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[E68] Telesales Week: Stop sounding like a telemarketer
No one likes being called by a
telemarketer. Or being pitched by a salesy salesperson who is pressuring them
to buy.
So why do so many inside salespeople
fall into that same mode when they are on the phone?
When in doubt, don’t
do what everyone else is doing.
Episode 68 – Transcript
This is episode 68 of the
sales experience podcast.
So glad that you’re here, so
glad that you’re listening. I know I say that a lot, but I truly appreciate
everybody’s support. A
Anyone who downloads one
episode or all of these episodes today, I appreciate the fact that you’re
interested in sales, want to improve your sales process, become a more
professional salesperson and fundamentally hopefully with my goal is to change
the landscape of how sales is viewed such that the sales experience is a
positive one for both you, the salesperson, as well as the prospect and future
potential hopeful client and what they felt like they got from you.
How that process went.
Avoiding things like buyers, Myrrh Morse and them waking up at two o’clock in
the morning and being worried or upset or freaked out about what they purchased
and instead I want them to feel happy and feel great.
Become an advocate, send you
referrals, shout from the top of the mountain, become a raving fan. Now of
course that’s not going to happen with every single person who buys from you.
There’s people who gravitate more towards those kind of tendencies and being a
referral advocate and being the outspoken person who’s talking a lot about you
in positive ways, and then there’s others that will buy it, use it, and then
not really hear from them again.
And so that’s fine as well.
But the goal is on the overall sales experience. Now, today’s episode this week
in particular talking about telephone sales can, today I want to talk about the
sales experience and how that feels, how that looks when it’s done right and
when it’s done wrong.
In my experience with the
telephone with salesperson now when it’s done wrong, and this is just my
experience over 16 years of being in telephone sales related businesses,
working with different companies, different call centres, nationally,
internationally, all around in companies I’ve worked at companies I’ve had as
clients.
One of the big things that
people default to that doesn’t work or that makes the job of being a
salesperson harder is when you sound like a salesperson. Now, what do I mean by
that? I mean that prospects are going to start off in any interaction with a
potential salesperson with their radar on with this concern or fear or just
looking out for the fact that the person they’re dealing with might be a
salesperson.
Now, of course, and I covered
this in the personality and behaviour weeks that I covered many, many weeks
ago, is that there are certain personalities, certain people, and just
different people based on their life experiences in the world where they’re
more trusting or they’re not as worried about it and they’re not as sceptical.
Their emotional mental walls
and barriers aren’t as high when going into a sales interaction. And then
there’s people on the other end of the extreme where their walls are really
high, they have a lot of barriers in place, they’re super concerned, they’re
worried about being taken advantage of.
Most likely they’ve had some
experiences in the past with a salesperson who has ripped them off or sold them
a bad product, a bad bill of goods, or manipulated them in some way and got
them to buy something they didn’t actually want. And so they’re coming to you
with that baggage and that baggage is causing these walls to go up their radars
on high alert.
They’re constantly looking
out for ways that they’re interacting with a salesperson. That sales person
might be on the bad side and not the good side. So your number one goal as a
salesperson, as a telemarketer, whatever that is, is to not sound like a
salesperson and not to sound like a telemarketer. What does that look like in
practicality? Well, let’s just get into actual details. So a telemarketer when
they call you, what does a telemarketer sound like? Hi, my name is Jason.
Is this John? Hey John, how
are you doing today? Oh, oh, hello. Can I speak to bill? Hi Bill. How are you
doing today? How was the weather? There’s a certain thing and we’ve all gotten
these phone calls and I have had the luxury of being in many different call
centres and hearing lots of them.
We all know what a
telemarketer sounds like. We all know what a sales person sounds like. We all
know the way they start the conversation, the rapport, the small talk. They
want to talk about the weather and they want to talk about sports.
They want to kind of butter
up the prospect and get them kind of warmed up so that they are a little more
comfortable with moving forward into the sales pitch. And then there’s the
sales pitch itself where it’s all about the company and how great they are and
how amazing what they’re selling is and their long track record and all the
people who think they’re awesome.
That’s what salespeople do.
