This is module 9 in the Smart Sales System, where we will discuss how to use voicemail messages most effectively in sales. You might not think much about what to do with voicemail: you might just hang up most of the time, then leave a voicemail every once in a while, asking the prospect to call you back.
But it is worth stopping to think about and strategize because when calling prospects, you are more likely to get voicemail than anything else. With that, I am going to show you a voicemail strategy that optimizes what you say and the way you use the voicemail box.
This strategy is built around four tips and general concepts. I will explain those to you, then provide four voicemail messages built on those tips that you can copy and use with your product or service.
Assume the Prospect is Not Going to Call You Back
The first tip is to assume the prospect won’t call you back. This might sound like a negative mindset or attitude to operate with, but here are six reasons why there is a low probability for a callback:
- The prospect is too busy
- The prospect is not interested (yet)
- The prospect has an ego
- The prospect assumes you will call back again
- The prospect forgot to call back
- The prospect does not listen to the message
You might hear that and think we might be saying it is a waste of time to leave messages. We are not saying that at all, because voicemail is one way you have to communicate with prospects. Not a great way, but one way to deliver your message nonetheless.
And actually, in today’s world, where prospects don’t answer the phone, and cold emails can get deleted or filtered without being read, in some ways, the voicemail box is one of the better ways to communicate with prospects because they might listen to part of your message before knowing it is OK to delete.
When you assume prospects won’t call you back, it completely liberates your mindset and frees up your thoughts and energy. It can eliminate all the wondering about whether the lack of callbacks is due to a lack of interest or to you not doing a good job. The lack of callbacks is normal because prospects don’t return voicemail messages from salespeople who are cold calling.
This assumption can also help you to prematurely walk away from prospects by labeling them as uninterested when they don’t call you back after a couple of voicemail messages. That does not mean they are not interested. It is normal and simply means you need to keep calling them.
Change the Goal of the Voicemail
Another way the assumption that the prospect is not going to call back opens up our strategy is that it allows us to change the goal of the voicemail message. In a traditional sales approach, we leave a voicemail to prompt the prospect to call us back. But when we have clarity that the prospect is unlikely to call us back, we can focus on a different goal.
We recommend using the voicemail messages to educate the prospect. We can try to educate them on who we are, how we help, and why it might be worth them spending their time to talk with us.
You might think that sounds like a good approach, but figuring out how to do that seems complicated. The good news is that we have already created everything you need for this because we created the story you want to tell when we created your sales message. And your sales message can be broken down into building blocks that we can easily use to create a series of voicemail messages.
Don’t Ask for a Callback
The third tip is to skip asking the prospect to call you back in your voicemail message. This is a subtle change, but it helps keep the callback in your hands in terms of ownership. While it would be nice for the prospect to call you back, by keeping ownership and control of that step, you can make sure it happens.
Another reason this is a good practice is that it is more polite for you to own and handle the callback. By asking the prospect to call you back, you are asking them to perform a task. And if it is a cold call, it is too early in the process for you to assign the prospect work. You can do that later, but at this point, you are working to earn their attention and time, and with that, you need to be the one to perform the work.
Educate the Prospect
Even though we assume the prospect is not going to call us back, we don’t necessarily assume they won’t hear our message. With that, try to use this time and space as a way to educate the prospect on why they should talk to you when you call them back.
A conventional approach usually involves a message of:
Hello, this is who I am. This is what I sell. Call me back at this number at your earliest convenience.
Not only does that come off as a salesperson trying to sell something, but it also tries to get the prospect to call back, which is unlikely.
You can slightly adjust that approach to improve how you use voicemail to educate the prospect. Here are some different approaches that you can take.
We help businesses to [1 to 3 benefits]. I will try you again later in the week.
We help businesses to deal with [1 to 3 common problems]. I will try you again next week.
We helped [past client] to [benefit] and this lead to [business benefit]. I will try you again in a couple of days.
Of course, that is not the complete voicemail, but it outlines the general direction. You can leave one message that mentions the benefits. If you don’t connect with the prospect after a few attempts, leave a second message that highlights the problems you fixed. You can repeat by leaving a third message that mentions a name-drop example.
Send a Voicemail Follo-Up Email
The last tip is fairly minor, but many salespeople don’t do it, so I think it is worth discussing: send a voicemail follow-up email after every voicemail you leave. This can be helpful for a few very basic reasons:
- It helps to reinforce the message you are trying to communicate and deliver
- It is much easier for the prospect to save info from an email than from a voicemail
- It is much easier for the prospect to reply to an email than to a voicemail
In the video attached to this blog post, we provide examples of how to apply these tips to sales voicemail messages.
