Chapter 1, "The Fears"
My name is Tom Kaufmann.I have been in sales and marketing for close to 30 years.
This audio will be the first of several chapters on my seminar on the techniques of cold calling. In this seminar on cold calling, I will refer to scripts that I use. Examples of these scripts may be found in another chapter on this seminar. So let's begin. Chapter one: In this chapter I will outline most of the fears salespeople have in cold calling. Then I will spend some time with the biggest fear, namely the fear of rejection.
I have had the good fortune of mastering several key sales techniques, These techniques include everything from being a good listener to cold-calling.
In this seminar I am going to focus on one of the most feared sales techniques that haunt salespeople. Cold calling or " gold calling" as I refer to it, is a great way to maintain your sales territory, and an incredible way to grow your sales. A good cold caller will never go hungry. Most sales managers push their sales staff to do more and more cold calling. As a former sales manager, the first thing I did was to ensure that my sales staff learned to conquer their fear of cold calling. By conquering this fear, I knew I could increase their chances of success. Remember a good cold caller never has a bad day. I can remember a late Friday afternoon making cold calls. I was not having much success. I was ready to quit for the day. Then I remembered a habit I had developed several years ago, where I never end the day in a negative situation. So I made one more call. That call ended up in a 5 Million dollar sale, you heard me correctly, 5 Million dollar sale that put 17 thousand dollars of commissions in my pocket.
So how does a sales person overcome their fear of cold calling.
This is done by understanding your fears. Just exactly what are you afraid of? And why?
The biggest reason sales people do not cold call- is the fear of rejection. They simply don't like it when people say 'no' to them. After that the reasons fall into a combination of the following:
Fear of contacting strangers. Don't know what to sayI don't know any companies to contact where do I get a list. I don't know who is the right person is to talk to how do I find out what are the right questions I should be asking? People don't talk to me because they hide behind voicemail they are too busy to talk to me they don't call me back I don't want to be a pest. I don't know how to handle objections. These are very common and real fears. These fears keep many good salespeople from becoming very outstanding and wealthy salespeople. In the chapters ahead, I will be covering each of these fears and the techniques I developed to conquer them.
So let's examine them let's understand them and then let's get over them. If you as a sales person can do this you will make a great living in sales. It takes a lot of discipline. Continuous practice will make your fears disappear. Eventually you will look forward to cold calling. As a matter of fact, it's a lot of fun. Most human beings do not like being told no. They don't like being rejected. So how do we get over that. I have learned not to take a no personally. I have learned to take the no professionally. I have learned to recognize that people do not say no to me personally they don't even know me. So think about that, they don't even know you! So don't take it personally, take it professionally. Maybe they don't need your product or services right away .Don't waste time with them . Talk to them at a later date. I get on to the NEXT CALL! Do the same Keep going until you find someone who does need your product or service. And is willing to spend time with you, instead of you wasting time with people or companies who do not want to spend time with you. There will be enough who will need your company's products and services. Its called the Law of numbers.
This is the end of Chapter One. In the following chapters I will be spending time on the other fears mentioned, and how to conquer them. If you practice what I have taught here, you will eventually get over your fears. Remember, you will succeed if you practice and practice I did.
Happy selling!
Thank You!
