Make More Phone Calls to Really Grow Sales. (Really)

"The phone is dead. Long live hiding behind your computer to make sales!"

And Other Great Lies of Sales & Marketing

Wanna make money online, in your pajamas, while you sleep?

Here's all you need to do:

1. Get a list
   1. Buy the list from a broker (money)
   2. Partner/Joint Venture with someone that has a big list and offer them 30-50% of the sales (future money)
   3. Spend money on PPC ads targeting your ideal prospects (money)
   4. Spend time on social media crafting interesting prose that drives readers to a...(money)
      
      
2. Market to the list like a boss
3. Build a website or landing page
   1. Build a website fast with tools like PhoneSites or MediaTemple
   2. Optimize the site for SEO to get "free" traffic (time, expertise, some to a lot of money)
   3. Or just do a series of landing pages with programs such as LeadPages that incorporate with your...(money)
4. Setup your CRM/email autoresponder such as...
   • Keap CRM (money)
   • Ontraport (money)
   • ConstantContact (money)
   • AWeber (money)
   • HubSpot (money)
   • MailChimp so you can...(free to a little money)
     
     
5. Create compelling content to drip on/nurture your prospects to...
   1. Attend your webinar, which requires...
      1. A webinar platform such as Zoom (money)
      2. Google Hangouts (free but maybe not the image you want)
      3. A compelling story and offer that...
         1. Engages your attendees
         2. Entices them to take action
   2. Attend your live event, which requires...
      1. Securing a location (money)
      2. Logistics (money)
      3. Staff (money)
   3. Call for more information
   4. Call for an appointment
   5. Provide additional information so you can segment your list and send more targeted information, which requires…
      1. A CRM (some to a lot of money)
      2. More copywriting with enticing content and offers (time and expertise and/or money)
         
         
   6. Buy what you're selling, which requires...
      1. A shopping cart or other ecommerce platform (money)
      2. A PayPal account and/or a merchant account (money)
      3. A bank account (preferably a business bank account)
6. Fulfill your orders (money)
   1. If you're sending a digital product where will it be hosted?
      1. CustomerHub (money)
      2. Kajabi (money)
      3. Amazon S3 (some money but more expertise)
      4. Memberium (money)
      5. WishlistMember (money)
      6. Free membership plugin on your website, which requires
         1. Better hosting (money)
         2. More skill/expertise either on your own or through a virtual assistant (time and maybe money)
   2. If you're sending a physical product...
      1. How will you create it?
      2. How will you ship it?

(And these are just the steps I could think of in a 10-minute stream-of-consciousness span at 6:35 AM on a Saturday morning. There are probably 50-150 more.)

There are books and binders and three-day and 6-month programs costing thousands of dollars for EACH AND EVERY step listed above.

Building an online business, or even adding an online component to your offline business, takes time, money, and expertise.

All of which I encourage you to develop.

But your phone is sitting there, waiting for you to pick it up and use it the way it was originally meant to be used: to make a phone call.

Shocking I know.

Make Appointments and Sales Today With Your Phone

If you are new in your field or you're wanting to expand into a new region or add a new product line or if things are just slow right now and you need to light a fire and you don't have the time or the money or the expertise to launch a direct mail campaign or a PPC campaign or a social media campaign and your email list is not as big or as good as it needs to be or you're not confident in your ability to write compelling sales pieces that will get your recipients to take the action you need them to take, PICK UP THE PHONE!

But here comes your "but..."

But, Wes, Everyone has caller ID and big companies like Coca-Cola are disconnecting their voicemail so I can't even leave a message, so the phone is dead!

 

Cold calling is dead.

 

People hate to talk to salespeople.

 

CEOs and decision makers don't answer their phones or return voicemails, anyway. I have to master this internet marketing/social media marketing thingy.

 

Really and truly I do. I do. I DO!!!

 

I can't make warm calls, let alone cold calls.

 

I hate the phone.

 

I don't know what to say.

 

I hate scripts.

 

I feel so robotic.

 

Hold on a second. #RuinAMovieIn5Words is trending on Twitter. I gotta go."

Look. I get it.

Making pure cold calls out of the Yellow Pages is not enjoyable and without a script, a plan, a clear objective, and a heaping serving of pigheaded determination, you won't last long at your sales job if this is all you do, and you do it like most unprepared sales people do.

The Alternative To Cold Calls

So don't make blind cold calls. Instead, make "gold calls."

With the amount of information you can find online via sites like LinkedIn you should never make a truly blind, shot-in-the-dark cold call again.

Combine that with a smart social CRM like Nimble (watch Nimble in action on The CRM Sushi Podcast) and in under five minutes you can find out as much as you need to know about your prospect to make a great first call.

Now you're making an educated call and can offer value to the person you're calling, which will make them want to hear more of what you have to say. (You do have something worth saying, right?)

Doing this type of research and engaging with prospects in the niche you want to dominate is a vital component of your growth and sustainability until you master the 50-150 it takes to build your online super nova that pulls everyone with money into your gravitational realm of business.

Even if you have a solid online presence today, that could change in the next 3-6 months as new competitors spring up, Google changes its algorithms, the economy implodes or explodes or new wars begin or end or gas goes up or down or Democrats or Republicans take over Congress or the Senate or the White House, etc.

So get great at using the phone.

Like you, your competitors are afraid of the phone.

The key to winning in any industry or niche is doing the opposite of what your competition is doing.

That means you need to spend some amount of time on the phone because, at the end of the day, marketing is just selling in print, and selling is the transference of a feeling, and that feeling is confidence.

When you are confident your product delivers on its promises,
When you are confident you can predict and handle any objection,
When you are confident you can make money with your product in your niche,
THEN you will have the money and the confidence to do what it takes to expand your online presence and automate your sales and marketing as quickly and massively as possible.

Until then, pick up the phone, speak to someone, take note of what they say, take note of their questions and concerns, learn how to address them, and at 5 pm pour yourself a nice glass of brown liquid and congratulate yourself on doing what it takes to build a business.

Next I'll address another big Lie in the realm of Sales and Marketing: "You're not giving enough presentations!"