It’s simple. You begin with, “Hi, my name is Ari. Maybe you can help me out for a moment.”

How would you respond if someone said that to you?

Probably, “Sure, how can I help you?” or “Sure, what do you need?” That’s how most people would respond to a relaxed opening phrase like that. It’s a natural reaction.

The thing is, when you ask for help, you’re also telling the truth because you don’t have any idea whether you can help them or not.

That’s why this new approach is based on honesty and truthfulness. That’s why you’re in a very good place to begin with.

When they reply, “Sure, how can I help you?,” you don’t respond by launching into a pitch about what you have to offer. Instead, you go right into talking about the core problem to find out whether it’s a problem for the prospect.

So you say, “I’m just giving you a call to see if you folks are grappling (and the key word here is ‘grappling’) with any issues around your sales team chasing prospects who turn out to never have any intention of buying?”

No pitch, no introduction, nothing about me. I just step directly into their world.

The purpose of my question is to open the conversation and develop enough trust so they’ll feel comfortable having a conversation.

The old way of cold calling advises asking lots of questions to learn about the prospect’s business and to “connect.” The problem is that people see right through that. They know that you have an ulterior motive, and then you’re right back up against The Wall.

These ideas may be hard for you to apply to your own situation at first because trying to leverage calls based on what we know about our solution is so engrained in our thinking.

If you stay with it, though, you can learn to step out of your own solution and convert it into a problem that you can articulate using your prospects’ language.

And that’s the secret of building trust on calls. It’s the missing link in the whole process of cold calling.

6. Recognize and Diffuse Hidden Pressures

Hidden sales pressures that makes The Wall go up can take a lot of forms.

For example, “enthusiasm” can send the message that you’re assuming that what you have is the right fit for the prospect. That can send pressure over the phone to your prospect.

You must be able to engage people in a natural conversation. Think of it as calling a friend. Let your voice be natural, calm, relaxed…easy-going. If you show enthusiasm on your initial call, you’ll probably trigger the hidden sales pressure that triggers your prospect to reject you.

Another element of hidden pressure is trying to control the call and move it to a “next step”.

The moment you begin trying to direct your prospect into your “sales process”, there is a very high likelihood that you can “turn off” your prospect’s willingness to share with you the details of their situation.

It’s important to allow the conversation to evolve naturally and to have milestones or checkpoints throughout your call so you can assess if there is a fit between you and the person you are speaking with.

7. Determine a Fit

Now, suppose that you’re on a call and it’s going well, with good dialogue going back and forth. You’re reaching a natural conclusion…and what happens?

In the old way of cold calling, we panic.  We feel we’re going to lose the opportunity, so we try to close the sale or at least to book an appointment. But this puts pressure on the prospect, and you run the risk of The Wall going up again.

Here’s a step that most people miss when they cold call. As soon as they realize that prospects have a need for their solution, they start thinking, “Great, that means they’re interested.”

What they don’t ask is, “Is this need a top priority for you or your organization to solve, or is it something that’s on the back burner for a while?”

In other words, even if you both determine that there ia a problem you can solve, you have to ask whether solving it is a priority. Sometimes there’s no budget, or it isn’t the right time. It’s important that you find this out, because months later you’ll regret not knowing this earlier. 

Putting the Pieces Together

Have you ever wondered where the “numbers game” concept came from?

It came from someone making a call, getting rejected, and the boss saying, “Call someone else.” 

But with the new way of cold calling, it’s not about how many people you call. It’s about what you say and how you come across.

Do you remember the definition of insanity—continuing to do the same thing but expecting different results?

If you go on using the same old cold calling methods, you’ll go on experiencing the ever-increasing pain of selling.

But if you adopt a new approach and learn how to remove pressure from your initial cold calls, you’ll experience so much success and satisfaction that it’ll really change the way you do business, bring you sales success beyond your imagination—and eliminate “rejection” from your vocabulary for good.

Ari Galper, founder of Unlock The Game, makes cold calling painless and simple. Learn his free cold calling secrets even the sales gurus don’t know. To receive your 10 free audio mini-lessons visit www.UnlockTheGame.com

7 Ways to Cut Loose from Old Sales Thinking

By Ari Galper, Founder of Unlock The Game™

Sooner or later, we all backslide into old ways of thinking about selling that lead us down the wrong path with potential clients.

