| When I was in high school, I played quarterback on our football team. We wereplaying our cross-town rivals and approximately 15,000 people showed up forthe game. Our coach became a little flustered and forgot some of the plays.Early in the game, he sent a play in from the sideline. I called the play inthe huddle, but as I was walking to the line of scrimmage, I realized that theformation and blocking assignments were messed up. The receivers and I weregoing one direction and the blockers were going the other direction. I rememberthinking two out of three isn't bad and went ahead with the play. I soon learnedwhat happens when everyone's not on the same page. I was annihilated; my passwas intercepted, resulting in a touch down for the other team. I never madethat mistake again. As a leader in a network marketing organization a lack of focus will lead to a score for the other team. In talking to leaders and first time distributors, I've learned that voice mail has worked for one person and not work for another. Why? Because success has little to do with the voice mail system and a lot to do with the sales process being used. Voice mail is nothing more than a tool that facilitates the process. Whether you are selling a business opportunity or a product, you rarely go from introduction to close on the first contact. So before you implement the tool, implement the process. Selling a business opportunity takes longer than selling a product and selling a high price product takes longer than selling a low price product. Personal recruiting and selling is a different process than managing a downline. Downline management is where tools like voice mail can be most effective. There are several mistakes that people make when they create business processes and select tools. - They think too small. To build a large organization, you have to think big. Don't create a process or select a tool that will only work for a small group; plan on supporting a downline of 10,000, not 10.
- Not insisting that everyone use the same processes and the same tools. Remember my story about team members going different directions during the same play? How much more effective can a group of people be if they are all telling the same story and moving in the same direction? Simply plug them into the existing process and your team is on their way.
- The third mistake I've seen is that network marketers expect the tools to do the closing. Ninety-nine percent of the time you can't give someone a tape, a toll free number, or a web address, and expect them to purchase or sign-up. It usually requires a face-to-face conversation, or at least a phone call. Include this in your process and train your people to close.
Voice mail can perform several functions and can be set up to successfully resolve all of the issues I mentioned above. 1. Voice mail can be used for prospecting and selling. Most voice mail systems can be configured so that an opportunity or product message is played when someone calls a phone number. - If you are using your voice mail system for this purpose, it is best to have a toll free number. Rarely will prospects call a long-distance number to be sold something.
- These messages should be relatively short. In a voice message you can hold someone's attention for 2 to 5 minutes.
- Finally, leaders should not expect everyone to record their own messages. The majority of people just will not do it. Leaders should provide a library of messages that people in their organization can use. Remember that your goal is to have the caller leave you a message so tailor your message for this result.
2. The other function voice mail can successfully perform is to motivate, educate, train, and support your organization. - For this purpose, you need to choose a voice mail system that can automatically send messages to your organization. You can't do it with group lists you have to build yourself. Organizations change too fast.
- Make sure you can slice and dice your organization so you can send messages based on rank, state, specified leg, or level.
- Get everyone on the same system. The key to getting people on the system is to send valuable information on the system several times a week. If people see value in the information, they will get on the voice mail system and stay.
3. Make sure the voice mail system you choose has a quality Web interface. It is likely that more than half of the people in your organization use the Internet. If you can get your people to use a voice mail Web interface, they will get more value out of the system and your organization will be stronger because if it. - Phone interfaces can be cumbersome and expensive. Web interfaces make account set up and management easier.
- Make sure you can listen to and send messages on the Web. Usually there are no per minute fees associated with listening to messages on the Web.
- Make sure that the Web interface logs all the phone numbers of individuals who call your number. This way you know everyone who calls, because not everyone will leave a message.
You might be asking yourself, why should I use voice mail instead of email to perform these functions? The answer is simply that voice communication is more effective than text communication. If you are trying to persuade or motivate, you can do that much more successfully with the sound of a voice. You also have more reach with a voice mail system. The number of people that use the Internet regularly is increasing, but you will still be shutting out twenty-five to fifty percent of people by not using voice mail. You can use a combination of email, Web content, and voice mail to create a successful sales, marketing, and management process. The more tools you use the better defined your process has to be or it becomes confusing. To make it simple, I would choose one and the one I would choose is voice mail, because for this industry voice mail makes the right play.
|
