A Quick Way to Find More Prospects in a Down Economy
April 11th, 2008In a pending recession, the question always comes up on how to find more qualified prospects since a business will need more prospects in order to close the sale. Since businesses spend less money in a recession, you will need more prospects in order to keep your business at its current revenue levels.
The best sales prospecting system is one that is inexpensive and brings immediate results. As the economy turns down, you need to react quickly, and have a plan in order to insure that revenue levels continue to grow to meet your sales objectives. Some businesses that are successful during a good economy can suddenly find themselves in a near bankruptcy situation if they do not improve their sales process and sales prospecting methods during a recession.
Recession pressures means that the quality of our targeted list becomes even more important. There are excellent sources for targeted lists on the internet and many are highly reliable while others may be as much as 40% bad. These bad contacts simply waste marketing and sales dollars, so focus on using a quality list.
One way to get quality lead names is through the use of Splash Pages or what is more commonly called and Landing Page on the Internet where the prospect fills out a form for more information. Typically the form will be filled out in order to get what is called a “Permission Marketing” piece or access to a White Paper.
One technique that has become popular for warming up a prospect is to send a postcard or a greeting card prior to the phone call from the salesperson. There are several services that you can use to electronically send out these post cards or cards through the US Postal Service. All you have to do is to upload your prospect list and then select the card to send and it will send it out immediately in your own handwriting.
It is critical, before making any follow-up calls on a lead from a Landing Page, that a script be setup that can be roll played and will cause the prospect to do most of the talking in order for the salesperson to determine if the prospect is a good fit. This is normally done with a Question Oriented Sales Process.
When Cold Calling a list it is important that you not sound like a telemarketer or a salesperson. If you do you will likely trigger sales pressure and the call will end quickly with a “I am not interested”, or “we have what we need”.
One area of concern is the Fear of Self Promotion or what is also called Call Reluctance. One can overcome Call Reluctance or fear of making cold calls by understanding how to control the subconscious mind. The use of a Sales Process Coach is important for quickly getting over the fear of making calls to strangers.