Best Way to Approach Local Businesses? How to Open the Sale?

Advertising is relatively easy to sell. It helps to specialize in a niche and learn the business "lingo" for example in medical, dental, automotive, real estate, insurance etc.

My sales reps generally will target a business complex or medical center and just walk in asking for the person who orders [your product or service]. If it's a small business ask for the owner or manager, don't just leave your business card. You need to actually speak to the buyer, or get his/her name. As with advertising, our product has very wide appeal (hands free voice texting for any phone), so it's quick and easy to demonstrate.

As you start getting revenue, ramp it up to larger businesses. You will need to have some kind of followup system in place (such as Act) to keep track of your customers and prospects. Ideally call back or visit at least once a month just to check on results, and obtain referrals!

Thanks for the advice. That's sort of what I was planning on doing. Just looking for a good "ice breaker" more or less so I don't come off as just "another annoying guy trying to sell some stuff".

I'm also working on developing a sales letter and coupling that with more information about my company and mailing that out to a targeted list that I've researched myself. For the cost of a stamp, some envelopes and a few pieces of paper, I think it's worth a shot and could serve as a great lead generator.

Great Ideas - I have often used a dialing for dollars specialist to sell 15 minute appointments, while you tell them your in the neighbourhood. You will be surprized at just how many people will give you 15 minutes to pitch to them.

Thanks

Usually having some kind of "hook" or intriguing question works. I have no idea what you are selling, but if it's some kind of internet thing, you might ask "How is your website working for you? Are you getting any sales from it?"

Whatever works without appearing too salesman - like.

Sometimes just being sincere about wanting to help them will do the trick. Often times, if you can't help them, they may be willing to give you some referrals.

Business owners trust other business owners. You're not a salesman. You're another business owner.

May be worth your time to do a little cyber stalking first.

What I mean by that is not quite going in 100% cold.

Having some information on your product vs. whatever medium they are using for advertising now. Plot your course of business that you want to target, wether they be by niche or geotargeted by street corner so you don't spend all day driving across town and burning gas.

Do a wee bit of research so that when you walk in... you know how you can benefit them compared to what they are already doing. Then find out who owns the location by going on to Manta. If they don't have a claimed listing there you can always go to your county records website... Secretary of States website... whatever... and find out who owns the company.

That way when you walk into the door.... you are somewhat prepared. You aren't necessarily cold calling. You are... but you aren't.

You can walk in and say..."Where's Bob?" Saying it like you have known Bob since the second grade. More often than not... acting like the age old friend will get you right past the gatekeeper. Unless they have Jedi like skills of detecting sales people.

I try to dress nice... but not too nice. No $3k suits. Business casual. Maybe even Jeans and a shirt... pending on the type of business. Always keeping in mind.... I am one of them....

Sometimes being overly dressed screams "sales rep" and you just became the opposition vs. a friend who shares common interests and thoughts. Whose common interest just happens to be how to grow my business.

When making initial contact. You may have a free gift/offer you might want to propose. The theory of reciprocity is HUGE, and works quite well.

What are you selling? What's your medium? If I knew more I may be able to help you put together a pitch or at least an opener.

Don't want to share in public?

Shoot me a PM.

Whatever happens... just keep in mind this is sales... and a numbers game.

The more no's you come across. The closer you are to a yes.


Don't give up five minutes before the miracle happens.

Depending on the type of organization, you should probably be aimed at related companies. I think that putting larger companies is the best idea of local companies, because small firms usually contribute very little, and asked 10 or 20 companies are very small and can be a mess. I suggest you write a package of care, and simply saying what you do, how much you need, and why you need this money, where is this money goes and how you can benefit the community.

Hey!

I don't know exactly what kind of advertising you are doing, but what I do whenever I need some quick cash is Pizza Advertising. I take a pizza box into the business and it grabs people's attention. Then they approach me. Wondering who ordered a pizza.
Gina Gray sells a great program here.
Don Alm also offers a program about several kinds of advertising here.

Hope this helps!

I can't imagine cold calling in the automotive industry.

For some reason I just can't wrap my mind around it.

My cousin owns a Chevrolet Dealership... All of his sales comes from a retail environment. The people come on the lot. His reps try and close. No prospecting whatsoever for the sales reps.
I thought that was the industry standard. So I can REALLY see not wanting to cold call for selling a car. That is a lose / lose out the gate.

Either way... it doesn't matter.

