According to sales guru Jill Konrath, although many people have shifted to paid advertising such as Google AdWords, banner display, CPV and PPV, the old highly efficient e-mail marketing technique still works. It is called email cold calling.
Getting Your First Foot In The Door
Jill Konrath is a corporate sales trainer and an Internet marketer with years of experience dealing with the most strategic methods. She says that email cold calling in this approach is not done by a spammy manner where you just send out a bunch of e-mails and hope to get one response, and who knows, a miraculous call with a real person on the other side of the line.
The process involves three main steps which are:
• Get to know your prospect.
• Personalize your email cold calling contact.
• Work from the head to the tail of your prospect's organization.
Getting To Know Your Prospect
The reason why so many e-mail marketing campaigns fail is because they make use of rehashed e-mail template letters which everyone has seen a couple of hundreds of each. They have no personal touch, nothing that can link the prospect to feeling that you are talking to him, and him alone.
This is where this email cold calling process is totally different. In it, you study your prospect's company, what drives it, its ideology. You pick the tone of the organization, how your prospect communicates, how he/she expresses himself/herself and so forth.
Just to give you an idea, it's like dissecting a frog. In this case, you really go down to the various elements and components that could differentiate your email cold calling, so that when your prospect gets your e-mail they go like: “Wow! I was just saying this the other day.” or “This is what I always tell everyone. This guy/gal really knows what he/she is talking about.”
Now, why do things this way? It consumes too much time, some will say.
What's best? To send 1,000 e-mails and get 1 reply, and out of 100 replies, get 1 cold call? Or is it better to get 5 replies out of 10 e-mails, and who knows? 10 calls out of every 100 replies? Sounds good, right?
Well, Jill says her method is able to produce around 10 high-quality e-mails that have a 50% average response. This means that you work 100 times less and have a leverage 1,000 times greater. Her method!... it's that amazing!
Personalizing Your Email Cold Calling Contact
Once you've done your homework, know the ins and outs of the organization, you are ready to make the kill. But don't think that just because you know it all, that you're going to hit the ball with your first swing.
There are actually thousands of companies out there that do data mining work, and that collect a lot of insight about companies. So it's a little harder to impress people nowadays.
In this email cold calling step, you are reading your prospects mind. Literally. It's like contacting a CEO who's a writer, and you cite his/her work. You could say something like: “When you said that we have to make sound investments in your book “Smart Investments”, on page 51, I was hooked. I totally agree with you, and here's what I've done so far...”
This method of tuning into your prospect's world is so you are no longer a stranger and become part of the family.
If you are successful enough in bonding with your prospect, he'll say something like: “Don't I know you from somewhere?” And that's the power of this method!
Working From The Head Of The Organization To Its Tail
Now the reason why I say, “shoot to kill”, it is because sometimes you save a lot of redundant work if you're able to get to the CEO on your first contact, with a first foot in the door. Sometimes such email cold calling techniques allow you to get that cold call you want so much with just the first few e-mails. And that's the beauty of the thing.
However, let's say that you try to get to the CEO and using this method you try your best to be subtle, professional and polished in your e-mails. But if even in doing so, you fail to click with your prospect and he gives you the cold shoulder, this is where this step will be very effective.
Well, you learned so much about your prospect. Darn, you know where he eats, what he thinks, what he reads, what he writes, where he conferences at and so forth. Not that you are a stalker, of course, it's just that you're that persistent!
Then you attempt to make a contact with his executive assistant. Slip in a freebie for both, your prospect, and the executive assistant. Make them like you by liking what you give them.
If you're able to get your message across through anyone, and if at least you're able to leave a door open, it's most definitely possible that you'll multiply your chances of success.
It's obvious that this method won't be effective, let's say, with all your prospects. But if you're applying the 3rd step here on this article to, let's say, 10 prospects. Chances are that you'll really close a deal with at least 1 of them over time.
This is because your prospect will barely notice you from so subtle you are. He'll be reading your stuff, eating your donuts, talking to you at a conference, who knows... the sky is the limit.
You do everything with the least resistance approach. You relearn how to market. You become a marketing genie by learning what buttons to press, what words to say, what letters to write and so on.
Jill has been very kind in sharing her email cold calling techniques. She's put out 4 freebies just for you. 1 eBook, 1 audio, 1 workbook and 1 cheat sheet so you can dive into her world and know why she's so successful. Before you hit the subscribe button, her content is that amazing, we know you will, you can just start by sipping her content in small dosages. Then whenever you are done wetting your feet in the sea, get ready to dive in. We're certain that you'll keep coming back for more. And once you finally master these techniques, you'll wonder how you could ever do e-mail marketing without it.
Learn more about Jill Konrath at https://www.jillkonrath.com.
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