Crafting a B2B Appointment Setting Formula that Never Fails

Crafting a B2B Appointment Setting Formula that Never Fails

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In terms of generating sales and realize revenue growth, there is a constant need to optimize one’s appointment setting process. This is because business engagements with interested partners facilitate their transition to paying customers. But no doubt the process itself harbors a few complications here and there.

Firstly, one can assume that not all sales leads actually translate to actual purchases. This is an issue for a lead management system to tackle. However, since appointments entail head-on engagements with prospects, it matters if your salespeople have the proper qualities in terms of audience interaction.

It is also important to consider that effective B2B appointment setting depends on key sales facilities. The latest in CRM technology has to be installed so that leads can be better managed.

While these can be set, they also entail expenditures on staff trainings and system upgrades. Without proper oversight, these investments might just degrade your sales process, culminating in a failure to reach sales goals.

Failure is never an option and that is why businesses should focus on establishing sustainable strategies that can last long. Here are some useful tips to help you do just that.

Consider the time element in your engagements

It is crucial that your sales staff know the appropriate time to set appointments with their prospects. Usually, the ideal period in which to make contact is during lunch or around 8-9 am.

Follow up with email

In telemarketing, emails complement your prospect engagements. Your mails must have new information that was not yet discussed during the initial contact. To gain another engagement means keeping your prospect interested, best done through free ebooks, informational materials and invites to company webinars and trade shows.

Influencing comes first

It would seem the best approach to sell in the initial contact. But this often backfires, leaving your campaign on a difficult position to compensate for a rejected appointment. Marketers should remember that the sales process takes a long time before a prospect decides to buy. During such time, it is imperative to introduce your prospects to the types of capabilities you possess that other service providers don’t.

Be persistent but remain patient

The sales process takes a long time indeed, but this fact should not stop you from setting an appointment with your prospects. With a lot of hard work and dedication to your company’s goals will you truly attain realistic results in your B2B appointment setting.

How to Nurture an Effective B2B Appointment Setting Team

How to Nurture an Effective B2B Appointment Setting Team

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Any organization owes its success to cooperation. And no doubt a good B2B appointment setting campaign is bound to reap as many lead conversions as it can when its Sales and Marketing work harmoniously together, even in lead generation.

But enough about cooperation. Real achievements are influenced in part by the people behind these departments. Competency and professionalism are no less important than teamwork. Thus it is important for businesses decision-makers to invest in nurturing their appointment setting team.

When your goals are anchored on following up on qualified B2B leads, you might as well take crucial measures to improve your team’s performance. But this goes beyond small-time lectures and manuals on appointment scheduling. Training involves much more than just that. Indeed, it takes a lot more.

Here’s how you can create an appointment setting dream team.

Prepare a call guide.

A scheduled appointment serves as a thin blanket separating B2B leads from a purchase. Now, it is only a matter of puncturing through the layer using a special tool: communication. Obviously, there is a need to demonstrate a high level of authority to facilitate a purchase. For this, a pre-prepared call guide is essential for verbal effectiveness.

Build tolerance.

Profile your targets.

Of course, before any appointment is set, a thorough knowledge of your prospects is as good as effective communication skills. In the B2B industry, people in the executive class or in higher positions are your audience. Thus, you should maintain a database in which prospect information can be stored. Having a proper understanding of pertinent lead data can help your team to drive the appointment home.

Be consistent with your message.

What do you want to relay to your prospects? How best could you present your message to them? Once your team has a firm grasp of your lead generation and appointment setting parameters, you could bet that they could entice B2B leads to agree to a telemeeting.

How Marketing Automation and Appointment Setting go Together

How Marketing Automation and Appointment Setting go Together

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Since ROI maximization is always in the minds of B2B executives, it is not surprising that most of these businesses are spending heftily for optimized marketing solutions. However, making such a gesture never guarantees an improved appointment setting campaign.

