Cold Callers: I want your opinion!

[jlwilliams]

I may be over simplifying what you do, but offices are offices. Keep cold calling any and every one until you have enough of a base to work more referrals than new prospects.

Have you looked into groups and organizations in your area? It's kind of a cliche because it works.

 

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[minivanman]

Call up the gate keeper and tell him/her that you would like to send the person in charge of cleaning, a brochure so who would you send it to?

Now you have the person's name you need to speak to.

In about 10 days call back and ask for the person's name he/she gave you..... don't say anything else..... Is Jo Blow busy right now? Just act really casual. When he/she asks who you are, tell them, if he/she asks what company you are with just say I was just needing to speak with Jo (say this really, really nice).

You got out of the maid business? That's where the money is at!!! Why???

 

[Doug Smith]

But what do you do if that ask who I am? or what company i am with?

What if they ask me what is the call regarding?

I'll check them out

If they ask, Tell them. Maybe you could lead with your name, company name and reason for the call. If it were me, I would probably say to them It's Doug Smith, with Smith Cleaning and Restoration. The reason for my call is to setup an interactive demo our service.

I don't know how well it work, but what I would do is experiment with different lines and see what works. I think once you get passed a few hundred gatekeepers it will get easier and your script will evolve naturally.

One think I know for sure is make as many calls as you can. The numbers will always be on your side.

 

[Crexty]

If they ask, Tell them. Maybe you could lead with your name, company name and reason for the call. If it were me, I would probably say to them It's Doug Smith, with Smith Cleaning and Restoration. The reason for my call is to setup an interactive demo our service.

I don't know how well it work, but what I would do is experiment with different lines and see what works. I think once you get passed a few hundred gatekeepers it will get easier and your script will evolve naturally.

One think I know for sure is make as many calls as you can. The numbers will always be on your side.

Okay gotcha. I'm going to try a few variations and i'll post what works here best... I'll do 100 calls mon-fri trying different lines each day and see what works best. and at the end i'll make a report including ratios, numbers, and observations i've made

 

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[minivanman]

. Double post..... ???

 

[minivanman]

You've got to realize it's a numbers game. My friend Elena used to make 100 calls in less than 2 hours and she only got an average of 3 appointments a day. So you either need to get serious and do more calls yourself or hire someone to make the calls for you if this business is ever going to grow.

How did you get the customers you have now?

I still don't understand why you gave up the maid business and think you will make as much in the commercial business. It's not even close on the hourly average. I used to hang with hundreds of commercial cleaners in this association I was in many years ago and most of them had money struggles all the time. The few guys that did well.....1 was backed by his wife who made a very nice paycheck from her job and 1 that did all government work. The reason he did well with government work was because he had so many jobs and even though he didn't make that much profit, he still did pretty dang good from quantity. And both of those guys had their own floor crews. But hey.... if you can make it work so you are making great money from it more power to ya, I've just been around it for a LONG time and it is very rare.

 

[Crexty]

You've got to realize it's a numbers game. My friend Elena used to make 100 calls in less than 2 hours and she only got an average of 3 appointments a day. So you either need to get serious and do more calls yourself or hire someone to make the calls for you if this business is ever going to grow.

How did you get the customers you have now?

I still don't understand why you gave up the maid business and think you will make as much in the commercial business. It's not even close on the hourly average. I used to hang with hundreds of commercial cleaners in this association I was in many years ago and most of them had money struggles all the time. The few guys that did well.....1 was backed by his wife who made a very nice paycheck from her job and 1 that did all government work. The reason he did well with government work was because he had so many jobs and even though he didn't make that much profit, he still did pretty dang good from quantity. And both of those guys had their own floor crews. But hey.... if you can make it work so you are making great money from it more power to ya, I've just been around it for a LONG time and it is very rare.

I've gotten the customers I have now from referrals, cold calling, yelp, and other things.

It may be true that cash flow can be an issue but I have other forms of income.

- For bigger accounts like you are thinking $5000+ per month, margins are smaller and hourly rates are lower. In smaller accounts I am able to get away with above $30 per man hour because they love the integration with technology, the precision and detailed work we perform (I pay high and make it clear that I would rather have detailed work than a quick job). There is plenty of business to go around and there are many people I've spoken with who have grown to $5M+ Annually off smaller accounts.

Trust me the money is there, when clients choose the cheaper option over me. Half come back to me after realizing that the quality is ****.

People want the cheapest price, but the cheapest price for what they want.

They will not get what they want for mediocre rates, the ones that understand this have been through the crappy companies and realize that a service like mine is worth more (especially if they like a clean office).

The ones that choose to stay with the fly by night companies because of price.. they can stay. They are the worst type of customers (they want the most for little like you said).

