Must Read: No More Cold Calling by Joanne Black

I just finished reading Joanne Black’s book No More Cold Calling: The Breakthrough System that will Leave your Competition in the Dust. Joanne’s book is about:

• Harnessing the power of referral sales.
• Attracting  your ideal client,
• Acing out the competition,
• Reving up  your sales,
• And easily converting sales prospects to paying clients.

I was intrigued by Joanne’s work after reading a recent Demand Gen study that shows only 3% of sales were made via cold call and 97% of sales were made via warm calls (referrals, inbound leads, web leads, live chat etc). I started thinking… given that cold calling is becoming less effective, what can we do to ramp up other prospecting methods? As luck would have it Joanne and I met this summer at a conference, shared a glass of wine, and discussed sales. I came to discover that Joanne’s work has the answers you need to be successful in a no cold call selling environment. Read this book.

I specifically love the concept of the Referral Wheel in Chapter 8. This very powerful brainstorming exercise is designed to get you to think! Think about all the different categories of people who can be potential sources of referrals.  Most sales people think only their clients can be referral sources. A costly mistake! Likely you have dozens of other referral sources in your network. Simply take the time to think about them. Plot them on Joanne’s “wheel”, and then create a strategy for approaching them. Soon, you will have a pipeline full of warm leads.

In Chapter 11 Joanne also includes tips for management. Smart move Joanne! Managers are often overlooked in tactical sales books. By getting management and their sellers on the same page you will ensure the ultimate success!

No More Cold Calling is a one-of-a-kind sales guide for managers and sellers that shows you how to stop wasting your time calling people who don’t want to hear from you and boost your close rate to eighty or ninety percent! Send your commissions soaring, work less, and enjoy it more – all without ever making another cold call. Following Joanne Black’s proven, referral marketing system, you’ll discover how to turn current customers and your myriad of contacts into rich sources of referrals – as you establish relationships that ace out the competition. Qualified prospects, ready to do business, will call you asking for your help.

Dedicated to increasing your sales

Colleen