Lunch Duty Rap - Week 1

Since I'm the newbie, I have "lunch duty" on Fridays. This means that every Friday, I have be in the office covering for the other reps while they're at lunch from 12 to 1. Today, all the reps are eating Mexican food, and I get to sit here for an hour to answer phones and help customers who come in. Except that in Tifton, everyone goes to lunch from 12 to 1, so no one ever calls or comes in.

Well, I've hereby decided that every Friday, I'm going to keep myself busy by posting a Lunch Duty Rap about something I've learned during the week or something I read that day or whatever I deem important at the time.

This week, I'm attacking the effectiveness of different selling tactics.

I've been actively selling advertising for three weeks, and I've officially tackled an entire magazine on my own. A feat in itself! But I've also quickly learned some valuable things about sales and the best ways to get an exuberant "yes" out of people. I've been e-mailing, phoning and visiting my customers like crazy, yet not all of these three strategies get good responses. Here's the scoop.

E-mail

Obviously the easiest option. Just plug in an email address, write out your sales pitch, suck up a little bit, attach a rate card and you're good to go, right?

Wrooong. I detest e-mailing as an option. With e-mail, people can ignore you, delete your e-mails, never e-mail you back, and then you're left with a bunch of holes in your publication that you can't fill because you've been waiting on responses from people for a month. Frustrating.

However, my ad director did introduce me to a wonderful tool to make e-mail response a little more effective. Sometimes e-mail is necessary if the customer lives outside of the immediate area or is too busy during the day to chat or visit. For those unfortunate times, a "read receipt" is your saving grace. When you know that your customer has read your email, and your customer knows that you know, you find yourself in a priceless position of power.

Phone

Also easy, as long as you don't have a phone phobia (which I'm ashamed to say I've had on occasion). So just call up your customers, give them the scoop, get the sale and move on, right?

Sometimes. Actually, the phone is a lot more effective than I thought it'd be. I've made lots of sales just by calling someone up and talking to them for a while.

However, there are times when it's not such a great option. There are two cases in particular: when you're dealing with gate keepers and the absence of face-to-face communication.

Gate Keepers

"Good morning! This is Kelly with the Gazette, how are you?"
"Err, fine..."
"Is Mr. So-and-So available?"
"Ummm no... he's... uh... he's busy right now... Can I take a message?"

Chances are, that message is never going to reach the desk of who you want to talk to. "Gate keepers" are the office managers and administrative assistants who hold the keys to the person you're trying to sweet talk. The trick? Kill them with kindness. Eventually, maybe they'll start to like you and at least give you his voicemail.

Face-to-Face Communication

Never underestimate the importance of communicating with someone in person. Whether it's in your own personal relationships or professional ones, it's always harder for people to turn you down to your face. End of story.

Sales calls

Last but not least, sales calls - the most efficient means of effectively conveying exactly what you want your customer to know and getting good results. Despite the name, a sales call isn't a "call" at all. It's simply paying a visit - in person - to your customer.

Smiling, chatting, showing them examples of products, actively listening to them - these are all things that your customers will appreciate and respect, most of the time. And sales calls are my personal favorite because they get me out of the office and out into the community to talk to people and learn new things.