First, the response to the free motivational quotes ebook has been enormous! That’s great, happy to provide the value. FREE is an interesting concept, and I do suggest you pick up Chris Andersen’s book. "Free: The Future of Radical Price," to see how the economics of giving things away works in today’s economy.
OK, my final [...]

Many times voice mails from sales reps are horrible because they are too long and go into a sales pitch. Here’s one that very brief, but nonetheless horrible. Thanks to Tim Freeze for sending it in. I have scrambled the audio of the guy’s name, company, and phone number.

 
Wow! That was painful. Here’s a resource [...]

Sales consultant Paul McCord asked me to contribute to his Sales and Sales Management Blog. This week he is focusing on telesales, so I sent him "Why Your Voice Mails are Ignored, and What to Do Instead." Check out my posting for some useful ideas, as well as the posts from other sale experts.

Think about those prospects that you just KNOW should be buying from you, but you’ve come up empty thinking of new ways to approach.
Or perhaps you have customers that buy from you now, and your job description says you need to call them every month or so, but you feel awkward saying, "Well, I was [...]

This has happened more often than I’d like: I’ll be in a training session working on opening statements with sales reps, and someone will say,
"This won’t work in my market. My prospects are busy people. They won’t listen to this fluff. They want something direct."
So then I’ll ask, "Ok, what do you say?"
"I’m Jay [...]

I laughed out loud when a reader sent this to me, and I still do each time I listen, and watch the animation that some creative person added. This customer is obviously upset, but has a surprise ending.  
(Warning: if you are offended by profanity, DO NOT play this!)

Here’s a great example of why you should be totally prepared for leaving a voice mail message.

Having been in my business for over 26 years now, and telesales a lot longer (I did start when I was 14–really) I have seen just about every conventional and offbeat way there is to get to buyers, ranging from the perfectly ethical to the downright sleazy.
Here are a few interesting tips from a new [...]

Here’s a site I found that asks viewers to upload their funny or weird voicemail messages. There are not a lot of messages there, but I heard a few amusing ones. This one was from a guy calling into his previous company looking for a letter of recommendation.
http://www.truevoicemail.com/voicemails/boss-work/angryvoicemail.html
(WARNING: the profanity is prevalent)

Speaking of the little things and returning phone calls, I had a little drain issue before I left Omaha a couple of weeks ago and had to call a plumber. It reminded of a great contrast in sales experiences I had two years ago with plumbers.
 
I arrived at my lake house I had at the [...]