 

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[minivanman]

See, that's what I mean... $30 per man hour. Our average was right at $55. Low side was $30 per man hour and high side was $140 per man hour. And back then I paid $11 an hour to my highest paid girl. We started out at $7.25 and most were at $9-$10. She was with me from start to the end and through 2 other owners (I sold 1 business 3 times). So if you pay a high hourly rate at only $30 per man hour I just don't see where there is much profit in it but far be it for me. Good luck. I hope you stay around and keep us updated. Hell, I'm tempted to have one of my girls call to set up the appointments and go in half with you. I have a bad a$$ girl selling washers and dryers for me, I can imagine how good she can do at other things. But then I bring myself back to earth. lol Keep us updated.

 

[Crexty]

See, that's what I mean... $30 per man hour. Our average was right at $55. Low side was $30 per man hour and high side was $140 per man hour. And back then I paid $11 an hour to my highest paid girl. We started out at $7.25 and most were at $9-$10. She was with me from start to the end and through 2 other owners (I sold 1 business 3 times). So if you pay a high hourly rate at only $30 per man hour I just don't see where there is much profit in it but far be it for me. Good luck. I hope you stay around and keep us updated. Hell, I'm tempted to have one of my girls call to set up the appointments and go in half with you. I have a bad a$$ girl selling washers and dryers for me, I can imagine how good she can do at other things. But then I bring myself back to earth. lol Keep us updated.

After taxes , equipment, labor and workmans comp.. im at roughly 50% gross... theres quite a bit of profit considering my marketing and businesses expenses are very low.

 

[Crexty]

pm me lets chat more tomorrow.ill be hitting the phones hard.

 

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[minivanman]

You need to spend your time on the phone... forget about me. lol

I guess I need to put new batteries in my calculator because it isn't adding up for me.

 

[Crexty]

You need to spend your time on the phone... forget about me. lol

I guess I need to put new batteries in my calculator because it isn't adding up for me.

What exacty is not adding up lol

$30-40 per man hour
15-16ish cost per man hour

= PROFIT

 

[Crexty]

I will call 100 businesses tomorrow and will use my CRM to keep track of:

- How many gatekeepers put me through
- How many messages I leave with a gatekeeper
- How many decision makers i speak with
- How many voicemails I leave for decision makers
- How many estimates I get (IF ANY)


After a month of testing my ratios I am also going to include some sort of door to door selling (Everyones on the phones, gotta differentiate myself)

 

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[minivanman]

You got me, so if you pay $15 an hour, you have $15 left for profit. If you have workers that work a total of 100 hours per week you make $1500 to put in your bank account. $1500 x 52 = $78,000. Great job. Am I right or did I miss something?

 

[LeoistheSun]

Try direct mail. Theirs a group on Facebook called the charm offensive lead by Jon Buchan. It's it's humor and sticking out. I recommend you do both. Then follow up with calls.

 

[1step]

If your service is so great and you are so good at closing once you get in front of the right person then offer the business a free cleaning with no strings attached.

You can even say you only work with businesses that meet certain requirements and you need to talk with the dm first to make sure it's a good fit. For instance if you know your most profitable accounts are within a certain sf size or some other types of questions that can make your initial free offer seem more exclusive and not a scam

 

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[Crexty]

You got me, so if you pay $15 an hour, you have $15 left for profit. If you have workers that work a total of 100 hours per week you make $1500 to put in your bank account. $1500 x 52 = $78,000. Great job. Am I right or did I miss something?

I don't think you missed anything..

that means with 200 employee hours per week, that would be $156,000.

and with 300 employee hours per week, that would be $234,000 (minus a few bigger expenses at that point like a manager, and a supervisor)..

Profit man, profit

 

[minivanman]

Yeah..... the only thing your calculator is not adding up is that a $15 employee costs a lot more than $15. AAA or AA?

 

[Crexty]

Yeah..... the only thing your calculator is not adding up is that a $15 employee costs a lot more than $15. AAA or AA?

No no no sir. My labor rate is between 10.50 and 12.50. After taxes, workers comp, equipment and supplies, my cost is roughly 15-16.5/hr after gas and other misc expenses.

 

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[Scuur]

I cold call for my business a lot


I highly recommend reading Jordan Belfort's new book the way of the wolf. Regardless of what you think of him.
Two things your not trying to turn No's into Yes's
70% of calls are closeable.
Also get rid of the could just tell people what you want.

here's a similar script to what I use I don't know if it would work.
Hey my name is <Name> , Hey Real Quick, Can I speak to whoever in charge of your office? "Use a reasonable tonality like your trying reason with someone." Then they will ask what this for just answer: Regarding cleaning. "Use like a concerning slow tonality like your mom did when you were in trouble."they'll be like oh shit it's not clean

If you know their name.
Hey this (name) can I speak to John regarding cleaning?

