I just had a distasteful experience on the phone it was a great lesson in how to kill a sale! Has salesmanship died? What’s happened to curtsey? Is respect obsolete? Are we no longer polite?
Before we moved to Houston we’d sold our condo in Las Vegas and put our furnishing in storage. When we got here I was not up to returning to Nevada, today things are different. With that in mind I’ve been getting quotes on moving the remaining to Houston.
I’ve been checking alternatives on and off the net and on the phone. A friend suggested that company that delivers a shipping container to your door for loading then moves it to your new site! What a great idea, it’s going to take me a week or more just to sort things the idea that I could sort then load as I go is great.
I went on line. The site said get a quote. I filled in the information. I pushed "get a quote" the screen flashed "Thank you. Call 877-555-XXX" Now I preach that web sites, business cards and advertising have only one purpose: get the prospective client talking to a salesman! So I called.
I have no idea how many calls they get or what it cost to get those calls, but like most business it must be substantial! What does it cost you for each call? For each conversion from an inquiry to an appointment? More importantly from inquire to a sale?
Advertising real estate doesn’t cost nearly what it use to, but if you consider your time it’s still extremely substantial! When I left the bank to sell real estate my first broker tracked cost and calls recived, they could tell you what each call cost and it’s conversion to sales! Each salesman knew how many in coming calls it took to get a first appointment (3) for sales and how many out going cold calls (20) to get a listing! Yes, we were that good! What newbes and competitors couldn’t accept is that these were averages you couldn’t make just 20 calls an except a listing, but if you made 200 calls you could except 10 listings, 2,000 clod calls and you’d except 100 listings! That’s 2 listings a week for only 8 to 10 hours selective soliciting. (More on cold calling for success another time. For now let’s just say it was more like "luke warn calling.")
Considering your investment in each call can you or any company afford to waste them with inept people skills?
Considering your investment isn’t it time to put some time considering your phone manners?
Considering your investment isn’t it time to spend some time considering your purpose in answering that phone?
Considering your investment isn’t it time to put some time consider your conversion rate?
Consider what even a small improvement in phone skills could do!
Back in October 2006 I wrote A Little Sales Blog It’s a simple start.
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