What does matter is that you can still remain to use "positioning" even though you used cold calling techniques to prospect a client. The key is... You have to care.... Just not that much. I love cold calling because an appointment setter can set me 5 appointments a day. So when I walk in.... I know that it's O.K. if they don't take me up on my offer.
I know that I won't have to discount my services because I am scared that I have to make a sale!

Holy CRAP! I HAVE TO SELL THIS... never goes through my mind.

Why? Because I have several other people lined up today.... tommorrow.... and the day after.... so if they don't want what I have... it is there loss. Not mine.

250 fliers isn't even a good start for a test campaign.

At the typical 1% print media conversion rate... that is 2.5 phone calls.... that is if I have a decent flier. If my marketing Kung Fu is no good.... I can expect 1 phone call.

At the typical closing ratio of 30%... actually 20% if you are fairly new.... 250 fliers will get you absolutely no where.

Now if you have a track record in sales.... the warm lead from a presold marketing piece should convert at 70% - 80%. So 250 fliers = 1 sale... if your lucky.

So as the previous poster said... if I mail out 250 fliers... at around $.50 which is really cheap if I am going to include my hourly rate, I mean.... time is money. Then factor in the gas for the trip to the post office. etc. etc. etc.

I can spend $125 and get one sale! WOOOOO!!!!!

No thanks....

When I was brand spanking new.... I had no money to gamble with and my back was against the wall. So what did I do. I sold my Black Berry on craigslist. Used that money to get some leads and set up an autodialer.

Then.... already having a solid script... I started making phone calls. $1600 in 72 hours. Actually.... it was more like $2100. Why?

Because I was so nervous on my first appointment. It was my first... what do you expect?

I sold a fairly large site for $1000 yet a week later he called and said... hey... we will gladly pay you $1500. Which is what I originally asked for. But I was nervous and needed the money.... remember... I sold my cell phone to get to this point.

Anyway..... That sale was a result of my 3rd phone call. I say 72 hours because I didn't want to SEEM desperate... for all of you out there real big on positioning. 72 hours out is when I set the appointment. Walked in with nothing but a smile and walked out with a check.

Whew.... bills paid.

SO..... I can spend a couple of hours every day getting new clients by prospecting over the phone. OR... I can lick stamps for a coulple of hours every day and spend over $100 per day in marketing costs.

Either way.... I will get a new client. But for $100 per day of licking stamps. I can pay some college kid $10 per hour to set me at least 5 appointments per day.

You do what's best for you. I know what works for me.

That being said.... don't think. Just do.

Cold calling is not the only avenue of marketing that I employ. I have at LEAST 5 streams of marketing going at one time. The most effective, and the one that pays for the others.... cold calling.

There is more than one way to get to Denny's.

As long as you get there. I don't care how you do it. You can take the Freeway, or the back alleys. Whatever works for you.

I would think advertising requires cold calling. Don't know that for sure but from experience I can tell you most of our high commissioned clients came from cold calling. I own an insurance agency and we plucked them from a list. I don't know of any list of people who are looking for advertising solicitations or I'd tell you.

Regardless, the local coupon guy comes around about once a quarter even though we don't use him. Nobody buys insurance off a coupon is the reason we don't use him. But he is persistent. We have however referred some of our biz clients to him.

Does that mean that'll happen for you? I hope so. Don't pooh pooh cold calling. It works.

I'll give you another example. We just partnered with a national tax service to do our client's taxes. We will only be gathering the tax information. Their CPAs, EAs, etc will be doing the return via the Internet. I have cold called over 100 local businesses. All accepted my flyer and hung it in their break room for their employees.

How about that for a silent recommendation? I don't know the exact nature of your proposed biz, but maybe your biz model can copy ours in that respect.

Just my 2¢.

sandalwood

Are small business owners willing to give you their time if some kind of appointment is not scheduled?

That depends on you... Anthony.

If your Kung Fu is good. They will. If not... they will use that as an excuse to not deal with you. But....

MAKE AN APPOINTMENT. You talked with them... however... you got them on the phone. You walked in and were at the right place at the right time....

Now don't lose that opportunity. Make an appointment for when they are not busy.

"I understand Jim, You have a lot going on right now, but.... when would be a good time I could get your undivided attention for about 10 minutes?"

"What are you doing for lunch? I'll buy!"

Whatever it takes to get you infront of him or her for just a few minutes to establish interest and value. Once you have done that. They will push off whatever else they have going.

They have to see the need and the value first though.

