To dramatically increase your chances of engaging a prospect, tag team your touches between email and voice mail. Don’t stop until you’ve completed 8 touches.
When it comes to prospecting, there is no magic bullet. The honest truth is you have to do the work. But how you go about doing that work can make an enormous difference in your level of success.
It’s no secret that most people really dislike cold calling. Compounding the problem is that fewer and fewer people are answering the phone.
But fear not, there is a great strategy you can leverage that will help you (1) be organized, (2) give you talking points and (3) allow you to be in a timely rhythm with your prospects to create brand awareness and position you as a valuable resource.
The strategy has 3 steps:
Step 1: Determine 4 key talking points.
Your key talking points need to be about your target, something they are responsible for, something about their industry, an upcoming event, etc. Check out the blog post Email Prospecting: Automate Your Info Gathering to Be Relevant and Relatable to Prospects.
Step 2: Create 4 email templates, so you can cut and paste or automate a marketing campaign.
Remember, your emails should be 80 to 100 words total!! For more details on how to create the right email see the following posts: Email Prospecting: Three Opening Sentence Strategies to Get Your Email Read and Email Prospecting: An Example of a Bad Email Transformed.
Step 3: Create 4 follow-up voice mails.
Your voice mails will piggy back on your email templates and are no longer than 15 seconds in length. Here is an example of a voice mail for Jim, which will be relevant to an initial email sent to him about an acquisition of which he is an integral part:
Jim – This is Ryan from Redline Group, regarding the ABC acquisition. There are a couple of key initiatives that would be critical to your strategy. Give me a call when you get a chance. 555.555.1212. Again, 555.555.1212.
After you complete each of these preparation steps, then it’s a matter of pre-defining your schedule. An ideal schedule would look something like this:
Week 1: Monday, Email 1. Thursday, Voice Mail 1.
Week 2: Tuesday, Email 2. Friday, Voice Mail 2.
Week 3: Wednesday, Email 3.
Week 4: Monday, Voice Mail 3. Friday, Email 4.
Week 5: Wednesday, Voice Mail 4.
The consistency of the touches creates brand awareness and gives you the ability to show them your value.
The initial email gives you a soft introduction and when they hear your voice mail, they start to put things together. The follow-up emails are easy, as it is simply a matter of leveraging your previous email.
At the end of 8 touches, if they have not engaged, you can either move them to a monthly drip or retire them for a time and come back to them approximately 4 months later.
The great news about this email marketing strategy is it makes the process a lot simpler and drives a great response rate when done appropriately.
Guest post written by Beth Mastre, Vice President Strategic Development for The Sales Hunter. For the past 20+ years, Beth has honed her email marketing skills, not only out of sheer necessity, but also because she is passionate about connecting with people and helping them succeed. Beth’s experience and knowledge on this topic is truly second to none. Her experience is invaluable to The Sales Hunter and to other clients who look to her for guidance and advice. You can email her or call her at 402-614-7080.
Copyright 2013, Mark Hunter “The Sales Hunter.” Sales Motivation Blog.
