The Engaging Leader Diary – Selling Over The Phone

In November, I decided that we needed some help selling over the phone. Taking a cold hard look at our business, I realised we were shying away from picking up the phone and hiding behind email. We know we are good at what we do but we were playing the avoidance game.

So I appointed Anthony Stears as our sales coach aka The Telephone Assassin. I knew if anyone could guide and push us into action it would be Anthony. So what has working with Anthony taught us?

1. Having picked up the phone much more frequently we have been surprised – people are generally pleased to hear from us! We had been putting up non existent barriers and under valuing our experience.

2. By being our genuine selves and having lots of experience to offer we have been able to leave people with value from our call even if our services are not needed right now.These have included referrals for other great providers, helpful tips and advice.

3. We have become clearer about our offer. We have a great menu of products and services including an exceptional engagement tool and can
offer it on a try before you buy basis. This fits in beautifully with our approach of paying it forward. What is to be embarrassed about
sharing that?

4. We have become clearer about the steps in our sales process.

5. Linked to these steps we have a points system which has been really helpful. We have a spreadsheet and award ourselves points for
each stage of the sales process. We can see projects moving nicely through our pipeline and our aim is just to nudge ourselves along to
eventually a final decision.

6. As a small business we only have ourselves to hold us to account. Having Anthony ready to give us a polite kicking has been really helpful.
As I wrote in my book The Power To Get Things Done (Whether You Feel Like It Or Not). You need to have people and situations that
hold you to account and stop you from wobbling.

7. As a consequence our pipeline has grown and now new opportunities are becoming paid work.

8. My colleague John and I realise that thanks to Anthony we like making sales calls now :).

I think to be authentic when providing people development services you have to be honest and admit where you are falling short and take action. To learn more of Anthony’s top tips I interviewed him and you can access for free here  Selling More Over the Phone with Anthony Stears.

With thanks to our excellent Sales Coach – Anthony Stears

Chris Cooper is an engagement, leadership and team development specialist, coach, workshop facilitator and keynote speaker based in the UK. He is host of the Business Elevation Show the most accessed business show on Voice America with world’s leading on-line platform in 2018 and Co-Author of The Power To Get Things Done (Whether You Feel Like It Or Not). He is a fellow of the Professional Speaking Association and partner of Engagement Multiplier . To contact Chris to see how he and his business can help you : Chris@chriscooper.co.uk