5 Simple Templates That Generate Hot Leads

Transcription

1 5 Simple Templates That Generate Hot Leads

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3 2015 Gandia Communications, Inc. All rights reserved. Gandia Communications, Inc. (Gandia) will not be liable for any incidental, direct, indirect, punitive, actual, consequential, special, exemplary, or other damages, including loss of revenue or income, pain and suffering, emotional distress, or similar damages, even if Gandia has been advised of the possibility of such damages. In no event will the collective liability of Gandia and its subsidiaries, affiliates, officers, and directors, to any party (regardless of the form of action, whether in contract, tort, or otherwise) exceed the greater of the amount you have paid to Gandia for the product or content out of which liability arose. The information contained in this report and in our websites (including but not limited to information contained on message boards, in text files, or in chats) cannot replace or substitute for the services of trained professionals in any field, including, but not limited to, financial or legal matters. You alone are responsible and accountable for your decisions, actions and results in life and in business, and by your use of this report and our websites you agree not to attempt to hold us liable for any such decisions, actions or results, at any time, under any circumstance. 3

4 "Dialing for dollars." In the selling profession, that's just another name for cold calling. It's also a salesperson's most dreaded activity. I hated cold calling when I was in corporate sales. And I hated it even more as a freelance writer looking for work. I knew there had to be a better way to generate prospects. And I was right. In the year 2000, out of sheer desperation, I developed a technique I now refer to as "warm prospecting." It changed my sales career almost overnight. And when I became a full-time freelance writer, it helped me land great clients and grow my income. Even now, as a coach, trainer and publisher of two popular podcasts, I use this simple yet amazingly effective technique to contact potential partners and highprofile show guests. The 5 scripts in this document are a solid representation of the prospecting s that are working today for freelancers in multiple disciplines and industries. Study them, analyze them, think about how you can apply them in your own business. But above all, put them to use. I think you'll be surprised with the results they help you generate. To your success, Ed Gandia Founder, International Freelancers Academy 4

5 This Is a Different Kind of Prospecting Warm prospecting is not your standard, everyday prospecting. This is NOT about mass ing. It's NOT about newsletters, automation or copy-and-paste. In fact, it's the opposite of all that. Think of warm prospecting as "artisan prospecting." Each is personally handcrafted. And, when done right, these messages position you as a knowledgeable pro with a very relevant and timely message. Because of that, warm prospecting is ideal for: Freelancers Consultants Service professionals Small service firms Solopreneurs Entrepreneurs (but to approach partners or potential retailers) The essential advantage of warm prospecting is simple: This is one of the quickest, most cost-effective ways to attract and land high-quality clients without the unpleasantness of cold calling or the costs and time requirements involved with most traditional marketing tactics. That's not to say that this strategy should replace everything that you're doing not at all! I'm a big believer in having a diversified and multi-faceted selfpromotion effort. Think about a stock portfolio: If you're an investor, you don't want all your capital invested in one stock. You want to diversify your risk by investing in a number of stocks and other investment products. Same with self-promotion. It's perfectly OK to rely on one or two strategies as your main drivers of potential clients. But never put all your eggs in one basket. Why Do Freelancers Hate Prospecting? Now, let me explain why I believe that warm prospecting can become one of your main drivers of potential clients. And it has to do with the fact that warm prospecting, the way I do it, bypasses the three biggest reasons so many self-employed professionals hate prospecting for clients: 5

6 1. The fear of rejection 2. The time it takes to market your services through traditional means 3. And what I call the "tool du jour" hype Let me explain each of these briefly, because recognizing these three big obstacles is key to understanding why my prospecting approach is so effective. Fear of Rejection: The fear of rejection is a big one. It's the top reason so many of us hate marketing and selling. We don't want to feel like salespeople. And we don't want to be turned down we don't want to feel like we're bugging someone by pitching them something they're not interested in. And the reason for that is that most of us haven't learned how to separate business rejection from personal rejection. In our minds, getting "no" from a prospect (or getting hung up on or rejected in any way) is an emotional blow. We take it personally. And that, of course, affects our psyche, which impacts our performance even further, which makes things even worse and so the cycle goes. The Time Required: The second reason so many solos hate marketing is the time-intensive nature of the process. I mean, it just never ends, right? You have to promote your business constantly. If you don't, you'll quickly get caught up in that dangerous feast-or-famine cycle. Yet finding time to do this on a weekly basis is hard. Overwhelming Number of Choices: The third reason is not one that's talked about that much, but I think we're very quickly getting to a point where this is going to be a big topic of discussion as the hype surrounding social media starts to come back down to reality. I'm referring to what I call the "tool du jour" hype, also known as the "shiny object" syndrome. Not a day goes by where I don't get hit with an article, or blog post talking about some tips, technique or technology I need implement right away if I want clients to find me and hire me. Every time you turn around, someone's preaching about the latest and greatest social media tool. Or a new, must-have plug-in for your website. Or some "ninja" YouTube strategy you must implement immediately. 6