A few weeks ago, I had a phone conversation with Julie, who has been struggling with the old-style selling methods that her manager insists are the only way to sell their company’s technology solution.

Regardless of what product or service you’re selling, you should be able to relate to her dilemma.

Outdated sales skills fail to address the core issue of how we think about selling and unless we get to that core and change it once and for all, we’ll go on struggling with the same counterproductive sales behaviors.

And we’ll continue believing that we’re always just one new sales technique away from the breakthrough we’re looking for.

New Thinking = New Results

Maybe it’s time to take a different approach. Maybe we need to analyze our thinking and identify why we’re not making more sales.

How would your selling behaviors change if you changed your sales thinking?

Let’s take a closer look at these concepts so you can begin to open up your current sales thinking and become more effective in your selling efforts.

1. Stop the sales pitch. Start a conversation.

When you call someone, never start out with a mini-presentation about yourself, your company, and what you have to offer.

Instead, start with a conversational phrase that focuses on a specific problem that your product or service solves. For example, you might say, “I’m just calling to see if you are open to some different ideas related to preventng downtime accross your computer network?“

Notice that you are not pitching your solution with this opening phrase. Instead, you’re addressing a problem that, based on your experience in your field, you believe they might be having. (If you don’t know what problems your product or service solves, do a little research by asking your current customers why they purchased your solution.)

2. Your goal is always to discover whether you and your prospect are a good fit.

If you let go of trying to close the sale or get the appointment, you’ll discover that you don’t have to take responsibility for moving the sales process forward.

By simply focusing your conversation on problems that you can help prospects solve, and by not jumping the gun by trying to move the sales process forward, you’ll discover that prospects will give you the direction you need.

3. When you lose a sale, it’s usually at the beginning of the sales process.

If you think you’re losing sales due to mistakes you make at the end of the process, review how you began the relationship. Did you start with a pitch?

Did you use traditional sales language (“We have a solution that you really need” or “Others in your industry have bought our solution, you should consider it as well”)?

Traditional sales language leads prospects to label you with the negative stereotype of “salesperson.” This makes it almost impossible for them to relate to you with trust or to have an honest, open conversation about problems they’re trying to solve and how you might be  able to help them.

4. Hidden sales pressure causes rejection. Eliminate sales pressure, and you’ll never experience rejection.

Prospects don’t trigger rejection. You do — when something you say, and it could be very subtle, triggers a defensive reaction from your prospect.

Yes, something you say.

You can eliminate rejection forever simply by giving up the hidden agenda of hoping to make a sale. Instead, be sure that everything you say and do stems from the basic mindset that you’re there to help prospects identify and solve their issues.

5. Never chase prospects. Instead, get to the truth of whether there’s a fit or not.

Chasing prospects has always been considered normal and necessary, but it’s rooted in the macho selling image that “If you don’t keep chasing, you’re giving up, which means you’re a failure.“ This is dead wrong. 

Instead, ask your prospects if they’d be open to connecting again at a certain time and date so you can both avoid the phone tag game.

6. When prospects offer objections, validate them and reopen the conversation.

Most traditional sales programs spend a lot of time focusing on “overcoming” objections, but these tactics only create more sales pressure.

They also keep you from exploring or learning the truth behind what your prospects are saying.

You know that “We don’t have the budget,” “Send me information,” or “Call me back in a few months,” are polite evasions designed to get you off the phone. Stop trying to counter objections. Instead, shift to uncovering the truth by replying, “That’s not a problem.” No matter what the objection, use gentle, dignified language that invites prospects to tell you the truth about their situation without feeling you’ll use it to press for a sale.

7. Never defend yourself or what you have to offer. This only creates more sales pressure.

When prospects say, “Why should I choose you over your competition?,” your instinctive reaction is to defend your product or service because you believe that you are the best choice, and you want to convince them of that. But what goes through their minds at that point?

Something like, “This ‘salesperson’ is trying to sell me, and I hate feeling as if I’m being sold.”

Stop defending yourself. In fact, come right out and tell them that you aren’t going to try to convince them of anything because that only creates sales pressure. Instead, ask them again about key problems they’re trying to solve.

