Having a hard time getting to see the biz owner? Here's a sneaky trick...

Ok, I thought this was brilliant, and it worked. I don't know if this is original, my rep swears that it is (though it seems like something he might have read in a creative sales techniques book or memoir of a super salesman) so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt. It's really good, and I've hesitated for a couple of days posting this, but I decided to go ahead and share with the WF.

Our rep was having a hard time getting to speak to the business owners at several local businesses we were prospecting. No matter how many times he tried to set up a meeting, he couldn't speak to the owners. Someone was always running interference, or the owner had somehow "just stepped out". He came up with what I thought was an amazing plan, and it worked 100% of the time.

Here it is...

He put his sales material in a very large shipping envelope, and on the outside he put on a shipping label that read, in black text:

Business Owner
Business Address
City, State Zip

Then in large, bold red text he added (using a rubber stamp-like font):

OFFICIAL MATERIALS
OWNER'S SIGNATURE REQUIRED

He had a blue cap embroidered with the words "Southern Courier Service" and donned a matching blue short-sleeved shirt.

He then printed out a "Southern Courier Service" signature page with several sections, each representing a "package" with an address and a signature line. He put that sheet on a clipboard and then visited each of the businesses again.

Amazingly (or not so amazingly) at each and every business he visited, either the owner appeared from the back or he was told exactly when to return that the owner would be on the premise. In one case a persistent employee tried to sign for the package, but our rep refused saying "It says here that the business owner has to sign for it -- are you the owner?" After the obvious "no" answer, a quick phone call was made by the employee to the owner's cell phone and he was asked to return in 30 minutes. Needless to say, the owner was there, eagerly awaiting his important package!

100% of the time, either on the first or second visit,, he managed to hand over the sales packages to the actual business owner and collect a signature for the package.

We'll see how the conversion rate pans out, but I thought this was definitely thinking outside the box and was a pretty sure way to get a foot in the door.