Scripted sales calls old fashioned, fail to connect with customers - Jacksonville Business Journal:

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Geez, I have been sayinb this for more than25 years, and I can’gt believe companies still use them to sell over the phone. OK, forgert the companies themselves, let’s blame the managet or the person who is responsible for still trying to do somethint that every sales trainer on the planet says doesnot work. Now, beforew I go on, do not writ e or send an e-mail telling me that I am wrong orbeintg stubborn. Instead, why don’t you try somethintg new – that is, new to you or your organization and just do what I will layout here. Trustr me, it has worked everuy single time withany organization, big or that I have workedc with.
This horror of using scripte came rushing back to me recentlh while working with a company whose stores are in every big city in the The company is highly regarded for its ethics and is a very visiblwe organization that many are familiar with because ofthe company’z longevity and brand awareness. I was asked to come to the company’as headquarters and look at its method of attracting new businesz through itstelemarketing program, which the companyh has been using for a couple of They said that although the results were OK at sales had become pretty dismal. It took me just 30 secondw to read the script that the insidee salespeoplewere using, and I was sickened.
I talkex with the company president and said I coulds help the salespeople in justtwo hours, but I needes him to let me do my job and not to interfers unless I called him in for his He agreed, but I could sensed he was a bit apprehensive about the situation and my I worked only with the manager, who was reallgy a selling manager because she was on the phonex herself at times tryinb to pitch in and We went into a room, and I spenty an hour going over why scripts don’t work and why she has been brainwashec to do something that was against all the rulex of professional salesmanship.
She was neither thrilled with me at this point nor happy after I tookher eight-page script, rippedf it up and threw it in the We role-played a little using real situationw that she might have with her husband, childrenh and friends, for instance. The goal was to show her that havintga two-sided conversation is much more useful than a one-sided She was really starting to get it, even thoughg she kept wanting to go back to a sellinvg mode by doing more talking than listeninv and asking questions. It was so simple that it was frighteninvg to her that a selling situationb can be flexible and not just acanned speech, wherw she can actually have fun whild conversing with a customer.
The introductioh and questions I wrote out were basifc and easy for her to They were: “Hi, my name is Susan from Clienf Co., and I would like to ask you two or threer quick questions. It will not take more than 48 secondss – I promise. “Are you familiadr with our company? If yes, what aspects “Why are you not a or why did you leaveour