There’s nothing worse than hopping on a sales call and having the prospect tell you they’re not interested before you’ve even had a chance to explain yourself.

They’re irritated. you’ve got 5 minutes, ain't nobody having a good time.

And that was me last week.

In the first few minutes, the prospect practically shook their fists through the screen while telling me they weren’t interested in my services…

…but were willing to hear my pitch.

Zoinks, Scoob!

Now, I’m taking about 10–15 sales calls a week, so while I’m no sales pro, the reps have certainly made me a little better.

But this one looked like it was gonna be a fight.

Until…

I stopped treating the call like a pitch by saying:

“Well, I’m not here to pitch. I just want to see if I can help you reach your business goals and see what’s holding you back from getting there.”

Boo yah.

The tension in the air lifted, and the prospect started telling me how they didn’t have a reliable stream of leads to keep business coming in. Basically they were stuck in that nasty feast or famine cycle.

“What have you tried to do to solve this before?” I continued.

To which I got the common response:

“Well, we try to fix it ourselves, don’t have time, fail, and just go back to square one.”

Now we’re getting somewhere.

I could’ve jumped straight into our service, explained every little detail, and slapped a price tag on the table before they finished talking. But there was just one big question left to ask:

“And what happens if you don’t fix your lead gen problem?”

Asking this question shows the prospect "pain island". The cost of inaction of how they'll keep sufferring with the same problem until they take action to solve it. Make sure to give them room to think about what another few months of the same problem would mean for their business.

It’s easy to know you have a problem and still put off fixing it, especially when you’ve got 30 other things screaming for your attention.

And once you understand what’s at stake, you can follow up with:

“Mind if I propose a solution?”

Just like magic, there's no verbal wrestling match required.

Honestly, there are a million and a half gurus preaching sales scripts and tactics, and I’ve practically slapped my head against the wall trying to remember all their little “tricks” while someone waits for me to speak.

This gives me a much simpler conversation to follow.

Five steps.

1. Find out their goal.
2. Find out what’s stopping them from reaching it.
3. Ask what happens if they don’t solve the problem.
4. Propose your solution.
5. Present pricing, followed by: “Is there anything stopping you from getting started today?”

And if your service can’t solve the problem they’ve described, don’t try to wrestle them into buying it.

That’s a headache with an invoice attached.

Anyway…

A simple sales conversation gets a whole lot more useful when you’ve got interested prospects to have it with.

That’s where cold email comes in.

At the Cold Gold webinar, I’ll show you how we’re finding prospects who show signs they need our clients’ services and reaching out with an offer that fits.

​Join 189 others on the waitist here.​

Catch ya soon,

Parker