Michael Brenner in his blog post states that – Opportunities exist. They aren’t created! It is about unearthing them. Regardless of the proficiency of the sales person or that of the appointment setter, if there isn’t a pain or a need with a prospect – the prospect won’t convert to a buyer.
Michael also points out the challenge is with the activity, whatever the levels of activity – only 10% of the activity yields conversations and then, only a subset of these conversations make for a right party connect with a call-to-action. This translates to a dismal right party connect rate of 1 to 2%.
Accordingly, while no matter what you do, in this world of voicemail, your connect rate will remain between 10-15%, you certainly can make sure that all the people that members of your inside sales team speak with are ALL right party and, therein lies the secret recipe of making your campaign an unmitigated success!
I believe that qualification of an appointment is not so much about an opportunity as much as it is about getting with the right party (either a decision maker or an influencer), making sure there is an interest in speaking with us or learning about us (not about there being an opportunity) and a defined time to speak with us – B-A-N-T is only a function of the timing of the call. It is therefore ALL about the RIGHT kind of activity that will yield the opportunity provided of course the product being peddled offers intrinsic value to the respondent of the call!
