Sounding More Natural During a Phone Sales Call

Michele Warg
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Sales representatives are taught early on in their careers to practice scripts when calling potential customers over the phone. Cold calling, in particular, may make salespeople nervous when they first start out. Sounding unnatural on a phone sales call could turn off potential clients who may not want to speak to you again.

Sound more conversational and natural by remembering some basic tips about a phone sales call. Just like in-person sales, you must remember the road map to success for clients to sign on the dotted line. Treat your potential customer as a best friend's referral rather than a complete stranger. Lastly, practice with familiar people to see what happens.

Do not worry about closing the deal within the first 30 seconds of a phone sales call, or even 10 minutes into your first call to a prospect. The first step in sales is to open with a product or service someone else needs. Next, offer details about the products and services when your prospect requires more information about what you sell. Present your customer with everything he needs to make a decision about buying what you have. The closing happens in the fourth step of the sales process. One call does not make the sale, and it takes a process to sell even the best products to the neediest customers.

Think of your phone sales call as a way to get in touch with someone your best friend knows. If you are nervous ahead of a call, pretend you have known the person's loved one since childhood. It makes sense to think of your best friend's father, brother, sister or beloved relative on the other end of the phone call. It is easy to prop up your best friend to one of his relatives. Likewise, it should be simple enough to sell a product or service to someone who makes you feel comfortable rather than a complete stranger.

Practice, practice and more practice turns your sales script into a conversation rather than a robocall. Rehearse your phone sales call technique on your own sales representatives and sales team to see how others like it. Demonstrate your sales prowess to your family at the dinner table and receive positive feedback. Have your peers or friends stand in for sales prospects to become more comfortable with your sales pitch. Familiarity and comfort breed confidence, and this attitude comes across to potential clients on the phone. By the time you work up to your best prospect, your pitch is so refined and natural that it is hard to fail.

Phone sales calls do not have to be perfect; they simply have to be enough. When you practice regularly and recognize the sale does not happen in just one interaction, calling a complete stranger becomes easier over time.


Photo courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

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