by Nancy Calabrese | Jun 6, 2019 | Best Sales Practices, Sales Prospecting
Are you frustrated by the quantity of appointments set by your Sales Team? Are they delivering poor quality leads that aren’t converting to sales? Are your Reps lacking the skills and management needed to effectively set qualified appointments?
You need Call Center in a Box, our proprietary Prospecting Sales Training and Management program that will provide your team with the skills and management they need to Drive real RESULTS!
Call Center in a Box is a Prospecting Sales Management and Training Program where we train, manage and monitor YOUR Sales Team to improve YOUR bottom line!
Sales Training:
Too often, we see sales teams made up of people who may have a ‘knack’ for sales but no real training. They end up ‘winging it’ when it comes to prospecting, resulting in poor quality leads.
And even the strongest and most senior salespeople need to continuously train to stay at the top of their game. Harold Craxton, a professor at the Royal Academy of Music said, ‘Amateurs practice until they can get it right; professionals practice until they can’t get it wrong’. We agree and train YOUR salespeople to be PROFESSIONALS!
Our sales training covers the ‘how’ and ‘why’ of what your inside sales team needs to do to prospect effectively, including role play and modeling the correct way to make cold calls to set qualified appointments that lead to closed sales.
We provide your team with the tools, support and training needed to hit production goals. Our scripting ensures that messaging is consistent and that sales reps will have meaningful conversations with decision makers to set qualified appointments.
We set you up so your team will work in a CRM that is user friendly, simplifies the prospecting process and provides the tools they need to engage, qualify and set the appointment all in one place. This speeds up the sales cycle, enabling them to contact more leads in less time.
The CRM enables your sales staff and managers to track and record calls and monitor productivity, resulting in more accountability and higher quality leads.
Frequently, we see companies that have installed powerful CRM tools but have no clue how to use all the bells and whistles that enhance productivity. We show your people how to use features like voicemail drop, including the scripting for the messages, to make the most of their call time.
Sales Management:
The CRM allows management to access real time data, seeing what calls are made and when, enables them to listen in on actual calls and track the performance of their team.
We then meet weekly with your salespeople to review their progress, discuss their calls, coach, role play to teach appropriate and more effective responses and help them with any issues that arise.
Results:
This combination of training, monitoring, reviewing and repeating the process has been proven to drive improved sales and increases employee retention!
Our Sales Training program is industry agnostic, working for any team that uses cold calling and appointment setting as a strategy for driving new business.
Click here to learn more or Call us today at 908.879.2911 to set up a time to discuss how this sales training program can help YOU get the best results from YOUR Inside Sales Team or Producers!
Don’t have an inside sales team or producers? Click here to learn more about how we can do your cold calling for you!
by Nancy Calabrese | May 21, 2019 | Best Sales Practices, Sales Prospecting
Business owners often want to see quick sales results and instant ROI. That is like putting up the walls of a building without first building a sturdy foundation. Yes, you can throw up some walls but they will be flimsy and won’t stand up to the weather or the test of time!
The same is true in business. You need a strong foundation to build your business upon.
At One of a Kind Sales, we build you a STURDY sales foundation with daily, consistent outreach to your target audience. We work to develop long term relationships with the decision makers who will convert to real, CLOSED sales.
Building a strong foundation is the hard part – the part that takes time and patience, but the part that is most crucial to building a thriving business. And we can do this for you!
If your sales results are feeling a bit flimsy – or you know that your foundation is anything less than rock solid – give us a call. We can build you the foundation YOU need to build your business upon!
by Nancy Calabrese | Apr 23, 2019 | Sales Prospecting
Yes, you can do your banking and order everything from dinner to a washing machine to nail clippers online. You can turn on your TV, adjust the volume and lock your doors, even when you are not anywhere nearby. But you really cannot replace HUMAN INTERACTION for real results, especially when it comes to sales.
We are not disparaging technology – effective salespeople rely on a wide array of technical tools to identify prospects, monitor call volume and track KPIs. We are talking about the type of personal interaction that allows you to make a REAL CONNECTION with your prospects.
