Salespeople often complain about prospects not returning their calls after they leave voicemail messages, and they ponder what to say to get prospects to call back. It is not good to spend time and energy thinking about this because it is my belief that prospects do not return calls from voicemails that are left by salespeople. This might sound a bit pessimistic, but I base this assumption on the following factors:

  • The prospect is too busy to return the call.
  • The prospect is not interested (yet).
  • The prospect has a certain level of ego and feels it is below him or her to call a salesperson back.
  • The prospect assumes the salesperson will call back again.
  • The prospect intends to call the salesperson back but forgets.
  • The prospect does not listen to the message.

All of these points about understanding the prospect may sound a bit negative and I am trying to talk you out of calling the prospect altogether. That is not the point of this exercise. More so, the goal here is to better understand the prospect and be able to picture what is going on with that person so that you can make better decisions regarding your voicemail messages.