Copier Sales "Ask Art"

I had an email the other day from "caggles" (Print4Pay Hotel Member) in Illinois.

Subject: cold calling secret and question

Art,

First of all, i love the site and your posts are extremely helpful. Ive been a member for a while now and I have two questions about your latest blogs. I would love to know if there is something I can do differently other than hand out brochures, because it gets old and I could use some better results. Also you said that it is always important to remember to make 100 cold calls per week. Ive been doing this for almost 6 years (wow, that's scary) and it gets harder and harder to keep up on that. Do you consider 100 to be a combination of in person and phone cold calls or just one or the other? Thanks for your help and I would love to hear what you did differently that worked so well.

Thanks,

"caggles"

Hi "caggles":

You know that's what I used to do, is to hand out brochures and to tell you the truth, most of the time I would follow up days and weeks thereafter, actually more like weeks and whatever interest I may have generated was lost!

I'm just handing out my business cards now and asking for either the head of IT or the decision maker for IT related services. My pitch, and I stay extremely positive and cheerful. My name is Art and I'm just here to introduce my self and if you could please forward my card to the head of IT. By the way we are also going to follow up with a mailer on our services and who could we direct that to.

No appointments, no brochures for copiers, printers, fax, no doc management, just a card. If they ask what we do, then I tell them that we are a software and hardware company that focuses on new technology that will either improve their business or consult on how to save paper that is being produced (no mention of the word copier or printer here).

Well, to say the least is has worked, the key is then to follow up within three business days to set appointments for the warm leads (which I got three) and the other was to call every account again to verify the correct name and contact title of the person to mail literature to. I'll be calling those people back in a week or so, at that time all I'm trying to set an appointment for is to introduce our company. Yes, I get the naysayers, "we do not need anything", and I tell them "I'm not selling anything, all I need is 15 minutes to show you the services we provide". So far so good, in the last 12 months I've probably handed out hundreds of brochures an no calls.

Tip: Try to remove any logos from your card that are recognizable as you selling copiers, printers and etc. Also with some type of acronym if your company has office products, or business solutions. Make them ask you what you sell, and they will be more receptive. 100 cold calls, yes, especially in these times, you gotta get back to basics and beat the bushes.

Hope this helps.

-=Good Selling=-