Real, personal connection can be fostered in many ways. If your prospect is close by, meeting face to face is always a good way to connect with someone. Often, a live meeting can make the difference between ‘identifying a prospect’ and ‘creating a relationship that leads to SALES’.
When a client is not in your zip code, or even your state, the phone is an excellent tool. But it is only effective when the calls are made by people who are really LISTENING and INTERACTING with the people on the other end of the line. People are getting bombarded by robocalls all the time so you need to be sure to connect personally if you want to close sales.
We really like to use video calling. There are a number of easy to use platforms available including Zoom, GoToMeeting, Google Hangouts and more that can facilitate meetings that are the next best thing to live!
Frequently, salespeople will lament that they have built themselves huge social networks (often at great time and expense) but they are disappointed that these efforts have NOT resulted in actual sales. Social networks CAN possibly help you identify good prospects, but if you are not connecting in person, via the phone or video calls, you are NOT really connecting.
In person, phone calls and video calls allow you to build REAL connections with your prospect, allowing them to hear the inflection in your voice and see and FEEL your passion and enthusiasm.
Yes, technology can facilitate these calls but it is the PERSONAL INTERACTION that is the differentiator you need to really succeed in sales!
If you are NOT making the connections nor seeing the results YOU need, give us a call – we can help you with your script, train you and your team on your delivery and even make calls for you if needed! Contact us at 908.879.2911 or leads@oneofakindsales.com
by Nancy Calabrese | Apr 9, 2019 | Best Sales Practices, Sales Prospecting
When hiring sales team members, keep in mind that good Sales Reps need a good six to nine months of ramp-up time before they hit their stride and start delivering real sales. If you aren’t cognizant of this and cut bait before they have a chance to deliver, you are undermining your company’s sales efforts and wasting the time of potentially valuable sales people.
Too often, I hear from impatient C-suite execs who are expecting closed sales on day two from their new hires. Having extensive experience with training both our own sales team and the teams of others, we know what realistic guidelines look like and what you should expect from your sales people and when.
This is NOT to say that they shouldn’t be delivering! It is just to remind you that closed sales take time and legwork. For the first few months, you need to evaluate your salespeople on the activities they control and be sure they are doing that legwork.
Here are some guidelines for what to expect from your new sales reps and when:
Networking
A brand new Sales Rep should be out pounding the pavement from day one. They should be networking, both in person and virtually, making connections and finding leads.
Cold Calling
And they should, of course, be COLD CALLING! Making calls, EVERY DAY, gathering information and setting appointments with qualified leads is expected from day one and is something that can and should be tracked. (See our post on KPI’s for more on what you should track for sales success.)
Learning about the Company
The new producer should also be making time to learn about the company, the products and/or services as well as the company culture. They need to be able to identify the target audience so they can have the RIGHT conversations with the RIGHT prospects.
They also need to understand your company’s differentiators so they can address those prospects’ concerns, reservations and pain points.
Appointments
All Sales Reps should then be setting appointments with QUALIFIED leads. Depending on your industry and sales structure, they may pass this along to a closer or they should be skilled enough to close the deal themselves.
Different Industries have different timelines
In some verticals, like the insurance industry, it can take up to 2 – 3 YEARS to validate a book of business. In this case, you, as an employer, may not realize your ROI for 2 – 3 years. This can be difficult but being shortsighted or having unrealistic expectations, will only undermine your sales efforts.
Time to closing can also be impacted by the SIZE of the target company. Larger companies have more layers of management and often more conservative purchasing approaches, so this usually means that it takes longer line up all the RIGHT people and departments to close sales.
Understanding YOUR target audiences’ timeline and sequence, and addressing those factors in your strategy, can make for less frustration and smoother progress.
List Quality is KEY
No matter what industry you are in, lead generation should be happening in the first months. But cold calling results are HIGHLY dependent upon the QUALITY of your call lists. Keep this in mind if your Sales reps do not seem to be ‘producing’ quality leads.
Realistic Expectations
Employers need to set realistic expectations for deliverables and good sales reps need to be diligent and consistent in their approach and delivery. Good sales results come from repetition and reinforcement.