7 But really... who can keep up with all that stuff? And even if you DID keep up with it and actually implemented all these things, by the time you do so, they're already outdated. It's ridiculous, and it creates an incredible amount of confusion and fear among independent professionals who are simply trying to figure out how to land more and better clients on a limited budget and with a limited amount of time. I'm not saying social media is a bunch of hype. And I'm not claiming that SEO is a waste. Not at all! I'm merely suggesting that there's been so much talk about "tools" over the past five years or so, that we've lost focus on the end goal which is to land more and better-quality clients. Instead, we've become obsessed about the "means" and largely forgotten about the "end result" we want. 8 Reasons Why Warm Prospecting Rocks! Warm prospecting approach bypasses all three of these obstacles: fear of rejection, lack of time and the confusion created by the "tool du jour" crowd. It's a better approach to finding quality clients fast and cost-effectively. And here are just eight reasons why: #1: Less Intrusive First, this prospecting approach is less intrusive, even though Inboxes are so personal. By its nature, doesn t have to be read immediately when it lands in a prospect s inbox. Instead, it sits there until the prospect can get to it. Compare that with incoming phone calls, which have to be picked up in order for your message to be received. Plus, when you land in voic , prospects can t scan your voic quickly to see if it s relevant, so it will almost always get deleted. Considering how incredibly busy prospects are today, using a medium that s more convenient for the prospect increases your chances of success everything else being equal. #2: More Relevant The second reason rocks is that, in general, prospects are much more receptive to a strong and relevant message than they are to a cold call or to some other direct approach. When done correctly, short messages get read all the way. Which means you can deliver your message without the standard defenses prospects put up every time someone calls them with a cold pitch. They can quickly scan your 7

8 note and make a decision as to whether to reply or not based on your full message and not just the first 3 seconds of an incoming call. And that s been my experience: When cold calling, you have about 3 to 5 seconds to make an impression. But with , you have 10 to 20 seconds. AND your prospect hasn t put up the defenses he normally puts up when a cold call comes in. #3: More Personalized The third reason is that is a better medium for delivering a relevant and personalized message. That s because it s easier to digest a marketing message when you see it in writing than over the phone or in person at a networking event. The prospect can scan your message and quickly determine its relevance and value. She can t do the same with a voic , cold call or in-person conversation. And when you craft a powerful, relevant and personalized , you ll dramatically increase your chances of getting noticed and getting a positive response. #4: Leverages Key Psychological Triggers Fourth, warm prospecting s hit on key psychological triggers that are TIMELESS namely personalization and relevance. These are triggers that will always work because they appeal to core human emotions. And they work even more today because inboxes are overflowing with countless "me too" s and generic marketing messages that are not personalized. So unlike so many prospecting gimmicks and fly-by-night tactics you hear about all the time, this is not something that's going to stop working in a few months or even a few years. #5: Helps You Stay Focused and Motivated Fifth, from a purely emotional standpoint, prospecting with will help you stay more focused, motivated, energized and creative. You ll no longer feel like a pest. And as you start getting results, you ll feel even better about adopting prospecting as a long-term business-building strategy. #6: Less Expensive Than Most Other Strategies Sixth, prospecting is inexpensive. You don t have postage costs. You don t have to leave your office. You don t even have to pay for a list. In fact, the best lists are those you compile manually not those you rent or buy. #7: Quick and Immediate Seventh, prospecting is quick and immediate. As you ll soon see, my method involves a bit of research and taking some time to write a customized 8