That’s what telemarketers do. Now, you may have the title of salesperson, but
that doesn’t mean you have to act like the stereotypical salesperson, which is
focused on me, me, me. I’m going to sell my product to you.
I don’t really care about you
and or I’m going to follow the same old school processes, which is, hi, how are
you? And then let’s talk about the weather and Oh, did you see the game last
night? And all of those things, especially that telemarketers do. Your
fundamental goal should be if you’re in a telephone sales role, an inside sales
role, or you sell anything over the phone, even if it’s not 600 500 calls a
day, maybe it’s 30 calls a day, whatever that is.
Your goal should
fundamentally be to sound the opposite of what a telemarketer, cold caller salesperson,
high pressure sales he kind of person sounds like, is to take what that is in
your mind, in your experience, any calls that you’ve gotten.
If you’re not sure what that
sounds like, like for the next week, every time you get a random call, especially
from a toll free number, answer your phone on your cell phone. Listen to how
they sound, and then observe how you feel as a result of that phone call, that
opening all of that. Take that information and then do the opposite.
Always do the opposite. Don’t
do or sound like what a telemarketer or a salesy salesperson who’s just coming
out of the gate with their own needs and wants and desires in mind. Now, of
course, of course, if you’re listening this, you have a quota, you have goals,
you have money that you want to make.
You have a number of deals
that you have to close either a day or a week, a month, quarter or whatever
that is. So of course closing deals is super important.
That’s what this is all
about. The sales experience is not just about the other person, the prospect in
the future customer having this great, wonderful experience that hopefully they
buy. It’s also about you having the wonderful experience as a salesperson
that’s you feel confident and good about.
It’s also helping you meet
your goals while at the same time doing the right thing for your prospects, but
fundamentally do not sound like a telemarketer or salesperson unless you want
to be treated like them.
If you want to be treated
like a cold calling telemarketer or a cold calling salesperson, cold calling,
SDR account executive, whatever it is that you are, if you want that sound like
that person come out of the gate, happy, cheery, you know, asking how they are
talking about the weather, do all of those things. If you want to be treated
that way and put in that bucket.
Now, here’s what I’ll tell
you. I mentioned this a few minutes ago. It’s not that this will kill all of
your sales coming out of the gate and doing things, in my opinion, in the wrong
way, relative to what a prospect is wanting, right? So they want more of a
relationship.
You’re calling them, it’s not
something they can just order online, which means they want to have a
conversation with a professional. And if you’re cold calling them, then you’ve
got to explain to them why it’s important. But you got to figure out why it’s
important to them. And so it’s not that doing any of this that way, doing it
like a telemarketer or a salesy salesperson is gonna make it so you can’t close
any deals like a single sale because those people still get some results.
It’s just that it’s gonna
make it harder. It’s going to put you one step behind where you want to be 10
steps behind because it’s going to trigger their walls like I was talking
about.
And then you have to be
really good at what you’re doing. So you can bring those walls back down so
that you can get through to the other side, which is the sale and it’s not that
being those kinds of ways. Talking like that, being excited and cheery, being
super animated is going to make it so you can’t close a single thing, just me.
And it’s going to have to work harder and you’re going to have to be better at
it once you do get your foot in that door.
Now if you don’t sound like
that and you take your own approach, you act like yourself and you just go into
it like a conversation between you and somebody else instead of trying to
manipulate or persuade somebody, figure out what they want, which I’m going to
talk about in the next episode. And you just truly just have a conversation.
Instead of trying to be
something you think you’re supposed to be as a salesperson or a telemarketer,
you’ll find much better results because you won’t hit up against that wall as
hard and as often. Hopefully that helps. So again, we’ve talked about being on
the phone a lot, following a process.
Now, the key is to not sound
like those people that everybody does, not like getting a call from or enjoyed
dealing with. That is your mission. That will help you with your sales
experience. Subscribe. Make sure to find this podcast everywhere that you
downloaded from. It’s everywhere online. If you can’t find it online, send me a
message cutter consulting group.com website.
You can find me on LinkedIn.
Send me a chat if you can’t find it somewhere or if you want help with how to
not sound like a telemarketer or a salesperson, people don’t like, send me a
message. Let’s get on a phone call.
Always, remember that
everything in life is sales and people remember the experience you gave them.