Marketing automation however continues to be a relevant tool despite how some B2B experts view it. In terms of setting up sales engagements with B2B leads, it continues to be a reliable partner for better conversions.

Time saving processes.

When leading an email marketing campaign, you would want every second to count. Time is essential as your prospects definitely make a great deal out of filtering what they deemed to be unimportant messages. They simply don’t want to entertain anything that doesn’t have anything to do with their time. With marketing automation, you are able to effectively manage multiple campaigns (and not just direct mail) by producing messages that aren’t insipid and huge time wasters.

Better lead targeting.

Precision is always a complex issue. But automated lead targeting could help you find the prospects that are eager to engage and to buy. You wouldn’t have to rack your brains over a list of potential prospects in your LinkedIn network. And you would give your conversion rates a boost by providing your lead generation and appointment setting with high profile B2B leads.

Better lead nurturing.

Automated lead management and follow up could improve any endeavor for a sales appointment. Once you get to interact with a potential B2B partner, it is imperative to keep him or her interested until an appointment is anticipated. With marketing automation, you are able to engage your prospects directly and warm them up for your sales pipeline.

Apparently, a good marketing automation program has to be handled expertly. Better guarantees are made by companies that have a proven track record in lead generation and appointment setting.

Preparing for Appointments with B2B Prospects- A Checklist

Preparing for Appointments with B2B Prospects: A Checklist

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As soon as telemarketers, email marketers and other online marketers have convinced their prospects to agree to an appointment – whether face-to-face or via phone call – it’s now the sales people’s turn at bat.

It’s only the beginning; there are still a lot of things that could happen after a business meeting. The sales presentation could go awry, the meeting could catch the prospect at a bad time, or there could be other factors that could bring the appointment to its demise.

While these things are often unavoidable, it’s always wise to come to the meeting prepared. Here are some tips on how to increase your chances of a successful business meeting:

Do research. A LOT of research.

When a company sends someone over to discuss potential business with another company, prospects usually expect salespeople to know them very well. It’s not because of some misplaced ego trip; it’s just logical to assume that if you want to do business with a company, you have to know a lot about them, even if nothing’s been closed yet.

To fail on that item can paint doom for your sales meeting. Not only that it would be difficult to align offers to their needs, it also tells them that you’re really not that committed to them.

Foster familiarity.

If you’re the salesperson, you need to be observant the moment you sit down with the prospect. What does their normal office scenario look like? How do they dress? How swell are their technology? What’s the current buzz? The purpose of this is to find something to anchor on; something that you may find common among yourselves that you can talk about.

Doing this can help initiate a smooth flow of conversation during the meeting. But remember to keep things relevant and business-focused.

Make it about them, and offer valuable solutions.

You are there to help, not to sell (well, not yet, at least). You are there to enlighten them with value, not prices. You are there to offer solutions, not to force services for imaginary problems. Most of all, you are there to talk about them, not about yourself.

There’s no surefire way to close a deal, but being prepared and skilled to say the right words at the right time can definitely push your odds to lean towards success.

How to Succeed in your B2B Appointment Setting Campaigns_DONE

How to Succeed in your B2B Appointment Setting Campaigns

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If a lead generation cycle were a movie, then the appointment setting part would be the climax. It’s the deciding factor on whether an interaction with a prospect will move forward or come to a halt. Because of this importance, telemarketers need to make sure they can grab this opportunity while it’s on the table.

Here are the best practices in carrying out an appointment setting campaign:

Gathering preliminary details

  • A defined target list with job titles, industries, and verticals
  • From the contact’s perspective, what’s the benefit of agreeing to an appointment?
  • Expectations from the sales team
  • Full understanding of products and services

Gaining buy-in from sales:

Communication before, during, and after the campaign is critical for a successful campaign. Before campaign launch: Outline the appointment setting process, set expectations, and gain a clear understanding of the desires and expectations of the sales team.

Adjustments can be made prior to launch based on feedback from sales team. Communication during TM appointment setting will allow for minor adjustments or modifications throughout the campaign.

