Sales Prospecting Perspectives

For those of us that need to work over the next few weeks, please don’t assume that your teleprospecting effort is a lost cause. Don’t get me wrong, the last two weeks of December can be notoriously more difficult than most trying to run a cold calling/marketing campaign. Chances of getting any C-level executive live during that period seem to go down dramatically since they’re probably off at their ski chalet hobnobbing with high society.

It is unfortunate but we do resign ourselves to the perceived fact that we will not be able to get a hold of anyone over the holidays. While I understand that there may be more people out of the office than we would like, there are actually some that DO work this time of year. Someone has to work while the mucky-mucks are off at their chalet.  We also can benefit from the fact that they generally should have the time to speak with you since their days won’t be packed with back-to-back meetings.

So this time of year give some thought to changing it up a bit. Put your first calls into Directors and below. I’m not saying your should completely scrap the top-down approach, but if you’re interested in increasing the chances of having healthy conversations don’t be afraid to place your initial dials into a manager or supervisor level title.

Another thing  we should be focused on is getting our 2011 propsecting lists in order. It seems we generally tend to put this off for the first few weeks of January rather than getting it taken care of now.  Pull the important criteria together (vertical, title, annual revenue) and hit it with an intro mass email over the next few days.

The email doesn’t have to be anything more than this:

Hi Mr./Mrs. Prospect,

I realize the holiday’s can be hectic for all of us. I spend much of my time speaking with executives in similar positions as yours and realize how full your calendar must be closing out Q4 and planning new campaigns to ensure a strong start to FY11. 

Our clients utilize our services to identify and develop fully qualified, high revenue sales opportunities rather than loosely qualified appointments.  These opportunities move through the sales cycle much faster and close at a much higher rate. 

I would like to schedule 5 minutes for us to talk if you happen to be in the office over the next week, I’d love to learn more about your organization's current lead qualification and pipeline development efforts and determine together how our teleprospecting services can help you meet your future objectives. As I mentioned I realize it’s a busy time of year, so if the first week of January is better, since most of us are taking time off for the holidays, please let me know what time will work best for you that week.

Looking forward to hearing from you. 

Best,

Craig

Our response rate to this email has been much higher than we expected. It’s been an indicator to us that when you are always conscious of your prospects time you will get a response regardless of the time of year. Timing is everything. It is important to get onto your prospects radar NOW, especially as they are thinking about their 2011 initiatives. (Or if they’re, not they should be!) Don’t wait till the first week of January to get in front of them.

We all need to find creative ways of talking with our target prospects in general but especially over the holidays. Start putting your action plan together now, so that you can get a jump start to building your pipeline for 2011.