How often do you talk on the phone with clients?

[dvduval]

I was wondering if some of the marketing/sales efforts you do involve talking to people on the phone, or if you are almost exclusively using the web. It seems to me that when you spot an especially good prospect that speaking with them on the phone can help solidify your relationship with the client. What do you do to help solidify your customer relationships? And how much of a role does talking on the phone play?

[Bill Farnham]

I think everyone's milage will vary on this one, but for my flagship website our phone is the single largest source of sales revenue. I'm not sure how you are defining client, so I'll just relate how it works with our customers.

That particular website sells physical products, and a call into our 1-800 number allows us to upsell and cross sell the customer by engaging in a dialog that can't be done strictly through a web page. At least not any way I'm aware of.

So our average sale is generally three to five times the amount that we would have seen without talking to the customer. They call us looking for product XYZ and we have the opportunity to upsell them to more units of that product, or cross sell them by introducing or reminding them of a similar or better product.

Since we have over 3,000 products in our catalogs that are all consumables, it is easy to find other products the customer will want. And because the products are consumables we know we will be getting reorders in the near future. More products now=more products later.

Now this is just an observation...Because we sell consumer products that the customers are familiar with, we don't invest a lot of time explaining the products. A can of soup is a can of soup, and a bottle of shampoo is a bottle of shampoo. Not a lot to go haywire there.

If we were selling information products there could be an entire spectrum of questions that the customer would probably want to talk about. That could REALLY drive up the cost of customer service when using a phone.

You need to balance the pros and cons when using a phone. Phones are all about customer service, and that includes sales, and if you can't provide top notch customer service over the phone having one will just bite you back. You need to be sure that your phone is a profit center and not a drag on your bottom line.

For us, the phone is a win-win situation. Our customers are happier, and are sales are dramatically increased. They know they can speak to someone if something goes wrong and that gives them confidence to buy. We learn what their preferrences are and can recommend products we know they will like.

Bottom line...Use the phone if it fits your business model. Gary Halbert used to say that the only way you should ever let your customer order your product is by phone. (Unless, of course, your customer is a ****weasel

KJ

[dvduval]

In my case, the phone is not used all that much, and buying on the internet is the primary method of purchase. I wonder if phone sales would help someone like me.

[sparrow]

I guess it depends on what your selling

If I am selling ebooks very rarely unless I am trying to upsell to consulting

But if I am trying to solidify a consulting job, then 100% of the time I work the phone, this is the only way you can gain any ground quickly and listen to the potential clients

You can get so many more que's that close the deal doing this way

Ed

[dvduval]

Yes, when I am building a framework for continuing work over a period of time (i.e. consulting), the phone is an absolute must.