View all episodes
By Jason Cutter
4.9
3535 ratings
No one likes being called by a
telemarketer. Or being pitched by a salesy salesperson who is pressuring them
to buy.
So why do so many inside salespeople
fall into that same mode when they are on the phone?
When in doubt, don’t
do what everyone else is doing.
Episode 68 – Transcript
This is episode 68 of the
sales experience podcast.
So glad that you’re here, so
glad that you’re listening. I know I say that a lot, but I truly appreciate
everybody’s support. A
Anyone who downloads one
episode or all of these episodes today, I appreciate the fact that you’re
interested in sales, want to improve your sales process, become a more
professional salesperson and fundamentally hopefully with my goal is to change
the landscape of how sales is viewed such that the sales experience is a
positive one for both you, the salesperson, as well as the prospect and future
potential hopeful client and what they felt like they got from you.
How that process went.
Avoiding things like buyers, Myrrh Morse and them waking up at two o’clock in
the morning and being worried or upset or freaked out about what they purchased
and instead I want them to feel happy and feel great.
Become an advocate, send you
referrals, shout from the top of the mountain, become a raving fan. Now of
course that’s not going to happen with every single person who buys from you.
There’s people who gravitate more towards those kind of tendencies and being a
referral advocate and being the outspoken person who’s talking a lot about you
in positive ways, and then there’s others that will buy it, use it, and then
not really hear from them again.
And so that’s fine as well.
But the goal is on the overall sales experience. Now, today’s episode this week
in particular talking about telephone sales can, today I want to talk about the
sales experience and how that feels, how that looks when it’s done right and
when it’s done wrong.
In my experience with the
telephone with salesperson now when it’s done wrong, and this is just my
experience over 16 years of being in telephone sales related businesses,
working with different companies, different call centres, nationally,
internationally, all around in companies I’ve worked at companies I’ve had as
clients.
One of the big things that
people default to that doesn’t work or that makes the job of being a
salesperson harder is when you sound like a salesperson. Now, what do I mean by
that? I mean that prospects are going to start off in any interaction with a
potential salesperson with their radar on with this concern or fear or just
looking out for the fact that the person they’re dealing with might be a
salesperson.
Now, of course, and I covered
this in the personality and behaviour weeks that I covered many, many weeks
ago, is that there are certain personalities, certain people, and just
different people based on their life experiences in the world where they’re
more trusting or they’re not as worried about it and they’re not as sceptical.
Their emotional mental walls
and barriers aren’t as high when going into a sales interaction. And then
there’s people on the other end of the extreme where their walls are really
high, they have a lot of barriers in place, they’re super concerned, they’re
worried about being taken advantage of.
Most likely they’ve had some
experiences in the past with a salesperson who has ripped them off or sold them
a bad product, a bad bill of goods, or manipulated them in some way and got
them to buy something they didn’t actually want. And so they’re coming to you
with that baggage and that baggage is causing these walls to go up their radars
on high alert.
They’re constantly looking
out for ways that they’re interacting with a salesperson. That sales person
might be on the bad side and not the good side. So your number one goal as a
salesperson, as a telemarketer, whatever that is, is to not sound like a
salesperson and not to sound like a telemarketer. What does that look like in
practicality? Well, let’s just get into actual details. So a telemarketer when
they call you, what does a telemarketer sound like? Hi, my name is Jason.
Is this John? Hey John, how
are you doing today? Oh, oh, hello. Can I speak to bill? Hi Bill. How are you
doing today? How was the weather? There’s a certain thing and we’ve all gotten
these phone calls and I have had the luxury of being in many different call
centres and hearing lots of them.
We all know what a
telemarketer sounds like. We all know what a sales person sounds like. We all
know the way they start the conversation, the rapport, the small talk. They
want to talk about the weather and they want to talk about sports.
They want to kind of butter
up the prospect and get them kind of warmed up so that they are a little more
comfortable with moving forward into the sales pitch. And then there’s the
sales pitch itself where it’s all about the company and how great they are and
how amazing what they’re selling is and their long track record and all the
people who think they’re awesome.
That’s what salespeople do.
