Selling is a science. Effective sales calls will embolden you to set a new milestone in your game. But the point of consideration is how can you make your sales call effective. Most sales reps are responsible for generating revenue via Tele-sales.
Moreover, most people fix their client meetings via calls before visiting them. If you are experiencing a low response to your cold calls or phone calls for sales in general, you should understand the science behind effective sales calls.
The science of sales focuses on two areas: buyers and sellers. If sellers embed themselves between the buyers and situations during sales calls by applying the techniques/sciences, then the sales journey proceeds smoothly with positive end-results. In order to do so, the sellers should have a better understanding of the sales calls, types of sales calls, and how to handle the calls in any situation.
Let’s dive into them one by one.
Sales call
A sales call is a phone call made by a sales representative of a company to a person with the purpose of selling a product/ service. A sales call is usually the middle stage of generating sales between a salesperson and his/her client.
Although the initial phone conversation between a sales professional and the prospect is a very “non-salesy” type, it has the ultimate purpose of selling the product(s) or service(s). Therefore it is called a sales call.
The basic motto of a sales call (first contact) is to define a prospect’s need and how soon he/she needs the solution of his pesky difficulties. But to understand those metrics, the sales calls should be planned and one by one step should be followed.
Types of sales calls
Different methods are adopted to handle different types of calls. In order to do so, a sales rep should have a deep knowledge of different types of calls. Here is the list of different calls:
1. Cold Call
This is the process of solicitation of potential customers who have no prior indication of receiving calls from a salesperson. In other words, it is an unexpected call for the leads. The objective of this call is to find the needs and pain points of the leads. This is an old and traditional method to find customers. An efficient sales professional finds 2% success with regular B2B cold calling.
2. Warm Call
When the call is made to the prospect with a prior indication by some sort of contacts such as an email campaign, a referral or meeting in any event or conference, it is called warm calling. In this process, when a salesperson calls a prospect, the previous contact acts as an icebreaker. This is an efficient way to find a new lead.
3. Sales Appointment Call
This is a scheduled call where the sales rep and prospects have agreed to have a business discussion. It may be an appointment setting for telephonic call or face to face discussion that allows the seller to present the product or service to the prospect.
4. Follow up Call
This is an activity to monitor the progress of the customer journey towards your product or service. This is a very crucial stage of the sales funnel which most of the sales reps miss. You can measure the lead’s position through this call for your products and services. Also, you will have an opportunity to nurture prospects.
How do you pitch sales over the phone?
Sales pitches are tough. Among all the channels, the 82% sales pitch is happening over the phone.
According to the CRM benchmark report by Copper Qualtrics Research, phone calls are the most common channel used in managing sales relationships.
But it is not as easy as it appears. Here are a few tips to make your sales pitch over the phone easy:
- Plan your sales pitch call: Before you pitch the sales calls, plan your call with step by step point you will cover throughout the conversation. To do a plan, you should have basic information about the lead to whom you are going to call.
The information can be collected through any social media channels like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. Based on the information you can start your conversation so that the lead’s interest level will increase to continue the call. - Prevent hang-ups: Most of the outbound calls get hung-up when leads come to know the call is from a salesperson. The first and most significant part of the sales call is to prevent hang-ups. Here are a few points to keep in mind to prevent the hang-ups:
- Don’t provide an opportunity to lead to hanging up: At the outset of the call, don’t ask “Is it the right time to talk to you”, instead you can ask for 5 minutes to talk to him/her.
- Create the impression: Once the allotted time is over, ask for another few minutes to continue. This activity will create an impression that you value their time.
- Make the conversation interactive: In order to continue the conversation, ask a few questions and provide them the opportunity to ask you a few questions. In this way, the conversation will be interactive and leads will not be able to hang up.
- Fill your voice with confidence: When it comes to telephonic calls, confidence matters. In the realm of sales, the level of confidence ensures the leads to proceed further.
