01. Why don’t my leads answer the phone?
Is it a lead quality issue? No. The issue is that it’s not the 80s anymore. Nowadays people barely answer calls. Why? We live in an age of robocaller scams. According to the Pew Research Center, currently only 19% of Americans answer calls from unknown numbers.
02. How should I contact my leads?
There’s many ways to communicate, so you’ll need to adjust to using alternative more modern communication methods that create less friction for the customer.
SMS/Text
Make sure to be brief and to the point. This is not the place to write an entire bible. Carefully craft your message for the best chance of response. Choose a CRM that features SMS App integration so you can effectively send and receive text messages.
- 95% of text messages are read within 3 minutes
- 90% percent of customers prefer text messages over direct phone calls
- SMS has a 19% higher CTR compared to 4% for emails.
E-mail still performs better than calls
A well designed HTML e-mail and carefully crafted subject line can do wonders in terms of performance.
You should still call, just don’t expect many people to answer.
03. Speed
Contact leads right away.
04. (6) is The Magic Number
You should always make at least (6) contact attempts for each lead by SMS, e-mail, and calling.
You also should make at least (6) sales attempts
“Too many sales professionals view objections as obstacles, when they should instead view them as opportunities,” says Hal Becker in his book, Can I Have Five Minutes of Your Time?. Becker, a former top salesman for Xerox, says that 63% of sales are made after the fifth rejection.
“You need to hear five no’s before you hear a yes,” Becker writes. Unfortunately, he notes, 75% of all salespeople give up after their first rejection.
This was written long before the time of Cell Phones and even Caller ID. So keep this in mind as we are in a time where people prefer not to answer their phone for unknown callers due to the robocaller epidemic.
05. Use a Sales Script
Contact the leaders in the industry to see how they close deals. Hit them with all the rebuttals you can’t seem to get get past and see how they handle them.
Download a free leaked sales script from one of the top companies in the industry!
06. Quality E-mail Design is More Important Than Ever
It’s more important than ever to e-mail leads. Many people simply don’t like giving out their phone number, and prefer to be contacted via e-mail. Don’t just send them a basic text e-mail… invest in a professionally designed e-mail. At the very least use an e-mail template.
07. You Never Get a Second Chance to Make a Great First Impression
This applies not only to your e-mail, but your logo, brand, web site and any other materials your customer sees. Again, invest in the services of a professional designer for your materials or at the very least use templates. If you DIY, and create materials in Microsoft Word for example, potential customers will notice, and it will decrease your chances of converting. Even a small detail such as having an unprofessional sounding company name can harm your sales performance in a big way.