10 – January 10
“Everything you want is out there waiting for you to ask. Everything you want also wants you. But you have to take action to get it.”—Jack Canfield
As a single person working alone in my own seminar and public speaking business, I send out ships on a daily basis. Some are medium-sized cargo ships like speaking at a networking meeting where I can meet many potential clients. Appearing on television or speaking at a national conference are large cruise ships. Writing this book was an aircraft carrier! But my bread and butter canoes are follow-up telephone calls to people I’ve met who are interested in my work. I close all of my sales on the telephone so I know that “The money is in the phone.” To remind myself of this, I spray-painted my telephone gold. I paint my fingernails gold, too. It’s a mnemonic device, reminding me that the riches I desire are often just a phone call away. It’s not “Cold Calling,” it’s “Gold Calling!”
Follow-up phone calling is a discipline. I work alone at home, and often people will ask me how I stay focused on work with all the distractions that are possible. You know, the laundry, personal chores, housekeeping, food, Oprah. (Oops, well I do watch Oprah—she’s terrific—and I plan my afternoon break for that. And I hate laundry, so that’s no distraction.) But for the most part, it’s easy to stay focused on my job. All I have to do is pay some bills. When there’s no more money, I remember that “The money is in the phone.” I get busy and call potential clients.
Where is your money? If you’re a business owner or in sales, your money is in the phone. If you’re employed, you sold your boss on hiring you. Ask your boss where she thinks the money is in your business. Pay most attention to your tasks at work that produce income. Businesses must make money to survive and pay you—how can you help them make more money more efficiently?
Focus on sending out the ships that bring in the treasure.
Today’s Affirmation:
“My phone is ringing off the hook with people calling to give me money!”
People avoid the phone in droves. Either they don’t know that’s where the gold is, or it’s just too scary to reach out to someone they don’t know. (They want the gold to be in the email, but like direct marketing, the sales results from that are 1%. Not enough.)
Once I talked with a woman who had been a regular at one of my networking meetings but then stopped coming. When I called and asked her why, she said the group didn’t work for her – she never got any business from it.
“How many meetings did you go to?” I asked.
“I went to one every month,” she replied. (Only one?)
“Did you call people after the meeting?” I inquired.
“No,” she said. “If they wanted my services, they would call me.”
I knew she wouldn’t be in business for long.
Let me give you a tip: They aren’t going to call you.
Why? Because they have a life, they have priorities, they need clients themselves, they have another appointment, it’s their mother’s birthday, they have to wash their hair. You and your stuff are way down at the bottom of their priority list. Even if what you have is what they most need and close to the top of their list, they aren’t going to call you. They have fears. They have objections: You’re going to charge too much, they really should remodel their house first, it’s their daughter’s birthday tomorrow, maybe you aren’t really the best one for the project, it’s too far to drive, they’d have to convince their Significant Other and that might mean an argument and that would lead to problems and oh it’s just easier to forget the whole thing…
And you don’t call them, because you don’t want to hear all their objections. You want to hear “Yes!” so much! But not as much as you are afraid of hearing “No.”
And those who do make calls often do them badly. They just PITCH themselves and their services instead of finding out about the other person and seeing if they can help them. Don’t you just hate sales pitches that start out, “Let me tell you about the wonderful (blank) I do”? The are all me, me, me, I, I, I, blah, blah, blah…
So most small business owners continue to network, send out emails, and don’t get the results they want, and make a lot less money than they deserve. They never took a sales training about what to say when they pick up the golden phone.
But wait, you might be thinking. Phone calls are old technology. Can’t I just get all my customers through advertising on Facebook, Twitter, and sending emails?
No.
Not if it’s just more pitching.
Oh, you can get some. You can get followers, you can get readers, and eventually some of them will turn into clients. But the truth that no one wants to tell you is that it’s a very low percentage and it’s really slow. Don’t you get hundreds of emails, tweets, and posts every day? Do you read them all? Do you know the average open rate of an email newsletter is only 10-15%? Your copy had better be really great and you’d better have thousands of people on your list if you’re going to rely on that.
The real secret to Social networking online is the same as physical networking in person – you have to create relationships. And you don’t do that by endless pitching. The tweets and posts have to engage the reader, reveal yourself and what you’re about, show your caring and expertise.
I call this “Sending Out Ships” (so that some day your ship will come in). Here’s an example:
Lucy, an attorney in Texas, a participant in my last Financial Stress Reduction® Workshop teleclass, said she had signed up for my newsletter, read them for months, then signed up for my 365 daily pages from The Wealthy Spirit. As she read them each day, so many of them spoke to her that she started printing them out and putting them in a notebook. When she got so many the notebook was messy, she decided to just buy the book. When I announced in my newsletter that I was having a free teleclass “Confidence, Charisma, and Cash” she signed up for it and listened. She wrote me to say thank you and that she enjoyed every minute of it, and she was interested in signing up for my workshop. That’s when I called her and closed the sale.
So when you do get a call from someone who is interested in your product or service, how are you going to convince them that you are the one they should work with? Do you know what to say to close the deal when they are really interested but they have objections? Like time and money and I-have- to-wash-my-hair?
What are the secrets to having wonderful, engaging phone conversations with prospective clients that result in higher ticket sales?
If you would like to learn my simple, friendly, engaging techniques for making warm calls that result in new friends, new strategic partnerships, and lots more new clients, take a look at my 8-week Financial Stress Reduction teleclasses – click here http://www.chellie.com/financial-stress-reduction-telecourse-information.html for information.
Or you can pick up your golden phone and call me at 310-476-1622!