9 and personalized message every time. But we re not talking about a lot of time. Certainly not the amount of time many other prospecting approaches require. Plus, your prospects get your message immediately. You don t have to wait days or weeks. #8: Allows You to Handpick Your Prospects Finally and this one is very important prospecting enables you to handpick your prospects. Much of the marketing advice you get out there is all about prospects coming to YOU, which is definitely a good thing. But when prospects come to you out of the blue, you have no control over who they are or when they come to you. They just show up, knocking on your door. Again, I think that's a good thing. But it's also critically important that you implement one or more PROACTIVE strategies. In other words, strategies that allow you to pick specific prospects based on your goals, preferences, and what you may know about a prospect that would make them a great client for you. And that s where prospecting comes in. This is probably the fastest and most cost-effective way to find and land high-quality clients when done right! As I mentioned earlier, I ve used to land some very profitable clients over the years. I ve also used it to start conversations with high-profile business people and even to secure big-name speakers to events such as the International Freelancers Day conference. In fact, for our International Freelancers Day conferences, I used to reach out to people like: Brian Clark from Copyblogger Jason Fried of Basecamp (37Signals) Pam Grout, author of global bestseller E-Squared Pamela Slim, author of Escape from Cubicle Nation Mari Smith, social media guru Jonathan Fields, author of Uncertainty Jill Konrath, author of SNAP Selling And my friend and co-author of The Wealthy Freelancer, Pete Savage, used to connect with bestselling author and business celebrity Dan Pink, and get him to agree to review our book. He ended up liking it so much, he gave us a wonderful testimonial, which we placed on the book s cover. With the exception of Jill Konrath and Jonathan Fields, whom I already knew, everyone else I contacted was a completely cold outreach via . They didn t know me from Adam. And even with Jill and Jonathan, the way I originally connected with them was via . I was successful because I used the prospecting approach I'm about to teach you. 9

10 Now, again, I want to emphasize that you have to do prospecting the RIGHT WAY, because most solos professionals who use prospecting do it completely wrong. And if there was ever a marketing tactic you HAVE to know how to do right, it s . There s not much wiggle room. There s not much room for error. When you use as a prospecting tool, you simply CANNOT: Send out an blast to a list of prospects (that would be spam) Send out the same message to everyone on your list Send out an that only talks about you and all the services you offer (a written sales presentation) Use it to market your newsletter or a new service offering The Basic Warm Template So what's the right approach? To be effective, your prospecting s must be: 1. Relevant 2. Timely 3. Credible Let me first give you the basic template for an effective warm . I'll then show you six effective scripts and give you an analysis of each (turn to the audio portion of this tutorial for that line-by-line analysis). SUBJECT LINE: [Meaningful Connection] BODY COPY: [Meaningful Connection] [Value Statement] [Credibility URL] [Soft Invitation to Connect] [ Signature] 10

11 The Goal of a Warm Before we get to the actual script samples, I want to make something very clear: The goal of a warm is NOT to land a client. The goal is to start a conversation! Essentially, what you want from your s is to get the prospect to respond with a question or statement that indicates some level of interest. Here are some examples of successful responses from a prospect: "Interesting. Tell me more about what you do." "We may have a need for someone with your skills. Can you send me more information about your fees?" "Do you write white papers? If so, I may be interested in talking with you soon." "Thanks for your . We were working with another designer, but she recently left to work full-time with another client. Can you touch base with me in 3 or 4 weeks? I'll be in a better place to discuss at that time." And from there, your next job is to get the prospect on the phone. That's where the real selling is done. But to get to this place, you need a short, personalized and relevant message that will get their attention and elicit a positive response. Let me show you how to do that via the six examples that follow. To listen to my audio commentary on each of these scripts, go back to the web page where you downloaded this PDF, which is: OK, let's get to them... 11

12 The Sherlock Structure of a Sherlock Warm I read/heard about. So I did some digging around and found that you are also. I'm writing because I do for. Unlike most designers, I also have. Here's a [sample/article/other credibility element]. Should we connect? SUBJECT: You have very inspiring stories Hello Mindy, I came across your website a few times over the years because I do a lot of work with nonprofit organizations. As I looked through your site this morning, I read Sabrina s story -- it was very inspiring! I m writing because I work with nonprofit organizations to create marketing materials that truly get noticed and increase donations. I helped the Arts Council for Santa Cruz increase awareness of their events and bring new donors to the organization. I was also involved in projects that were awarded a prestigious "Our Town" grant through the National Endowment for the Arts. Here s a link to samples of my work: [URL]. Should we schedule a brief call to discuss how I may be able to help you? Best regards, [ Signature] 12

