"How Are You Doing Today?", it seems to be one of the first lines from various telemarketers and salespeople calling us to try and engage us with their brand.
And yes, most of us bail on that call almost immediately.
It still amazes me that companies/organizations deploy employees in call centers without the proper voice script and voicemail training.
Most of us here on LinkedIn are B2B salespeople and yes, I still see the same mistake being made by many of them. It is almost like that line of "How Are You Doing Today"? is cemented into our minds.
Honestly, it is worse than getting a blind email. Most of us know right away, it is someone trying to sell us something. And most of us do not like these calls interrupting our day.
We train B2B salespeople with the proper voice scripts and call training before we allow them to sell in the field. Yes, our trainees learn with our scripts and practice internally with their internal staffs prior to making any calls to prospects.
We use a number of different opening lines and "How Are You Doing Today"? is NOT one of them. We train B2B salespeople to introduce themselves and their company/organization and then ask: “Did I Catch You In The Middle Of Something” (or something close).
The next 1-2 seconds will tell them where the call will most likely be going.
From there, the scripts are written in a way where the salesperson can quickly introduce the brand/solution and simply ask if they can send some additional information. The prospect does not feel pressured to make a decision or uncomfortable having to say no. And most times, it opens up a dialogue about the brand/solution and whether or not they have another brand/solution in place already.
Everything at this juncture is the tone of voice of the prospect, which is a tell-all, to be truthful.
When B2B salespeople make introduction calls that are genuine, without a tone of pressuring someone to buy, they are building a CRM pipeline of prospects knowing that it will take anywhere between 8-15 “touches” (e-mails, calls, mailers, etc.) to “convert” those prospects into customers.
If you have deployed B2B salespeople and have not heard their opening call scripts lately, we suggest you do some internal training and write the proper voice scripts for your brand/solution. In all of the salespeople, we have trained over the years, over 90% have had an opening script that did NOT work well for them.
When we gave them the proper script for their brand/solution, they were even MORE engaged to make even MORE outgoing calls!
If you would like some additional help or input, do not hesitate to reach out to me at jeff@jeffbosworth.com. I am glad to help in any way I can!
