Question

Topic: Customer Behavior

How Do I Turnaround Turn Downs

Posted by Anonymous on 12/16/2008 at 2:53 PM ET 50 Points
I work for a company where to increase our customer base, we make a lot of cold calls.
As anyone who has ever done cold calls knows though, you get a lot more no's than yes. One thing that I've heard though, is that when a person gives you certain responses, it may not necessarily be them turning you down... and you still may have an opportunity to turn that into a sale.

Does anyone know any good rebuttals to use?
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RESPONSES

  • Posted by Frank Hurtte on 12/16/2008 at 3:46 PM Accepted
    Dealing with turn downs on cold calls has been a major discussion point for sales professionals sense time immemorial.

    How you address "no" depends on the industry you serve and what you are promoting.

    There are some businesses which sell a slash and burn type of product. They take the approach, if you don't buy from me today - we will never cross paths again. So why not push the potential customer to the point of, well, anger - to the point where no is NO! The reason doing so will produce a 5% uptick in sales. Hopefully, you are not in one of these industries. If you are, I suggest using a fake name and a disguise(just kidding).

    Most businesses want to create a long term relationship. In doing such, this means not creating enemies in the wake of their cold calling efforts.

    In these cases, there are a number of alternatives to an actual sale. Simply getting permission to phone back in 3-4 months becomes a step on the road to making a sale. Determining the proper procedure for submitting a bid would be a fall back.


  • Posted by michael on 12/16/2008 at 4:32 PM Accepted
    Cold calling is my favorite activity. Usually you can feel your way thru the responses to determine if it's a final NO.

    Been doing this for too long to use those "so you're saying you are not interested in saving 35%"-type responses. Have you seen the move Pursuit of Happyness? That sales process doesn't work anymore....I mean to develop long-term clients.

    Michael

  • Posted on 12/16/2008 at 10:44 PM Accepted
    What kind of product/service do you sell? I agree with Frank that how you handle turn downs highly depends on what you are proposing.

    However, getting a lot of NOs might also depends on your approach. In insurance for example, if you sell the product on the phone, you're more likely to get a no, than if you just sell an appointment!

    Anyhow, if that's the principal way of developing business in your company, ask for advice on how to handle rejections. Surely your superiors and more experienced sales can give you tips on specific situations. They might even have compiled a document with all the most likely rejections you might face while cold-calling.

    Best of luck,
    Davide Pasini
  • Posted on 12/18/2008 at 11:34 AM Author
    Michael, I was actually watching the Pursuit of Happyness a few nights ago and I observed that... haha... So I am starting to second-think that procedure now.

    Davide... I sell advertising.

    Does that help in suggestions for ways to handle "no's"?
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