Part 2 of the 2-part series, “To Cold Call or Not To Cold Call”

You will recall from the first part of the To Cold Call or Not to Cold Call article series that I suggested you form the basis of your cold calling script on a very simple question: “What problem do I solve, and who has this problem and the capacity to pay me to solve it.

By now I hope you have tried it and seen some results.

If you have, and it hasn’t worked for you, maybe you should be testing some other problem / solution questions to get a better response.

Now that you’ve used it, at least with some success, you should be getting in front of a few more prospects and using the meeting to delve further into the problem and how it impacts on their business. By taking the time to listen carefully without interrupting, you should now be able to present what you do as a solution instead of simply pitching it.

Let me illustrate what I'm talking about with this analogy. My late father was a doctor, and he had a saying, “Prescription without diagnosis was malpractice”.

Consider that you go to your doctor and before you explain your symptoms, he jumps in and diagnoses acute appendicitis and books you for surgery. As he’s doing so, you look curious and say, “But I'm here for an ingrown toenail”.

Startled, he asks, “What’s wrong with your stomach?  You’re clearly uncomfortable.”

“I had a burger with the works for lunch and the onion is repeating on me” you reply.

That’s exactly what your prospect thinks when you pitch without investigation. The pitch process is an outdated American process from the days where door to door salespeople went everywhere with a canned story. They told it to everyone on the basis that some would buy and some wouldn’t.  Their managers had told them that selling was a numbers game and with the size of the target audience, they would make sales if they just kept telling the story.

That’s okay in the States when you have countless towns and cities to visit, but not here in Australia with our very limited audience.

Getting back to my point here…

By now you should have spoken with enough people to identify maybe two or three key problems you can address. Now you have to look for leverage to save you the number of phone calls and meetings. Here’s what you do…

Start writing direct response copy and using it on your brochures and website. Now, instead of brochures packed with features and stories about you and you products, you’re writing about them and their problems and how you can fix them.

Let’s use this as a simple example…

You sell a new adhesive for denture wearers. Your new adhesive is stronger than anything currently available and the user’s dentures won’t fall out unexpectedly.

Your advert might be:

Attention Denture Wearers!

If you’re sick and tired of your dentures dislodging at the wrong moment and embarrassing you; if you would like to enjoy eating sticky foods like muffins and cakes with confidence again, just call {this number} or visit {this website} for a free sample of Secure Denture, our new super-strength denture adhesive that guarantees your dentures stay where you want them all day, every day. 

As a plumber you might write:

Sick and tired of messy plumbers who are always late and charge too much?

When you next have a plumbing emergency, call Aardvark Plumbers on 1300 000 000 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              1300 000 000 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              1300 000 000      end_of_the_skype_highlighting      end_of_the_skype_highlighting. We guarantee that we will be on time every time, that we will clean up afterwards and that our bill will be within your budget.

Next you can take your message and use it as a sponsored link with Google using their AdWords program. Here you have three lines of copy with a display URL that links to your site. Your headline can have up to 25 characters including spaces and the next two lines can have up to 35 characters each including spaces. Here’s an example:

Need a Plumber fast?                                    21 characters inc spaces
This Plumber arrives on time, will             34 characters inc spaces
clean up and quotes fixed prices                               34 characters inc spaces
www.AardvarkPlumbing.com.au             

This process has changed the face of your adverts to position you and your service in front of those experiencing the pain your business solves. Now your phone should ring, and your inbox should be receiving new enquiries.

© James Yuille, 2010.