That’s what telemarketers do. Now, you may have the title of salesperson, but
that doesn’t mean you have to act like the stereotypical salesperson, which is
focused on me, me, me. I’m going to sell my product to you.
I don’t really care about you
and or I’m going to follow the same old school processes, which is, hi, how are
you? And then let’s talk about the weather and Oh, did you see the game last
night? And all of those things, especially that telemarketers do. Your
fundamental goal should be if you’re in a telephone sales role, an inside sales
role, or you sell anything over the phone, even if it’s not 600 500 calls a
day, maybe it’s 30 calls a day, whatever that is.
Your goal should
fundamentally be to sound the opposite of what a telemarketer, cold caller salesperson,
high pressure sales he kind of person sounds like, is to take what that is in
your mind, in your experience, any calls that you’ve gotten.
If you’re not sure what that
sounds like, like for the next week, every time you get a random call, especially
from a toll free number, answer your phone on your cell phone. Listen to how
they sound, and then observe how you feel as a result of that phone call, that
opening all of that. Take that information and then do the opposite.
Always do the opposite. Don’t
do or sound like what a telemarketer or a salesy salesperson who’s just coming
out of the gate with their own needs and wants and desires in mind. Now, of
course, of course, if you’re listening this, you have a quota, you have goals,
you have money that you want to make.
You have a number of deals
that you have to close either a day or a week, a month, quarter or whatever
that is. So of course closing deals is super important.
That’s what this is all
about. The sales experience is not just about the other person, the prospect in
the future customer having this great, wonderful experience that hopefully they
buy. It’s also about you having the wonderful experience as a salesperson
that’s you feel confident and good about.
It’s also helping you meet
your goals while at the same time doing the right thing for your prospects, but
fundamentally do not sound like a telemarketer or salesperson unless you want
to be treated like them.
If you want to be treated
like a cold calling telemarketer or a cold calling salesperson, cold calling,
SDR account executive, whatever it is that you are, if you want that sound like
that person come out of the gate, happy, cheery, you know, asking how they are
talking about the weather, do all of those things. If you want to be treated
that way and put in that bucket.
Now, here’s what I’ll tell
you. I mentioned this a few minutes ago. It’s not that this will kill all of
your sales coming out of the gate and doing things, in my opinion, in the wrong
way, relative to what a prospect is wanting, right? So they want more of a
relationship.
You’re calling them, it’s not
something they can just order online, which means they want to have a
conversation with a professional. And if you’re cold calling them, then you’ve
got to explain to them why it’s important. But you got to figure out why it’s
important to them. And so it’s not that doing any of this that way, doing it
like a telemarketer or a salesy salesperson is gonna make it so you can’t close
any deals like a single sale because those people still get some results.
It’s just that it’s gonna
make it harder. It’s going to put you one step behind where you want to be 10
steps behind because it’s going to trigger their walls like I was talking
about.
And then you have to be
really good at what you’re doing. So you can bring those walls back down so
that you can get through to the other side, which is the sale and it’s not that
being those kinds of ways. Talking like that, being excited and cheery, being
super animated is going to make it so you can’t close a single thing, just me.
And it’s going to have to work harder and you’re going to have to be better at
it once you do get your foot in that door.
Now if you don’t sound like
that and you take your own approach, you act like yourself and you just go into
it like a conversation between you and somebody else instead of trying to
manipulate or persuade somebody, figure out what they want, which I’m going to
talk about in the next episode. And you just truly just have a conversation.
Instead of trying to be
something you think you’re supposed to be as a salesperson or a telemarketer,
you’ll find much better results because you won’t hit up against that wall as
hard and as often. Hopefully that helps. So again, we’ve talked about being on
the phone a lot, following a process.
Now, the key is to not sound
like those people that everybody does, not like getting a call from or enjoyed
dealing with. That is your mission. That will help you with your sales
experience. Subscribe. Make sure to find this podcast everywhere that you
downloaded from. It’s everywhere online. If you can’t find it online, send me a
message cutter consulting group.com website.
You can find me on LinkedIn.
Send me a chat if you can’t find it somewhere or if you want help with how to
not sound like a telemarketer or a salesperson, people don’t like, send me a
message. Let’s get on a phone call.
Always, remember that
everything in life is sales and people remember the experience you gave them.