Then explore how your product or service might solve those problems. Give up trying to persuade. Let prospects feel they can choose you without feeling sold.

The sooner you can let go of the traditional sales beliefs that we’ve all been exposed to, the more quickly you’ll feel good about selling again, and start seeing better results.

Ari Galper, founder of Unlock The Game, makes cold calling painless and simple. Learn his free cold calling secrets even the sales gurus don’t know. To receive your 10 free audio mini-lessons visit www.UnlockTheGame.com 

Developing Neural Pathways

Word up,

Had an interesting chat with my friend Vince on the way home tonight.

We were talking about forming new habits.

In this case I was telling him about how long it had taken me to write a proposal.
I was about a month into doing this work. To be honest I had been putting it off for the simple reason of not knowing how to do it.

Anyway, this week I made the effort to get it done and off my desk.

It took a long time but I got there and learned along the way.

But this is where neural pathways come in.

You see that first proposal took me a month.
BUT…

If I had to do another proposal I reckon I could knock it out in a day now.

WHY?

Because I have the neural pathway in my head that allows me to get it done quickly and easily now.

The task is no longer in the unknown. I know what I need to do. The good chemicals flow in my head.

You brain will automatically take the path of least resistance to get things done.

So if you are struggle with something and it is bothering you, block out some time to just sit and get it done.

Create neural pathways that will help you in the future!

Big love

Jon

Cold Calling Tip 1: How To Respond To “We’re Not Interested”

Evening all,

Having made many hundreds of cold calls in my career I noticed several trends calls go down where I get certain responses.

After bombing out miserably and just giving up at the first obstacle earlier in my career, I have now developed a challenging auto reply mechanism to get past any initial challenges.

The first block I am going to share with you is when the person at the other end of the phone says “We’re not interested”

Step 1 for me is to always say “That’s not a problem”. 

I got that line from Ari Gapler. I watched a video by him once where he said it is important to always diffuse an objection straight away and the magic words to do that is to say “That’s not a problem”. That’s from Ari’s Unlock The Game program.

To be honest, I have never questioned why it works as it just does so I continued to do it whenever I get an objection. 

Say it calmly, the other person stays calm and it gives me a few seconds breathing space to think of what I will say in step 2.

So step 2 in this case I would normally say “What exactly are you not interested in?”

This works great with a prospect who is just trying to block you before you make your pitch. Most the time this line means they respond by asking what you are selling and allows you to engage in further conversation. 

You will receive more obstacles but I will cover my typical responses in one blog post at a time!

So when are prospect says “We’re not interested”, calmly respond with “That’s not a problem, what exactly are you not interested in?”

Try it and let me know how it works out for you!

Big love

Jon

P.S If you enjoyed this tip please do feel free to add a comment or retweet or like on Facebook for me

P.S.S If you check out Ari Galper’s Unlock The Game he is offer a 10 part audio course full of cold calling tips. I recommend checking that out. Click Here

The 5 Proven Ways To Generate Leads

Everyday I imagine you are being bombarded with the latest ways to get more leads into your business.

At the end of the day, there are 5 proven ways to generate leads.

You do not need to follow all the latest fads. You just need to pick your strategy and stick to it.

When you have a plan, that you can measure, you will get results.

When you get results, you can make tweaks to get even better results.

So lets go back to basics a little here….

…let’s re-visit the 5 proven ways to generate leads into a business.

1) Sell More To Your Current Customers:

The easiest way to get more leads is to go speak to your current customers and find out how they are doing. Ask them what problems they are having and see what opportunities come up for you to add value. The more you build the relationship, the more the customer will be happy to work with you.

2) Buy A Targeted List And Do A Direct Response Mailing Shot with Telemarketing Following Up:

You know who your perfect customers are. And you know you just need to talk to these people so they will discover how you can add value to whatever they are having problems with. Get a decent targeted list and sent out a direct response mail shot. This is not where you try and flog them something, you just want them to respond and contact you so you can build a relationship. 

Now the success of a mail shot is about 3% on average so that leaves you 97% to follow up on as you have warmed them up a bit. Be realistic though. Many of the contacts will not have seen your initial mail shot as it is likely to have gone straight in the bin. A good direct response message will capture their imagination and get their attention.

