Six Big Voicemail Mistakes and How To Avoid Them!
Copyright 2006, By Rosalie Marcus Rosalie@promobizcoach.com http://www.promobizcoach.com/
http://www.promobizwoman.com

Those of you that have taken classes with me know that I believe cold calls are one of the least effective ways to get new business, but regardless of whether you make cold calls or not, you'll still need to use the phone to return messages, call suppliers and contact referrals. Below are six things to avoid when leaving a voice mail message and how to easily correct them!

1. Rambling. Decide what you want to say ahead of time. The fastest route for your prospects and clients to hit the the delete key is to leave a long, rambling message. Practice what you want to say before you make that important call, and keep it short and to the point.

2. Talking too fast. This is especially important if you're leaving a telephone number. Speak slowly, but with authority. Leave your telephone number twice; once at the beginning of the message and once at the end.

3. Being self-serving. Here's the cold, hard truth; the prospect you're trying to contact doesn't care about you or your company, but they do care about the RESULTS your company can get for them. Instead of saying: I'm calling to introduce myself and my company say I'm calling because I help companies like yours decrease lost time accidents...Increase trade show traffic...build brand awareness quickly and I've got some great ideas I'd like to share with you. You get the idea!

4. Not asking permission. If, per chance, a live person does pick up the phone, the first thing you need to know is if this is good time to speak. Nothing will turn off a prospect faster than a salesperson calling at a bad time. Always, get permission to proceed first.

5. Being defensive. Not everyone is a good prospect for you. Don't take it personally be polite and move on if you get someone that is clearly not interested. Pushy and aggressive sales techniques went out with the last century!

6. Giving up too soon. Here's another cold, hard truth. Most people won't return your call, but that doesn't mean they're not interested; they're just busy. Use your intuition. When a prospect has good potential there's no reason to stop trying. Just space your calls, and make your messages enticing. And if the phone messages you're leaving aren't getting the results you want, try contacting in a variety of different ways. A personal letter, a spec sample, an interesting article with some useful information may get a better response.

Have a comment about this posting?

What's your biggest voice mail frustration?

How have you gotten past the voice mail barrier?

I'd love to hear from you!

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All comments are welcome!
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About ROSALIE MARCUS:
Professional sales coach, speaker and author Rosalie Marcus is the creator of the Ultimate Profit Boosting Program, a comprehensive Program For Making More Money in Promotional Products Sales!

Rosalie specializes in helping new and emerging promotional products sales professionals boost their sales, increase their income and work smarter, not harder!
Reach her at: Rosalie@promobizcoach.com or 215-572-6766