If you get objections I usually expect 2 to 3 objections in my industriey so I like to list what ever they say as objects the docs out we have somone else etc
I'll list the first objection not sure if it will work in your industry but it might.
______________________________________
Objection --- There not here right now etc

tell the gatekeeper I’m sorry I didn’t Catch your name?

tell the gatekeeper Ask for whoever's in charges name.

use their Name say thanks and you will call back a different time.

call back in like in a 2 or 3 days

like Hi this in (name) can I speak with (name) please?
____________________________________________________

 

[Crexty]

Hey! Thanks for the response. How many decision makers are you able to speak with out of 100 Calls?

I cold call for websites


I highly recommend reading Jordan Belfort's new book the way of the wolf. Regardless of what you think of him.
Two things your not trying to turn No's into Yes's
70% of calls are closeable.
Also get rid of the could just tell people what you want.

here's a similar script to what I use I don't know if it would work.
Hey my name is <Name> , Hey Real Quick, Can I speak to whoever in charge of your office? |use a reasonable tonality like your trying reason with someone| they will ask what this for just answer Regarding cleaning. |Use like a concerning slowTonality like your mom did when you were in trouble.|they'll be like oh sh*t it's not clean

If you know their name.
Hey this (name) can I speak to John regarding cleaning?

If you get objections I usually expect 2 to 3 objections in my industriey so I like to list what ever they say as objects the docs out we have somone else etc
I'll list the first objection not sure if it will work in your industry but it might.
______________________________________
Objection --- There not here right now etc

tell the gatekeeper I’m sorry I didn’t Catch your name?

tell the gatekeeper Ask for whoever's in charges name.

use their Name say thanks and you will call back a different time.

call back in like in a 2 or 3 days

like Hi this in (name) can I speak with (name) please?
____________________________________________________

 

[Scuur]

Hey! Thanks for the response. How many decision makers are you able to speak with out of 100 Calls?

On a good day, I'll set up 3 to 4 appointments. I generally don't make more than 25 calls a day though.

 

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[itsemdub]

@Crexty it seems like most of the other posts touched on the gatekeeper aspect of the call already, but you will likely never get a Dr/Dentist on the line during the day unless it’s lunch hour. A larger office will have a gatekeeper. Have you tried going direct to the gatekeeper and talking numbers right off the bat? For instance, I’m sure you have a price you’d charge for cleaning services for an office within the Dr office size range. Hit the gatekeeper with that right off the bat and see if it generates any interest. If it doesn’t, pushing for a meeting to attempt to generate a sale will likely be fruitless. I think that most b2b is driven by one thing: price consciousness.

If you’re willing to step outside of cold calling...linking up with the business bankers at your local national/regional banks would be an invaluable step. Most doctors I’ve interacted with take their business bankers recommendations and referrals without question

 

[minivanman]

No no no sir. My labor rate is between 10.50 and 12.50. After taxes, workers comp, equipment and supplies, my cost is roughly 15-16.5/hr after gas and other misc expenses.

I'm just going by what you said. You said you pay well...... $12 an hour is not very well in any area of the US. I paid $11 an hour 15 years ago. And when I asked how much you paid, you said, $15-$16. I'm just sayin..... I've been around a couple of the cleaning blocks and I am actually wearing the t-shirt to prove it. Not near as much money in commercial cleaning as residential and not very much of a profit to be made at all. But we can agree to disagree. Now back to the originally schedule program

So how did the cold calls go and why do you only call 100 or so a week? If that's all you have time to do, hire someone to make the calls for you. Let them call from home and pay them a really good amount when they get you a bid. And $12 is not a good amount. Pay them $25 for each bid they get. I say do this at home because the odds are slim to none that you have a place for them to call from. So you aren't losing anything by giving it a try. How many people did you get to talk to today?

 

[Crexty]

@Crexty it seems like most of the other posts touched on the gatekeeper aspect of the call already, but you will likely never get a Dr/Dentist on the line during the day unless it’s lunch hour. A larger office will have a gatekeeper. Have you tried going direct to the gatekeeper and talking numbers right off the bat? For instance, I’m sure you have a price you’d charge for cleaning services for an office within the Dr office size range. Hit the gatekeeper with that right off the bat and see if it generates any interest. If it doesn’t, pushing for a meeting to attempt to generate a sale will likely be fruitless. I think that most b2b is driven by one thing: price consciousness.