3) Learn How To Online Marketing Properly:

You website is their to earn you money, either directly from sales or indirectly as it allows you to capture contact details in order to follow up and build a relationship. If your website does neither then bin it and go learn how to do it properly. This will save you money in the long term on pointless ineffective web marketing efforts.

4) Advertise In Relevent Publications:

You should know what type of publications your perfect customers are interested in and read on a regular basis. If you know what the publication is straight away, it is a good sign it is worth advertising in. Again use a direct response approach to your advert. The aim should be to get people to contact you so you can build a relationship. 

5) Referrals

If you have genuinely added value to your customer, then you should have created a raving fan who is happy to refer you. Do not leave it to chance though. Make referrals a condition of doing business with you. Be upfront that you expect referrals if they are happy with you. Chances are your customer hangs out with other people with the same problems so make sure you make them spread the good word.

Right, there you go. Five proven ways to generate leads. None of is rocket science but as always, the simplest plans are normally the best.

Have you got another proven lead generation technique you want to share? Leave a comment and let me know!

Big love

Jon

What I love about sales

A lot of people shy away from having do any type of selling.

For me, I love it. 

I get a massive buzz from helping people find the solutions they need to move forward in both life and in business.

It wasn’t always that way.

I remember a senior manager earlier in my career telling me I was a brilliant analyst but would never make it in sales.

Two years later I had a nice shiny trophy that said otherwise!

My sales career took off when I stopped thinking about me and my reputation in the office, and started putting my customers first.

I realised if I took the time to find out about what problems my customer had, and offered a value added solution that helped them instead of ramming my services down their throat….

…I started getting customers buying more from me…repeat sales.

Whilst my main back ground is in the Energy Industry, I have gone on to sell in many other markets. 

From teaching men how to lose man breast, to helping teens find a cure for pimples right though to men needing help with romantic pick up lines.

By doing my research,  was able to find markets with hungry crowds of customers needing help…

And helping them…well that is what I love about sales.

Jon

Sick Days At A Record Low

Evening,

Found this interesting article on the Daily Mail website today about how the average number of sick days taken by employees in 2010 was the lowest its has been in a long time.

READ: Record Low Sick Days

This was pretty surprising to me as in times where a lack of pay rises have often been the norm, I would expect more people to try and skive of and take back what they can.

The complete opposite appears to have happened though.

It is a mixture of employees being scared of being made redundant so they are making more effort to be seen to be a hard working good value employee and the rest is the good old British spirit of sticking together as a team through the rough patches.

So what were the top two sicknesses that dropped….stress and back pain…

What do you think about that?

Big love

Jon

NLP and Anchoring

I am a big fan of NLP.

Using NLP really helped me to learn about myself and getting better results in everything I am doing.

I was watching a show on MTV last night called “I Used To Be Fat” and the trainer Joey Gloor showed how to do anchoring in a really cool way by developing his Power Stance and BOOM technique.

I love it…

Watch the video to see Joey demonstrating THE BOOM.

http://youtu.be/JVxeFTbBaSc

Just look at the results the young man got….

Big love
Jon

The money is in the non active prospects

One of the big things I have learned in my sales career is the difference between active and non active prospects.

Many people will focus on active prospects only.

These are the prospects who know they have a problem and are actively seeking a solution.

Sounds fair enough and sensible right?

Well it is not actually!

Active prospects count for about 5% of total market potential.

That leaves a whooping 95% of the market for someone like me to come in and focus on building relationships with non-active prospects.

By just talking to these non active people I can understand what is going on for them right now.

I can build trust.

I can recommend solutions to problems they didn’t know they had.

This is where competing on price becomes irrelevant.
You can leave battling on price to the desperate strugglers.

Focus on how you can add value to anyone you talk too.

Be the expert help that gives them more than what they had before meeting you!

And the more you do this, the more you attract from the non active market.

Big love

Jon

Jon Daniels | Sales Boss | 07778 521759

Seven Daily Sins

Found this article on the Daily Mail website this morning…

…it says there are seven daily sins we commit that are not actually good for us…

SEVEN DAILY SINS

It appears having a shower, brushing your teeth and cleaning are bad for me so I will stop straight away!

I will retain with the habit of sitting on the loo though…

…I am not ready to go squat in the woods.

What do you think of this article?

Big love

Jon