Sales Prospecting Perspectives

Sales Prospecting Perspectives is pleased to bring you a guest blog from Greg Klingshirn, Content Marketing Manager at SalesLoft. 

Cold calls are the bread and butter of successful sales development reps. But what about the times you call and don’t get an answer? Leaving a message is a hard starting point to a demo or qualified appointment.

Instead of being dejected when you don’t get an answer, use it to your advantage. When you’re confident in voicemail, prospects that don’t answer can be your silver bullet.

Leave a voicemail to remember with these five tips:

Next month marks an important milestone not only in my career at AG, but in my career in general.  This October I will have completed my first year as an inside sales manager.  It has been a busy year at AG, with many new faces, new clients and new challenges, as I transitioned from making calls to managing those who do.  A few years ago I wrote a blog outlining lessons I had learned after one year as an inside sales rep, and I am glad to reprise that entry to now include lessons from a management perspective.  

If you’re in sales, a lot of your time is spent on the phone -- outbound prospecting, inbound qualifying, cold calling, you name it. You may have a list of questions you want to ask your prospect, and you may have a roadmap for the direction you want your conversation to go. However, what happens when your prospect doesn’t answer the phone?

You’ll need to leave a voicemail that doesn’t get ignored or deleted immediately. If the average voicemail response rate is 4.8% according to InsideSales, how can you generate enough interest in prospects that they call you back?

The other day, I encountered one of the rudest and pushiest sales people I’ve ever come across. No, it wasn’t a used car salesman, and no, it wasn’t one of those ladies at the perfume counter who sprays before asking.

Surprisingly, it was someone from a very reputable technology company looking to sell us additional services.

Here’s how the conversation went:

Sales Prospecting Perspectives is pleased to bring you a guest post from Gareth Goh, Content Marketing Manager of InsightSquared.

Inbound, inbound, inbound.

Inbound sales, inbound marketing - it seems like that’s the only strategy that sales leaders depend on these days to generate leads and grow pipeline. And they should be focused on inbound! After all, the concept of inbound - aligning sales and marketing with the buyer’s intent and process, attracting them to you rather than pushing yourself on them - works. HubSpot pioneered the concept of Inbound Marketing and they have now built an entire industry around it. Buyers are becoming smarter and more sophisticated - they don’t need aggressive sales reps pushing products that they don’t want on them.

But wait! What about outbound prospecting?

Sales Prospecting Perspectives is pleased to bring you a post from Michaela Cheevers, Business Development Representative at AG Salesworks.

As a business development representative, it is important to make every contact attempt count in order to provide your client with the best information possible. Inside sales reps have the same imperative: maximize time by qualifying prospects creatively. That being said, it’s crucial to be prepared when communicating with anyone in your quest for information. No matter who you get live on the phone, chances are they can provide you with some information; you just need to be equipped with the right questions to ask. Here are some ideas for inside sales and business development reps to find opportunities for quality conversations, no matter where you find yourself in the prospecting trenches.

In the world of teleprospecting, many thought leaders are debating the efficacy of new and old techniques. With more and more sales leaders implementing new strategies, it's important for inside sales rep to keep up with the trends. However, don't feel you have to choose one technique and stick to it. Instead, learn to balance your techniques and manage your lists. Social selling is time-consuming, and it cuts out the ability to speak to prospects for a lengthy amount of time about their pains and needs, but it could lead to stronger opportunities. You may find that your team has more activity from the smile and dial method, but without some social intelligence behind these calls, those leads could be dead ends. Below are three things to consider when using commonly used prospecting techniques to find the balance that works right for you.

Sales Prospecting Perspectives is pleased to bring you a post from Taylor Lacey, a Business Development Representative at AG Salesworks.

What do you picture when you hear the word "nurture?"

Many people may think of a plant "nurtured" to full health. In inside sales, potential customers can also be nurtured. If they aren't a good fit now, does that mean they will always be unqualified for your product or service? Or can they slowly become a lead by means of a strong lead nurturing campaign? 

We’ve all seen the contact who doesn’t quite fit the qualifying criteria and is automatically added to the nurture bucket. These are three important tips to remember when nurturing prospects.