If you’re willing to step outside of cold calling...linking up with the business bankers at your local national/regional banks would be an invaluable step. Most doctors I’ve interacted with take their business bankers recommendations and referrals without question

Interesting,

Do you think I would have better luck calling other general offices like

Lawyers, Insurance Offices, Call Center, Manufacturers, Business Services, etc?

I've done some research and roughly 50% of companies in the US right now is not 100% SATISFIED with their current cleaning company. This means they might have a company who does a decent job, but misses stuff here and there, maybe misses cleanings here and there, cuts corners, or just unprofessional etiquette.

Many companies will go ahead and continue to pay money to these types of companies because they figure that is just "standard service" for this industry and that the problems they are having are not that big of a deal where they can put up with them.

I guarantee you at least minimum 40% of the companies I call that have a cleaning service are not 100% satisfied with their company. Maybe 80% satisfied but not 100%. If I can just get in front of their DM and show that service actually does get better and not always at an expensive cost. I could sell some of these DM's or at least let them service for 1 month. Once they see our level of quality in addition to the features we offer (that nobody else is yet), we could surely retain some of these clients.

 

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[ajmassaro]

I cold call for websites

Hi @Scurr, sounds like you've got a decent handle on the cold call script you've developed. Would love to pick your brain.

Also, do you have resources that would point me in the direction to get my feet wet with cold calling? I currently work full-time on the East Coast but would love to try my hand in Cold-Calling scripts to get some experience so that I may eventually transition into Sales from my current full-time position.

Thanks in advance!
Andrew

 

[Scuur]

Hi @Scurr, sounds like you've got a decent handle on the cold call script you've developed. Would love to pick your brain.

Also, do you have resources that would point me in the direction to get my feet wet with cold calling? I currently work full-time on the East Coast but would love to try my hand in Cold-Calling scripts to get some experience so that I may eventually transition into Sales from my current full-time position.

Thanks in advance!
Andrew

Sure send me a PM, also @Vilox is the one who helped me. His post is definitely worth reading. I made my scripts through trial and error. A big issue was when I had a friend start cold calling. That's when I realized a script may work for me but not for them. Since then I have rebuilt the script one hundred times. I looked for outside sources in books the straight-line method by Jordan Belfort. As well as never split the difference. It mostly came down to just calling people day in and day out. Learn from failures, you will know if a script is going to work within the first 25 phone calls.

 

[Crexty]

I'm doing some research with calls and testing scripts... I'll get back to you guys with stats tomorrow.

 

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[Wolfman]

Wow. Thanks for the input.

I agree that commercial cleaning is hard to get into, but I don't see eye to eye with you on business.

There is millions of square feet of commercial property in just one small city. 54% of companies will fire their current cleaning company due to quality issues.

The thing is I am actually adding value to the serivce. I'm not just providing "Over the moon" cleaning. My company has many features that nobody else is doing in my city (too my extensive knowledge) that allow the owners to get amazing cleaning without having to oversee , and a couple other things i'd rather not say here. I have gotten clients from cold calling and always get price objections. But when they see what I'm offering and I carefully go over it when them, they see how we add value and differ from most (if not all) companies.

I'm not having problems with my closing when I get in front of people, my rates for amount of closes to proposals/presentations is very good. I'm just not good with getting in their door (cold calling).

I owned a house cleaning service and sold it. I prefer this service to that honestly.

Thank you so much for that information, I do really appreciate the info

Hi Crexty, I admire your determination. I'll soon be facing similar challenges and I'm certainly no expert on sales but I know a little bit about people--they like to talk about themselves.
Add a simple question to your script (to a real person), before searching for the decision-maker: "How are you doing today?"
Repeat that question in the mirror until you can do it w/ sincerity and curiousity. Then actively listen.
Possible answers: "Oh really, tell me more?" "How did that happen?" "That's too bad, I feel for you." (You get the idea.)
At that point you can even ask them for their name.
If they give you their name, I'd estimate that you've just improved your over-all odds by 100%.
This is not rocket science. People like to feel important--especially a gate-keeper. Another thing to throw in is a sincere compliment.
Examples: "You have a nice voice." "I looked at your company online and I was really impressed." "I saw a picture of your facility/building. It looks like a nice place to work." ...
Even in B2B you are dealing w/ PEOPLE.
Personally I wouldn't bother dealing w/ rude people or machines.
Good luck, Greg

 

[Crexty]

Okay.. Today I tried with this script:

Gatekeeper: Hello, thank you for calling XYZ Company, this is Mary.

CSR: Hello, is Eric available?

They usually ask me what its regarding and I get shut down when i tell them Janitorial Services...

Ugh.. I might speak with 3-4 DM's? out of 100 Calls... No way thats a good rate.