Every business needs clients. Every business starts with no clients. So when you arrive at your office on day one you will need to get clients for your new business.
You sit in your chair, open the phone book and finger scan for clients. Your speech has been perfected by practicing it on your family. They all think it is convincing and when it ends they enthusiastically commit to whatever you are selling. You are confident. You dial the number, clear your throat and wait for the pickup. “Hello can I speak to the person in charge of widgets.” “That’s me, how can I help you?”
As you go through your sales spiel, the person on the other side of the line is either thinking whether to hang up, or to stay on the line and pretend to listen. Either way, you are not getting through – they do not care and are not listening. Even if they say at the end of the call that they are interested and that they will call you back, they won’t.
New business owners arriving at the scene will face this problem – nobody wants to listen. And rightly so. Who are you? What do you want? Why are you wasting my time?
It’s tough being the new guy. All your potential clients think they have everything they need and nothing needs improvement. Your job is to convince them they they have a problem and that you have the solution. But when you try to contact them, all they are thinking is, who are you? They are not listening.
Potential clients will only listen if they know who you are. That is why you cannot just pick up the phone and start to solve their problems.
Here are a few things you need to do before you pick up the phone and try to convince that you’ve got something better than sliced bread.
Send Them an Introduction Email
The point of this initial email is to introduce yourself generally. Nothing specific. Just a simple, “Hello, I exist,” email. In broad and simple terms, mention your company and its key services. Make the email short and to the point – make it easy to skim. The company logo should be clearly visible.
The purpose of this first email is to make your potential client aware of your existence. You want to create a little space in the person’s head containing your company name. In the future, when they hear your name, you want that space in their head to light up. You want them to say, “Yes, I have heard of you.”
Send A Snail Mail
Snail mail is something that a person can hold in their hand. It is a real physical entity – just like your company. They will receive your snail mail and notice the return address with your company name. A little light will turn on in their head. A very small erg of curiosity forces the envelope open. And, just like your introductory email, they quickly skim through the brief description of your company. Seconds later, they toss the mail in the waste basket. But the damage is done – the little space in their head with your company name has been expanded.
Send Them Another Email
Now that your potential client knows you exist, write them another email. The purpose of this email is to mention a specific problem that you can solve for them. Mention a problem that they have and how you can solve it for them. Make it brief but detailed. Try to capture their attention with a single issue they are struggling with and you have a solution for. At the end of the email, state that you will be calling them to discuss and answer any questions.
Now You Can Call
Call. Introduce yourself and your company. Start talking about how you can solve their problems. They will probably not remember where they heard of you before, but neurons of recognition will be firing in their head. You might not make a sale during this call, but they are listening.
Roman Jelinek had his own business and then he sold it. Now he is hoping to start another successful business. Read more about Roman here.
What if you introduce to people through advertisement? Where you really dont look for clients; clients look for you incase they are interested in your business and think you can solve their problems.
Anyway like the tips.
Hello Pradeep,
Yes you are correct, if you advertise it’s something else. Basically you can jump to the last step. The potential client already knows you and knows that you can help them. So you do not need to introduce yourself. You can jump right into helping them with their problem.
@Pradeep: I would say two things: 1.What Roman has outlined is, in itself, a form of marketing. It’s just a more aggressive form of marketing than putting an ad out and waiting for a response; and 2. There are many types of businesses where a sales call of some sort is much more effective than traditional marketing. A combination of the two is often the best approach.
Hello JohnYE. I completely agree with “There are many types of businesses where a sales call of some sort is much more effective than traditional marketing”. The cold call, re-call approach works only if you can call the person responsible for the problem you are proposing to fix. If you are calling and cannot get past the secretary this approach will not work.
Nice post. Yes, one need to listen deeply to know more about the client need.
I think calling works best. If you send an email first, chances are your email will find itself in the spam folder. I recommend calling between 7:30 and 9:00 AM and 4:45 and 6:00 PM. That way, you miss the gatekeepers and get directly in.
Reno, good point about the calling times. For me the best time to call was 5:00pm on Friday. Usually people are not too busy on Friday afternoon and they are in a good mood and therefore very talkative. The worse time to call is Monday morning.
I think the best way to attract a client and make him listen you is always go with some initial analysis about your client what he wants or what he is looking for only offer that which he is looking then there is always a 90% chance of getting business.