Five things to remember when making outbound sales calls

1.    Be ready to clearly introduce yourself within seconds. 

Yes, this sounds obvious, but we have seen entrepreneurs and sales teams falter on the first line of the first call. You need to deliver your introduction confidently, clearly and without any hesitation. It's the start of your relationship, so think about how you describe yourself. At one sales training we held for a group of Sales Development Reps (SDRs) at a global business, we worked with them to reframe and rename how they described themselves and they increased the engagement of their initial outbound calls.

Hello [their name], my name is [full name] and I’m [role or responsibility] with [business name].

 2. Ask to speak with the right person

If your call goes through to a receptionist, gatekeeper or someone who is not the decision maker or contact you want to speak to, you need to be ready to ask to be transferred. Make it a simple statement to ask to be transferred. As in: “Please can you transfer me to [person name or role]. ”

It's important to think about how you are phrasing this - it seems subtle but your are not asking for permission, you are simply asking to speak with someone. So don’t say: “Do you think you could you transfer me?" You must sound confident, and avoid a tone or language which may come across as unsure, lacking confidence. Be confident and use a polite tone to ask to be transferred.

 If you are struggling with your first conversation, remember to simply be human and ask for help. Again, it sounds obvious but it’s something we frequently see overlooked:

3.    Be ready to talk about the big problem you solve.

The one that keeps your prospect awake at night. It’s sometimes known as the ‘bleeding neck problem.’ And frame it with the results you achieve. Note: Be as specific as possible in the results you achieve, the time you achieved those results in. For example, saying: “We helped ACME Inc. to increase their employee retention rate by 50% within six months” is better than saying: “We help companies to increase their employee retention.”

4.     Be prepared to say WHY you're calling

Whatever the sales stage of your call: cold, lukewarm, warm or hot -you should be clear in your mind WHY you are calling. For your own direction, you should have a clear call objective - is this to book a longer call or a meeting, to verify some information, offer an audit, share a report, ask someone to an event or webinar, or book a demo. For the purpose of the prospect, you also need to be able to show the relevance and context of why you are calling. For example:  “I'm calling because we help [type of companies or businesses] to [problem you solve]," or "We just completed a project working with [company in their field] and [produced these results -be specific] and I’d like to see if you'd be interested to hear about how we did this and if it's relevant to your company.” If you have some specific insight, then show this, for example: “From what I know about your company from [source – their website, the news, company brochure, their social media ] I have some suggestions that could really help you to [achieve a specific result, work on an initiative, ] and I’d like to share them.”

Then ask them to join you for another call, to join your event - whatever the call objective is. But be sure to highlight the relevance and your expertise first.

5.    DON’T PANIC

Many entrepreneurs panic about making sales calls because they think they have to ‘sell' on the call. But your initial call is to start to build a relationship, introduce yourself and to secure a more-detailed discussion – which is all about solving problems. So be yourself, be interested in what the other person is saying, and don't panic.

Want to talk about how I can help you plan your sales conversations? Follow this link, and let's talk>> https://my.timetrade.com/book/23J2C