Other Factors to consider:

Size of sales team

The strategy will vary depending on the number of sales representatives that appointments are being set for. More customization is possible for smaller teams compared to larger numbers of sales representatives where establishing standards is critical.

Mobility/geographical considerations

Mobility of the sales team, as well as the geography they cover should factor in to understanding which appointments are best suited for the team involved.

Scheduling appointments

The type of appointment and geography of the accounts the field reps are responsible for are important to consider as you set guidelines for the time frame between initial conversation and potential appointment dates.

Appointment Duration

This will vary depending on the goal of the appointment, but a typical phone appointment should be set for a minimum of 15-30 minutes and a face to face would customarily take between 30 minutes to an hour.

Built-in flexibility

While setting appointments, it is important to detect 2-3 potential options, preferably on distinct dates and varying times of the day.

Next Steps

Delineating expectations once the appointment has been set including the hand-off process and the party responsible for sending the meeting invite and/or rescheduling. This framework should be in place prior to outbound telemarketing, as the contact needs to have a clear understanding of next steps once the appointment is set.

Appointment Setting Campaigns

Easy Networking Tips For Your Appointment Setting Campaigns

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In any B2B lead generation campaign, attending public events and creating networks from the people you meet is a necessity. You know that getting B2B leads can be done in a variety of ways, and it makes sense that you use all avenues in getting them. That is why networking is a good place to start. You get to meet a lot of people, interact with them, learn what issues they face every day, generally giving you an idea on what you and your appointment setting team should do to turn these acquaintances into actual deals or closed sales.

You can be successful in this, if you know how to do it. So follow these tips, and you will be in the right path:

  1. Come in early – while some of you would be tempted to arrive a few minutes after the event, but that would be a bad move in marketing. You would want to come in early in order to observe the other attendees better, as well as identify groups or individuals that you can interact with.
  2.  Ask around – when you are in a social event, please try not to stay by the walls. Not only will this make you look like a sore spot, it would also hinder you from meeting people and getting information out of them. That, in turn, would reduce the number of prospects that your telemarketing team can contact once you get back.
  3.  Forget the sales pitch – if you want a sure fire way to dissuade prospects from doing business with you, you should try using a sales pitch on them. Really, if there is anything that a prospect or networking event attendee hates to hear, it has to be someone trying to sell them something. That never ended well for those who used it. Besides, the whole point of you attending such events is to meet new people.
  4.  Talk about your passions – you know, if you want your new conversation partners to warm up to you, then talking to them about your passions can be a good topic. Besides, if both of you like the same thing, then would it not be the perfect way to establish a connection that can be transferred to your B2B appointment setting campaign later on? You should give this a try and see it for yourself.
  5.  Smile – truly, the one networking asset that many marketers tend to forget. You see, no one really approaches someone who, while they may have something good to offer, when they see that same person with a dour expression.
  6.  Do not dominate the conversation – while you may have something much to say, it is never a good move to actually hijack the conversation. A good appointment setter would let the others talk more. It is all about the conversation, not the business.
  7.  Follow-up – after the meeting, and especially if the conversation yielded good results, it is always good to give them a call or follow-up with the conversation, on a different date or a different place. In that way, you are connected with them beyond the event.

Pretty easy tips, to be honest. Just follow these and your B2B lead generation campaign would be fine.

Hire Right For Your Appointment Setting Team

Hire Right For Your Appointment Setting Team

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In any kind of business, hiring the right person for the job is a crucial activity. This is what makes all the difference in the success or failure of your company. That is also the main concern for those involved in B2B appointment setting campaigns.

You see, the risk of hiring the wrong man is a real problem. It can cost your company a big deal in terms of lost sales leads, not to mention the loss of good will and rapport, in case your new hire is not that good in public relations. Now, just imagine if the job vacancy is in the telemarketing department. Just think of the mess that it would create for you to fix.

