Thomas the Rhymer, can you give us some hints on what product it is you're trying to sell?
I got into selling IT related security products and boy, selling to nerds is the absolute WORST!
This company insisted on cold calling and more recently emailing which I believe to be a foolish waste of time. In the planning stages, I said very vocally that direct sales has a place but we would be better off approaching a few relevant tech blogs and sponsoring them first to get some name recognition and a few customers that way. Those sponsors were dirt cheap too and would have given us some direct recognition for our money.
Nope, cold calls only!
In the past 3 months of cold phone and email prospecting, i've only had 1 guy interested who we didn't even contact directly!
I'm grateful I can confidently pick up the phone and prospect, but i'm highly doubtful of its long term effectiveness especially in this day and age where people immediately hang up on telemarketers.
I love reading cold calling success stories, but my gut is starting to tell me these guys are either just spam approaching or worse big game trollers. My gut says selling should be easy in the right environment and for the 21st century, phone and email prospecting isn't it.
Since this is still my first sales gig, i'm hesitant to keep going. In a few weeks, i'm going to be going to a trade show. If I can't score sales from prospecting in person, i'll be quitting and looking for other work. Someone's got to pull the plug.
456 and H1N1 have some really great advice. 456's selling technique is great (similar to mine) and H1N1 has good cheap advertising.
I got into selling IT related security products and boy, selling to nerds is the absolute WORST!
This company insisted on cold calling and more recently emailing which I believe to be a foolish waste of time. In the planning stages, I said very vocally that direct sales has a place but we would be better off approaching a few relevant tech blogs and sponsoring them first to get some name recognition and a few customers that way. Those sponsors were dirt cheap too and would have given us some direct recognition for our money.
Nope, cold calls only!
In the past 3 months of cold phone and email prospecting, i've only had 1 guy interested who we didn't even contact directly!
I'm grateful I can confidently pick up the phone and prospect, but i'm highly doubtful of its long term effectiveness especially in this day and age where people immediately hang up on telemarketers.
I love reading cold calling success stories, but my gut is starting to tell me these guys are either just spam approaching or worse big game trollers. My gut says selling should be easy in the right environment and for the 21st century, phone and email prospecting isn't it.
Since this is still my first sales gig, i'm hesitant to keep going. In a few weeks, i'm going to be going to a trade show. If I can't score sales from prospecting in person, i'll be quitting and looking for other work. Someone's got to pull the plug.
456 and H1N1 have some really great advice. 456's selling technique is great (similar to mine) and H1N1 has good cheap advertising.