Top 10 Appointment Setting Tips for Small Businesses
Cold calling is still alive and going, contrary to some negative reports about this traditional marketing practice. There are different ways through which small to medium-sized businesses can achieve successful appointment setting and eventually achieve better sales margins and ROI.
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1) Provide specific information
Whenever potential clients seek for more information on your products or services, give specific details. Emphasize on what you provide if necessary and seek to know if they have any upcoming project or need of which you would be of assistance.
2) Call back prospects
Follow-up on promising clients to find out what exactly they need to know. It is critical to ascertain if this could be a lead to potential business or just a time-wasting gimmick. Investigating further on such requests affords you focused appointment setting.
3) Prioritise on Cost-Efficiency
Have in mind that your efforts aim at generating substantial sales profits at B2B lead generation cost that is acceptable. Set targets concerning different aspects of your business. These include number of accounts, average value of a new account, sales appointments needed for obtaining a single account and number of sales appointments necessary for obtaining one good account.
4) Design Incentive System
Having a good system for providing incentives easily sustains appointment-setting endeavors and boosts turnover of sales. Taking this step empowers your appointments program to generate positive results with consistency at reasonable cost. Avoid having an incentive system which clients find unreachable.
5) Customise the scripting Procedure for setting appointments and qualifying prospects.
Most potential clients do not offer direct information. Ask how much these potential clients would be willing to spend on a particular project. Those who agree to spending high amounts of cash would generally be more promising prospects compared to those who do not.
6) Have a Backup Plan
The majority of your lead generation costs for B2B sales are upfront, implying they are found within the range of potential clients who delay in offering positive response to your script paths for appointment setting. Counteract their slow action by asking them to state when they plan to take action on your offers. Having an alternate plan for approaching clients can greatly aid your prospecting activities.
7) Apply Good Judgment
The level of marketing activity practiced does not necessarily determine how many appointments get set, but rather your evaluation skills. Top producers do not focus on simply making a high number of calls or pitches to potential customers of their products or services. Rather, they employ proficient judgment and sales tactics to achieve success especially with complex sales.
8) Utilize referrals and word-of-mouth advertising
Utilising this approach is critical for boosting sales lead generation, especially when starting up in business. Keep learning new ways of convincing clients to consider what you offer to them.
9) Provide regular refreshment training of staff.
Realise that achieving more B2B sales appointments is just a primary step of B2B business development. Combine various approaches to attain successful appointment setting. Enhance ‘first meeting’ skills, pay attention to what clients want and incorporate this information into your phone scripts.
10) Listen to your Prospects
This is a common mistake made by appointment setters all over the world. Most of the time, the appointment setter calls hoping that everything will go according to the script. Listening to your prospects ensures that you know their needs and priorities, hence you will be able to come up with a proposal that can’t be rejected.
Appointment setting is all about results. If you can’t produce good results, then you are better off not working. These tips will enable you to focus on the more productive parts of the trade and as a result, you’ll get better returns for the time spent.
To discuss how Virtual Sales Limited can help with your Appointment Setting and start growing your business today please call Andy Dickens on +44 (0)1403 788 481 or get in contact via www.virtual-sales.com/contact/
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Andy Dickens
Andy Dickens is a veteran of IT Sales, used to leading by example. He is the CEO of Virtual Sales Limited (VSL) who offer telesales, telemarketing, lead generation and appointment setting services to B2b businesses. He previously was Sales Director EMEA for Red Hat and before that ran sales at Visio before it was acquired by Microsoft.