Mind you, that does not come cheap. In that case, why not do it right the first time? If you just know how to do it, then you will be in the right path.

Take it slow

You know, the hiring process should never be rushed. Sure, you know that upper management has their demands, and that they set deadlines, but you need to wait a little bit more, in case the right candidate comes up. Waiting for resumes to come in takes time, and that is something you can never rush.

Consider hiring as a sieve

In order for you to hire the right people for B2B appointment setting services, you need to basically weed out the worst from the best candidates. Basically, you can only do that if you have a lot of candidates, which means you keep contacting as many candidates as you want. And if you put the right rules and processes in place, like interviews or special instructions, you can truly get the best ones.

Have checkpoints

For longer hiring processes, it would be sensible to set up check points. This will allow you to screen out applicants based on specific skills or knowledge that your company may need. Also, this gives you more time to decide on who you should really hire to get your B2B leads.

Give out correct tests

This is one portion of the hiring process that is so important, but one that usually creates a lot of misunderstanding on the part of your hiring team. You see, test scores can only do so much, especially if what you give them is just a generic type of test. Maybe you need to conduct more exams, or probably more interviews to really bring out a candidate’s skill.

Ask your team

After you have evaluated the values, methods and skills of your candidates, and seeing them as acceptable in your eyes, try asking your own team, hear what they say. They might be able to give you additional input about their skills, or provide you a perspective that is different from what you initially thought of.

Yes, hiring more people for your lead generation campaign is a necessity. All it takes is for you to take a concrete effort to choose your people properly.

How to deal with Appointment Setting problems - Featured image

Six Steps To Dealing With Problems In Appointment Setting

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Managing and resolving problems are a normal part of dealing with customers in an appointment setting campaign. I mean, you are conducting one since you know that prospective sales leads have their own problems to solve, right?

We need to know how to best handle the selling process. By properly assisting your customers, you establish a better relationship with them. When they have a positive relationship with you, they spread the word to their friends and family. Word of mouth practically compels the listeners to come in and ask for our help. All of that starts with the proper way of resolving problems and issues that are presented to you. Now, this is how you do it:

To start with, clarify with the customer what the problem is. Listen carefully to what they are saying. You should take note that resolving this problem is very important to your B2B leads prospects. Otherwise, they would not even be coming near you in the first place. Take ownership of the problem (even you are not to blame). Your job, at this point, is to calm them down and open coherent discussion.

Next, investigate thoroughly the problem. And when I say thoroughly, I mean deeply. A problem may not be what it seems. It is possible that several layers of issues encompass a single problem, which will require several different ways to deal with it. A simple ‘band-aid’ solution will not cut it like that. You have to be decisive in dealing with such things.

Third, you should be willing to give your sales and telemarketing team more power to resolve issues. You can create a ‘one-call’ resolution system that will answer all customer issues in an efficient and effective manner. And the crucial piece of that set-up is giving your people the authority to deal with problems on their own.

Fourth, prepare your reports. After going through all the facts, you should then share your findings both with the company you work for and the customer you are helping. The former needs the data in order to store in their archives, while the latter would want to know the extent of your work. And both parties might be able to give you more details once they knew where you stood at that time.

After the reporting, then comes the time for you to develop the business solution. You know that each customer has their unique issues. That is why you should put some effort into crafting a personalized solution to their problems. It will take some time, but you will realize that you are in the right path come implementation time.

Finally, you should follow up. After implementing the solution, you should come back and asses it well. You need to know whether your plan worked, or if you need to alter the plan yet again. This is the last, yet the most important, step.

See, these can be simple ways to improve your lead generation and appointment setting campaign. You just need to have the courage to implement them.

How Do You Know You Need A New Appointment Setting Campaign

How Do You Know You Need A New Appointment Setting Campaign?

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How do you know when to begin a new appointment setting campaign? This is the question that has left a lot of marketers scratching their heads.

In my 10 years of experience in sales, I know that appointment setting can open good opportunities for your business.