Just my experience.

I am not my usual self... I am not feelling so hot today. I just might be allergic to christmas.

I find that true face to face cold calling has such a low close rate, I rarely do it anymore. Local networking / business groups will give you the opportunity in a non-threatening way to share your business model with dozens of businesses.

lol... BUY MY SERVICES OR DIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I find Google Places (GP) as a good loss leader. (you'll need a portable internet connection for this)
Check the business on GP, Is it listed?

No, walk in, ask if they know about GP, offer to help them get listed, no charge.
Five minutes later "Google calls" them. You're now a hero and a demonstrated Guru, they will be very interested in talking business.

Yes, check the quality of their listing. Most likely it is crap. Walk-in and offer to SEO it for them for a modest fee. Do a good job, then you can discuss "next actions" with them.

Offer free 1 hour consultations for business owners in your town at the SBA, chamber of commerce, etc. Be a resource, move the free line, give great information with no expectation of reward, and you will close a ton of jobs!

Go get'em!

as there are a number of people who will try your tactic combined with companies' resistance to such, you may need to be creative and outright credible.
Goodluck

There are some really good ideas in this thread some of which will fit most people's personality. i thing you need to do what you feel comfortable with otherwise you will waste your time as you will give up when the level of discomfort gets to high.

I am big on 'warm prospects' and so I try to supplement my prospecting with what i think of as opportunistic prospecting. By this i mean try to make a connection with businesses you come in contact with in the normal course of business. for example, if i call into a shop which is obviously a small business and looks like the type of business i like working with i ask questions about a product that will probably require the owner to get involved and introduce humor in the conversation to build rapport. In doing so i build up a database of warm prospects that produce very high close rates when followed up later.

I think it is about quality and not just quantity when you are prospecting. I guess this is a variation on prospecting through business groups.

Here's what has worked for me. I HATE cold calling so what I do is call late at night to get the voicemail. That way if they are interested they call me back. If a live answering service or owner answers I say "sorry wrong number" and hang up because I am not going to do a sales call at midnight.

This is what I did for even my past clients offering my new SMS text marketing service, and 2 called me back the very next day!

This is a really hard question to answer without knowing the specifics of your business. There are so many different kinds of "advertising companies" out there. For instance, my marketing agency does everything from print to local search to mobile.

If you are cold calling on businesses do not just leave a card or marketing material and expect a call back. You may get a couple but this is a waste of time. Personally I DO think cold calling in person is much more lucrative then over the phone but thats me.

Again without knowing the specifics of your company or what makes it stand out from the competition (USP) then it is hard to say but a basic formula should be:

To instantly set yourself apart from others cold calling - not just in your industry but total. This also makes you memorable. People have different ways of doing this and I think its more on personality but I like to start of with a light hearted comment or small joke.

Dont let a gate keeper stop you there are ways of putting a little pressure on them so they pass you through.

You also can't stop if a decision maker says they arent interested. Ask questions and always present in features and benefits specific to that PARTICULAR client. They only care what is in it for them.

Your objectives should also be clear. Your initial cold call's goal should not be to close a sale. It should be to set up a qualified appointment to then close the sale. You want to spark interest and this is done by uncovering needs - once you do talk to a decision maker with whom you should be setting the 2nd appt. not with the gate keeper.

So it should go something like this:
I like to walk in and if they are standing at the counter say something that they dont ever hear.
"Im a salesman dont shoot" OR
"You guys dont shoot salesman on Tuesdays do you?"
I dont use this every time and have tons of other stuff I say but you get the idea. As you do more and more cold calls this will be a little window into the personality of who you are dealing with. If you get a smile or a little laugh you know this person will probably give you a fair amount of time if they are not busy. If they dont do anything then you better get down to business.

For the gatekeepers by simply putting some urgency in what you are saying such as:
"limited time offer"
"time sensitive as you only deal with one client per given industry per area" OR what ever creates a legitimate reason that you need to be contacted swiftly or talk to a business owner if they available THEN you finish off with the simple statement:
"Are you the one who handles this sort of thing", OR "are responsible"
If you present it right they dont want to be responsible for it, especially if you present it as important RIGHT NOW.

I know this post reads a little confusingly but like I said it really depends on your business and many other factors that need to be known to answer it 100% clearly. Also these are word tracks off the top of my head and you can definitely brainstorm better ones I was trying to get the point across is all. Hope this helped and feel free to PM me if you need more clarification.