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Mike "Sparky" Detmer
is vice president of sales and marketing for Niles Audio and a member of the Consumer Electronics Association's Multi-Room Audio Video Council board.
Those of you who live in Florida or visit here know that Floridians
love their driveways. We’ve got all kinds—from stone to concrete to
blacktop. I remember visiting the client of a Niles dealer in Naples
who had custom-made pavers shaped and colored like the famous M.C.
Escher ink and watercolor drawing “Study of Regular Division of the
Plan with Birds.”
With this in mind, when it came time to resurface my driveway, I wanted
the job done by someone I could trust. And finding someone wasn’t hard.
Two driveway companies in my area send out regular mailers and I had
saved copies of both.
I began by calling one of them, Jim’s Driveways. A
professional-sounding person answered, “Jim’s Driveways, this is Jim
speaking.” I explained to Jim that I wanted resurfacing work done and
asked him to stop by my house, look over the driveway, and call me back
with a quote. He agreed, took down my number and said “goodbye.”
Feeling I was halfway to having the job completed, I called the second
company, Perfect Pavers. Again, a professional person answered, “Hello,
this is Perfect Pavers. How may I help you?” As I did before, I
explained that I needed work done and asked the same that I did of
Jim’s Driveways. The agent agreed to have one of their installers,
Alex, call me with a quote.
Later that week I received calls from both companies. The quote from
Perfect Pavers was 15-percent higher than that of Jim’s Driveways. And
guess what? I gave the job to Perfect Pavers. Not based on price, but
based on the telephone skills, and particularly the voice mail message
of Alex at Perfect Pavers. You see, when Jim called me back, he didn’t
sound very focused and he did a few things that just teed me off, like
talking too fast, saying too much, and rushing through his phone
number. While Alex, the installer from Perfect Pavers, spoke slowly,
asked politely for me to return his call, and left his phone number in
a clear and easy-to-capture way. I figured that if Alex could leave a
clear and concise message, he would do a better job on my driveway.
So if you want to get more jobs, learn to leave perfect voice mail messages. Here’s how:
• Think about the purpose of your call and what you want to
convey before picking up the phone. There’s nothing worse than leaving
a rambling, hard-to-follow message.
• Start by saying a greeting in an
enthusiastic tone and use your customer’s name: “Hello, Mr. Detmer!”
• State your first and last name, the company
you represent, and your phone number: “This is Alex Rodriguez from
Perfect Pavers at 305 (pause) 555 (pause) 4434.” Note: A simple way to
make sure you are speaking slow enough during the phone number
dictation is to write down the number as you speak it.
• State why you are calling: “I’m calling
to give you the quote you requested for resurfacing your driveway and
to answer any questions you may have.” Note: Don’t over talk. Your
objective is to get a call back, not to give details. People are busy
and you must respect their time. Some people will delete voice mail
messages half way through because the caller simply talked for too long.
• State clearly what you want from the
person you are calling: “May I ask for you to return my call at your earliest convenience?”
• Leave your name and phone number slowly and
clearly, “That’s Alex Rodriguez at 305 (pause) 555 (pause) 44 (pause)
34.” Note: The second time I leave my phone number, I say the last four
digits in pairs, which makes it easier for some to remember.
You probably have some good phone techniques of your own. If you want to share them, feel free to e-mail me.