  • It provides quality prospects because you only get to speak with someone that are really interested in what you have to offer.
  • It allows you to get in front of your buyers when they are at the right stage of their buying process.

So it is important to must make sure your sales pipeline has a lot of warm prospects to nurture to for your sales team to convert into an actual business deal.

When my team experienced drought in our sales pipeline, we’ve decided to evaluate our marketing efforts. After a lot of brainstorming, we came to a decision to set a lead generation strategy. We’ve listed down the 5 key indicators that helped us decide to revamp our appointment setting campaign.

#1. Lack of prospects to nurture.

Whenever you look at your calendar, you notice large patches of empty days, where there are no potential B2B leads for your sales team to contact and nurture. When this occurs too often consecutively, it either means your current source of customers have dried up or your sales team has become slower. You better know The Four P’s Of Sales Leads Nurturing.

Even if you have a lot of leads in your sales pipeline, only 20-30% of it are converted into sales. tweet this!

How can you improve your numbers?

Never assume inbound leads can fill up your pipeline. Have your sales team scout for more leads through different channels. Ask someone to make calls or have someone send emails or attend business events, etc. Whatever your team decides to do, just make sure they reach out to your potential customers and avoid unqualified leads.

Related: Ever thought of following up Inbound Leads via Outbound Marketing?

#2. You have no ready replacement for a lost client.

Bad service, poor quality of products, they found someone else with a lower price or there’s a need to change. Yes, it can be painful to lose a client, but it could be more painful if you do not have a replacement ready for the one you have lost. Regardless of the reason, It is a huge loss for your profits when a client leaves you, so you need to make sure that you have a sufficient buffer to deal with the loss, or you have to have a new source of income for your firm. How?

Have the sales team to separate their leads.

  • Sales-ready leads
  • Warm prospects
  • Not interested prospects

Here’s to Assess your Sales Leads: Is it Hot, Warm or Cold?

Encourage your team to nurture all prospects even those that are not interested as of the moment. They might need something later on and consider you.

Related: Don’t Just Blast Cold Email Picthes, Nurture and Win Customers [VIDEO]

#3. Your deals are getting stalled.

This is expected when nurturing B2B leads. You might want to take a closer look at your lead qualification process. Sometimes, being too strict on a certain opportunity can be more costly than taking it in and turning them into a business client.

What could you be doing wrong?

  • You’re sending the wrong message to the right people or vice versa.

TIP: Identify who is your ideal prospect and find out the following:

  • Needs
  • Interest
  • Problems
  • Concerns
  • You’re not hitting the right audience

TIP: Interact and communicate with your prospects on their preferred channel or social media site. 

Related: Why Should Live Chat be Part of your Multi-Channel Strategy?

#4. You only have small deals.

If you want your business to grow fast, focus on bigger projects because larger projects bring more revenue for your business. However, they have higher expectations as well. As the saying goes, “don’t keep all of your eggs in one basket”, don’t underestimate what small clients can provide. They can help increase your revenue from a lost client.

These deals cost less and you will maximize your team’s effort because we can’t underestimate small deals from clients who will only buy 1 or 2 of our products. All right, we all know how profitable niche marketing can be, tapping into small clients to capture a greater share of the market, but there is a reason why bigger is better. So, you might want to take a second look over those small deals that look so tempting to close.

#5. The market is saturated with your business.

What if you’re more passionate in an industry that is already a saturated market? The fact that the industry is oversaturated means there are a lot of opportunities to grow your business. You just have to know where to look for it.  

What can you do?

Don’t be afraid to be different. Improve your products. Offer something new that separates you from your competitors.

If you see any of these signs of your business, then it is time for you to do something about it and overhaul your appointment setting campaign.