If your sales team is not producing the results YOU need, give us a call at 908.879.2911 – we can get them up to speed and show them how to produce REAL results.
by Nancy Calabrese | Mar 5, 2019 | Cold Call ROI, Cold Calling Tips, Lead Generation, Sales Prospecting
While psyching yourself up to make that first dial of the
day may be the most daunting part of cold calling, MAKING the calls is NOT the
ultimate sales goal for most organizations. Setting QUALIFIED APPOINTMENTS and
CLOSING SALES are what impact your organization’s bottom line. Understanding
the full sales process and knowing (and monitoring) your KPI’s will help you
meet your ultimate sales goals.
KPI’s are ‘Key Performance Indicators’ – clear, specific
actions YOU need to take, during a specified time, to achieve a specific
outcome. In the example above, picking up the phone and making calls IS key,
but the specified desired outcome is to set appointments with qualified
individuals and then to close sales with those prospects.
If you are responsible for making that first call, your KPI
might be to make X number of calls per hour, day or week. If the other
subsequent metrics are falling or failing to be met, this number may need to be
increased.
Are you responsible for setting appointments? That KPI
might track the number of calls that result in an appointment. If this number
slips, go back to the initial call script and make sure it is solid. Re-work
that as needed to ensure the calls you are making lead to appointments.
The next metric to track would be the number of appointments
that are converting to actual sales. If you find this number slipping, you
don’t necessarily need to make MORE CALLS (though that may help increase your
odds) but you need to work on the delivery and content of those calls so that
when you are setting appointments, they are with people who are truly QUALIFIED
to close a sale.
Clearly identifying your goals and monitoring
your progress towards those goals is KEY to ACHIEVING them! Knowing and
monitoring YOUR KPI’s (Key Performance Indicators) will help you stay ON TRACK
to meet and exceed your sales goals.
Are your calls not converting? Need help with your scripts or to tune up your teams’ delivery? Give us a call – our training programs can boost YOUR team’s results.
And if you still need help, WE LOVE COLD CALLING! Give us a
call at 908.879.2911 to see how WE can make calls for YOU!
by Nancy Calabrese | Feb 19, 2019 | Sales Prospecting
According to a survey done by YouGov in December of 2017, eating healthier, getting more exercise and saving money were tied as the number one personal new year’s resolution for 2018. And most studies cite the number one business resolution as increasing sales and growth.
Sadly, other statistics show that 80% of New Year’s resolutions FAIL by February!
Reasons vary but most frequently, people just find change DIFFICULT. People WANT to go to the gym, eat more broccoli and save more money but actually making those changes are hard to do. They want to get strong but push-ups are hard. They want their businesses to grow but don’t really know what to do to make that happen.
At One of a Kind Sales, we can help! We KNOW what it takes to increase sales – it takes well trained salespeople acting on qualified leads. We offer a number of services that make sure you have both a funnel FULL of qualified leads and the effectively trained salespeople that will close the sales that will grow your business in 2019!
We TRAIN YOUR PEOPLE
Our proprietary training program will prepare YOUR inside sales team to make effective calls, setting appointments and collecting the key information needed to close sales. We make sure that your people have the skills and tools they need to meet and exceed your resolutions.
We help you HIRE WELL TRAINED SALESPEOPLE
If you don’t yet have an inside sales team, or are looking to build a stronger bench, we can provide you with well trained, qualified candidates who will get appointments set with leads who will CONVERT helping you meet and exceed your growth goals.
We can DO IT FOR YOU
If you are not ready to hire an inside sales team, hire US! Our highly trained salespeople can work on your behalf, keeping your funnel filled with qualified leads. It’s like having someone who can do your push-ups for you! We provide you with the leads that will convert to SALES. Note: 6 pack abs not included.
Call us NOW at 908.879.2911 to learn more about the sales training, sales candidate and lead generation services we offer to ensure that YOU meet and exceed the business goals YOU set for 2019!
https://www.statista.com/chart/12386/the-most-common-new-years-resolutions-for-2018/
https://www.bustle.com/p/6-ways-to-keep-your-2018-new-years-resolutions-7679811