13 SUBJECT: Read about Slate in the Houston Business Chronicle Hi Meredith, I read in the Houston Business Journal about Slate's impressive growth from zero to more than 1,100 employees in just three years. Congrats! I m writing because I may be able to help you clearly and concisely communicate with your employees. Among my 10-plus years of professional writing experience is more than seven years writing employee and benefits communications. I've won several awards for my writing, including the PR Communicator of the Year award from the Houston Press Club. And I excel in translating corporate-speak into engaging content that employees will take time to read. You can see samples of my work at [URL]. Would it make sense for us to connect in the next few weeks? Thank you, [ Signature] SUBJECT: Saw that you landed TRW Hello Maria, I read about your win of TRW on your Twitter feed the other day. That s great news congratulations! I work with design and marketing agencies as a freelance creative professional, helping them when their work capacity exceeds what their internal staff can manage. I ve worked on numerous direct mail projects, POS, internal communications as well as high profile national advertising campaigns for brands like Natwest, Disney and Siemens. Here is a direct link to my online portfolio: [URL] I d love to chat briefly to see if I can help you. If you re interested, just let me know when would be a good time to discuss. Regards, [ Signature] 13

14 The Industry Enthusiast Structure of an "Industry Enthusiast" Warm I read/heard about. In fact, that's why I'm writing, because I have a [passion/experience/deep domain expertise] in. I work with to. Here's a [sample/article/other credibility element]. Should we connect? SUBJECT: Congratulations on your new FLL facility Hi Jennifer, I recently read of the wonderful new facility that BluAir is building at FLL. It's always great to hear of new growth in the general aviation arena. I'm writing because I m a freelance copywriter specializing in writing for the aviation industry. I ve been a pilot for many years, so I have the advantage of being comfortable with the jargon of the aviation industry. (Have you experienced the time-draining headaches of working with writers who didn t know an aileron from ADF?) Here's a link to some of my work samples: [URL] Would it make sense for us to connect? Regards, [ Signature] SUBJECT: Excellent work on the Nutrix.com site! Hello Kelli, I've browsed your website a few times over the years, as I am very much into my home garden and sustainability. Yesterday I got your about your new website. Congratulations -- it looks fantastic! 14

15 I'm writing because my husband and I run a web design agency that works with small to midsize businesses. We act as a virtual design department for companies that don't want to hire in-house staff to create and maintain online stores and catalogs -- or to do website maintenance and marketing. Just recently, we lowered eletrolite.com's bounce rate, increased their per visitor page views and created an marketing campaign that increased their sales by 30%. Would it make sense to connect on the phone? No sales pitch, just seeing if we might have a good fit. Regards, [ Signature] The Local Player Structure of a "Local Player" Warm I am a customer of yours / love your stuff / am a fellow local biz owner. Here's how I've interacted with your products/company. And here's why I'm impressed. I'm writing because I do for. Unlike most designers, I also have. I love to run some ideas by you that could potentially help you accomplish. Would you be open to that? SUBJECT: Had a great lunch at your bakery! Hi Alana, I had a great lunch at your bakery late last week. I'll definitely be back! I just opened Franken Signs around the corner from you at 310 N. Polk St. We are directly across from the Grower's Outlet. And I'm writing because I may be able to help you drive more business to your bakery. I offer a variety of graphic services from graphic design to printing, signs, vehicle wraps, screen printing and embroidery. We even offer websites and fast website updates for your current web site. 15

16 I have some ideas on how you could drive more customers through simple yet creative signage. I'd love to run these by you, if you're interested. No pressure and no sales pitch. I was just impressed with your restaurant and thought of some ideas that could help you. In the meantime I will enjoy lunch at Two On Earth Bakery next time I spend lunch out of the shop. :-) Sincerely, Clifford "Biff" Smith Want to learn how to craft prospecting s that work like crazy? I'd love to teach you how to get results with this strategy! I have a comprehensive online home-study program called Warm Prospecting 2.0. In that program, I teach you the art of writing short, simple and powerful prospecting s that get response and help you land clients. To thank you for buying these templates and the accompanying mini tutorial, I'd like to offer you a 37% DISCOUNT on Warm Prospecting 2.0. All the details are here: This offers expires in just a few days, so check it out now! Already a previous student of Warm Prospecting? Contact us ([email protected]) to learn more about a special $29 upgrade option for this revised 2.0 version. 16