Buyers Cringe as Telemarketing Numbers Rise

I talked to a manager in one of the leading telemarketing agencies today. He told me of new offices opening worldwide and the addition of hundreds of new telemarketers. Needless I wished him and his team well. It was the only polite thing to do. However, privately I shuddered. Here is what I was really thinking – 'great another couple of hundred cold calling telemarketers is exactly what the world’s buyer DON'T need!'

At the same time many of our clients have been very slow to wean away from their dependence on traditional lead generation methods and in particular cold calling. That is in spite of the fact that response rates for the past 12 months have been falling beneath the floor.

The reality is that those who are depending on cold calling and telemarketing to generate new prospects and new customers are in for a world of pain. To those managers we say ‘take the next cold call that comes into your business and see how you like it!’

Like it, or not the telemarketer is the first causality of the buying revolution. The good news is that there are lots of alternatives that are much more effective and much more buyer friendly. Also there are a great number of ways to warm up even the coldest of calls.

Telemarketing Results Plummet by Up to 75%

The amount of activity required to generate leads today is growing out of control. It is like an iceberg - the what is seen above the surface, is minor relative to the effort that is required.

Take telemarketing for example - it can be a very lonely job if you are targeting C level.

How often would you expect somebody working on it full time might expect to talk to a decision maker?

Well last year, we ran some numbers across a wide range of campaigns in Britain and Ireland. The figures for C level exec in a large organisation were on average one decision maker spoken to every 3 days. So, in a typical month one would expect to talk to 3 or 4 decision makers, with perhaps somewhere around 20-30% being interested in meeting. That would put the telemarketing cost of each meeting at in the region of 3-4,000 euro / pounds.

Are you surprised at those figures? It is important to bear in mind that these are the results achieved by a full time telemarketing person. For those of us who have other jobs to do as well, namely meeting with customers, preparing proposals, etc., achieving the same result could take months.

Everybody knows it has got harder to access C level executives. Again our numbers shows just how much harder. Comparing 2008 to 2003, it takes twice as many calls and twice as many hours of effort to talk to a C level manager. Now, I don't want to even talk about the effect of the current economic slowdown on those numbers - the results are down by up to 75%!

What does all this suggest? Well that cold calling is out and networking is in. That if you want to talk to C Level executives you have to be patient and persistent. That you have to give these managers a compelling reason to want to listen.

Sales Avoidance Tactics

We have all got them – that is reasons to delay making that cold call, following up on that lead, or visiting that prospect.

Don't feel like making that call today? Well you are not alone! Jeff Thull in his book 'Selling Excellence' quotes research suggesting that 90% of sales people have some degree of sales call reluctance, with 40% having sever reluctance.

A nice term for them is Sales Avoidance Tactics – attending a management meeting, preparing a report, submitting an expenses claim, sending emails, etc.– all tasks that compete with sales activities for our attention.

No sales person is reluctant to collect the cheque, or co-sign the sales order – it is other parts of the sales process , in particular, lead generation that people run from. Specifically, the number one area of reluctance is cold calling (about which you find lots of information elsewhere in this blog).

So, you are not alone. But, knowing that won't get the job done. Sooner or later (and preferably sooner) a bit of 'just do it' is required. So launch yourself bravely, with your goal in mind, and get stuck in.

Remember, if you do the hard jobs first the easy jobs will take care of themselves.

Start small and start easy. Pick the people you feel most confortable approaching first and block some slots from your diary. Have all your preparation (including list, call guide, email, etc.) and practice (role playing) done and find out about the person and company before you call looking for a common link, connection, or topic of conversation. Then take the phone up and dont leave it down till you are done.

Remember as Dale Carengie said ‘Do the thing you fear to do and keep on doing it... that is the quickest and surest way every yet discovered to conquer fear.’