5 SMART Appointment Setting Goals For Your Next Campaign

5 SMART Appointment Setting Goals For Your Next Campaign

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As with any campaign that your company that your company undertakes, your appointment setting campaigns need to have clear, SMART goals so that you can positive results. Setting up SMART appointments relies on proper coordination between sales and marketing people. The sales department need to keep the marketing team updated with news about the leads passed on to them, and the marketing people should inform the sales department whenever new effective lead generation strategies are used or when new market demographics are tapped. Otherwise these goals will remain ineffective.

Here are the 5 goal criterias to help you do a SMART appointment setting campaign.

Criteria 1. Specific

Business appointments vary depending on which stage in the sales cycle your business leads are in. When b2b leads are not yet ready to purchase, sales people attending the meeting should be informed accordingly or else they might aggressively push for the  sale, and vice versa. Letting your sales reps know what to do before they get to the meeting will help them be more prepared and make your appointments more successful. Being specific also means setting appointments only with the people who can make the decision happen.

Criteria 2. Manageable

Don’t send a new sales hire to close a potentially big deal or else you could lose a potential client. The selling skills of your sales people should always be taken into account when pairing sales representatives to b2b sales leads. Doing so will help them close more sales for your company.

Criteria 3. Attainable

Have your appointment setters schedule meetings only with business leads who have an obvious propensity to purchase. This means the potential clients should always be—as much as possible—high-quality b2b sales leads. Even if the need for your product is not yet apparent, as long as the business lead will truly benefit from your products and services, you can ask for an appointment. For example, a professional BPO company has a business lead who owns a fast-growing startup with ten employees. Although their prospect has not yet expressed a need for outsourced services, the BPO firm can have an appointment with them to discuss the benefits of outsourcing. So, when that business lead needs to outsource in the future, the BPO firm will have already established a relationship with them that they can advance forward.

Criteria 4. Realistic

Let’s say you hired a telemarketing company for their amazing b2b appointment setting campaign. As much as possible, your contract should require them to deliver only as much business appointments as your sales reps can cater too. Keep in mind their work and personal schedules so that neither of these two will overlap with the appointment of the new business lead.

Criteria 5. Time-bound

When scheduling multiple meetings throughout the day, take into consideration the amount of time the sales representative would need for introductions, presentation, answering questions, and bargaining. Give your sales people enough time to spend on each client so that they can discuss matters more thoroughly. One more thing, unless you’ve hired professional b2b telesales representatives or some other online agent, allot enough time for the sales rep to travel to and from the meeting place.

How To Choose An Appointment Setter For Your Business

How To Choose An Appointment Setter For Your Business

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When choosing an appointment setter for your business, it is important to that their services are compatible with your company goals to develop to provide excellent customer service.

We all know that lead generation is important for a business to grow. It is also important to have a good system for contacting the leads to establish good relationship with them. Appointment setting services can help you manage your contacts, call them, deal with them and to set up a meeting.

To find new clients from those leads is not an easy task. It is absolutely impossible for a business owner to manage time and manpower to contact all those leads and make deals with them to do business. With B2b appointment setting, you can do all the tasks up to rescheduling and dealing with clients confusions about the set meeting.

Cost-Reduction

Outsourcing appointment setting services will not only help your business increase sales but it is also for cost-reduction and increase revenue. It will be much expensive if you plan to have your own appointment setting company. Training people and building the infrastructure will cost you a lot.

Double the Sales

B2B appointment setting services works like they are within your own company. They know how every product and services that you offer. They know how everything works. These will double the force of your selling system and increase sales output. They are expert in this field and able to make strategies that will work for your business.

To be noticed

Working with an appointment setter will not only increase your sales but will make you to be noticed by your prospects. There are different mediums that can be use nowadays like radio, TV, and online ads but business owners cannot be contented with them. They know that using the phone and talking to the potential customers is still the best.

What Appointment setting company to look for?

When working with an appointment setting services it is important that you work with a company that is already experienced and have good reputation. Check the companies that they have worked before. Look if they are effective like they said they are. Do not hesitate to ask questions. You must know how their calls are made, time they call, how many shifts and more. You might also want to know what other services they offer that can help your business grow.