According to the Wall Street Journal, high pitched voice shows nervousness whereas deep voice conveys confidence. Try to avoid the fillers like “um”, “ah” in your conversation. You can record your calls and review them and measure your confidence level to improve. - Get to the point without delay: Dry and boring starting can be the cause of hang-ups. Making your conversation interactive is good but keep in mind that it should not be dragged for a long time. Present your topic at the right time and make the topic interesting by showing your unique selling point.
7 Quick Tips To Ace Any Sales Call
Whether you’re an experienced professional or a fresher working in the business development domain, calling up clients/ leads will be your daily task. We have listed down 7 simple tips which will help you ace any sales call:
- Start your sales call with curiosity: If the beginning of your conversation is not interesting, there is a high possibility of hanging up the call. If you observe the waiters of the hotels, they start their day by greeting or wishing you. That is the hack they apply for their marketing.
Start the conversation with high enthusiasm. Catch the interesting point of your lead and initiate a discussion that has positive end-result. It will make the day of your lead even though they are not interested in your product and service. But your call will leave a positive mark to remember you. - Maintain the Flow of the conversation: Once you start the conversation with your lead and it went good, then the next step is to maintain the flow throughout the conversation. There are three steps to make the flow:
- Have a clear goal: First set your goal before making a call and ask yourself what you want to accomplish and how. Plan your points that need to be presented through call. A proper strategy will make you comfortable to drive the call with good flow.
- Listen to your prospect carefully: The key takeaway of the above-discussed point is to plan your call. But sometimes it goes in different directions for the new sales reps. Their plans show the picture of byhearting the script. So it is significant to hear your lead carefully and respond accordingly to maintain the flow.
- Lead the call: The last part of the call is equally important as the initial part. Use friendly strength in the call to lead the challenging questions of prospects. It may distract your strategy you have made but it is necessary to answer the challenging questions to lead the call.
More than 53% of what drives B2B customers’ purchase decisions is the salesperson’s ability to teach the customers something new or challenge their thinking.
- No Gossip on Competitors: This is one of the biggest mistakes salespeople do during calls. When you speak ill about others, no matter if it is your competitors or someone else, it affects your ethics.
Even if your product/ service is 10x better than that of your competitors, try to avoid talking ill about your competitors. Instead of talking about your competitors’ low quality and unreliable service or product, mold the conversation to the good features of your product or service. - Present your product wisely: The final goal of the sales call is to attract people towards your product. No matter how friendly you are taking to your prospect or how much positive your prospect is for your product, the end result is to acquire the customer.
You need to present your product wisely during a call that matches the flow of the conversation. Bring the product topic smoothly instead of pushing the product information suddenly into the conversation. This art comes through practice and end to end plan you make before the call. - Value your product with clear information: Once you bring your product to the lead during the conversation, make sure the information you are conveying is transparent and clear. The information should display the features of the product and beneficial points for respective leads that will heal their pain points.
The most important part is to give them more exposure (especially, unique selling points) of your product or service. The research of behavioral economics confirms that framing matters. Gaining and losing a customer complete depends upon the way you position your product in the conversation. - Empower the leads with examples of existing customers: In any field, empowering is the major part of the journey towards the destination. When it comes to sales, it is the most effective boost to convert leads to customers. To empower your leads, you should not compel them for your product, rather you give them space to think and decide.
In order to enhance the decision-making process, provide a few examples of your existing customers displaying the benefits they are having. As people believe in the live example, this trick will help you a lot to expedite the decision-making process. - Listen to the call records, find the lacking point and cover it in the next call: Improvement is a continuous process. To polish your sales calls, take the records of your conversation and review it. Find the point where you were lacking or failed to convey important information.
List down the information you want to cover after reaching the same lead once again. As sales don’t happen in one contact or one call, it requires many more follow up and nurturing calls, you have the opportunity to reach the lead in follow up calls or emails where you can cover the missing points/ information.
Sales techniques are improving day by day. Honing your sales skills is keypoint to acquire new customers. No matter your call type is inbound calls or outbound calls, but the above mentioned seven ways will help you to scale your call. Try to apply all the tips to your sales call and see which one working effectively for you.
All of the above-discussed techniques are proven and effective for sales calls. Try all the ways and join us to share effective techniques that worked for you and describe it in the comment box.
