Advice from Tim Sales

How To Follow Up With Leads That Don't Return Your Call

The following question was sent to me from Arthur:

"When trying to contact a prospect from the real-time leads purchased and failing repeatedly to get them on the phone for an initial conversation - how many times and how frequently should a person continue to dial that prospect's phone before leaving a voice mail message? And what kind of voice mail message should be left on the voice mail of the prospect that never answered their phone even for an initial conversation?"

Hello Arthur,

Thank you for your question. Let me take you back to the Inviting Formula so I can put this all in perspective for you.

1. Greet your prospect (the lead) so that they're talking with you.

2. Qualify your prospect to find out what they want

3. Invite them to look at something that will help them get what they want

4. Close to action so that you're actually moving them towards getting what they want

5. Follow up or follow through with them to ensure they get what they want

6. If any questions or objections come up, you handle those and continue with the Inviting Formula wherever the objection came up.

Now, the question you are asking has to do with step 5 - Follow Up with them. The reason you're on step 5 is because all the other steps require you to be talking with them in order to perform the step. So you follow up with them SO YOU CAN GO THROUGH THE INVITING FORMULA with them.

Please take a step back and view this as if you are the lead. They've seen an advertisement and filled out a request for more information and then that has been routed to you (when you bought the leads).

When a lead fills out a contact form requesting more information they are typically "searching" for a solution to something (unemployed, bored, wants more, etc). Most often they don't just fill out one form and most often they're not just looking at one source for a solution. Meaning, they may be answering help wanted ads in the newspaper, watching infomercials, putting out resumes and looking at business opportunities through search engines, magazines, etc. Just like if you're in the market to buy a house or a car, you don't just look at ONE house or one car dealer, you look at several.

So if you can pretend you are the lead for a few minutes you will be able to do the right thing(s) for them.

If you remember in Professional Inviter (in the follow up section) I covered what I called, "3 things about follow up." The first one is unrelated to this discussion - it's about the importance of the Close to action step in doing good follow up. But the other two are very important to this discussion.

1. DO follow-up

2. It's not you

Arthur, In the way your question is worded, I can sense some frustration and I want to tell you that #1 you're doing the right thing - you're following up! Now how you do the follow up and how frequently you do it is important.

Call the lead the first time (as quickly as possible after the lead hits your email box) and IF you get their voice mail, hang up (without leaving a message) and call back in about 30-60 minutes. If you still get a voicemail, leave an upbeat PROFESSIONAL (non hype) message. That message might be something like, "Hello _____, my name is ______, you responded to an advertisement having to do with a business you could work from h.ome. I'd like to discuss this with you. The number you can reach me at is _________; again that number is ________. Depending on when you call, I may be in a meeting so I'll also try to call you again. If you get my voicemail, please give me a time you're available to have a quick chat. Again, my name is ________ and I look forward to talking with you."

Depending on the time of day, you could call back again the same day. I'd make sure there's been a time lapse of at least 3 hours (from the time you left your message). So if you called at 5pm, you may call again at 8pm. For someone you don't know, I'd not call much after 8:30pm.

Over the next 7 days, call 3 times - leaving only one message. This is a simple message, "Hi _____, this is _____, trying to catch up with you - my number is _____, again ____."

NEVER BE FRUSTRATED OR UPSET! Just simply call them with the intent to make their life better. You're going to need to talk with them in order to do that - so you're just doing what you need to do to help them - NO DRAMA!

Over the second 7 day period call 2 times - leaving one message.

Over the third 7 day period call 1 time and leave a "final" message. The final message would be something like this: Note - the message below is only for someone you don't know. Use the script in Professional Inviter for people you know.

"Hi ______, I'm taking your lack of response as not being interested - which is fine; hopefully you've found what you're looking for. If anything changes and you want to pick this up at a later time give me a call, I'd like to help you. Bye."

That's it - it's not hard. There's nothing to be frustrated about - some leads find what they think will solve their situation in between the time they fill out the form and the time you call them. Some people don't answer the phone from someone they don't know - so everything is about how you "sound" on your message - so practice leaving that message until it's razor sharp!

And the final note I will conclude on is, "It's not you." Meaning, you can do EVERYTHING right and the lead still does not call you back - it's not you so don't give it another thought. Call another.

I'd be embarrassed to pretend there's something hard about doing this. :)

Thanks for your question Arthur - I hope I've helped you,