Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

Bringing Mojo to San Jose

Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010

Every day I share with people what Mojo can do for them and ultimately, their business goals.  Altogether it’s not too difficult a job, relying on rudimentary sales principles: identifying needs, offering solutions and if the two jive, we walk away with a great business relationship.
On February 7, I had the opportunity to travel to the West Coast for the first time so I could share the Mojo experience in-person.  I took a plane ride from Manchester, NH to Chicago, IL and then I was off to San Jose, CA to Tom Ferry’s Business by Design 3-day event. Face-to-face, to the thousands passing by our booth, I had the responsibility of conveying  a software-based triple-line power dialing and lead management program capable of emailing, dropping prerecorded messages on answering machines, and CID substitution.
Regardless of how daunting of a task that sounds, I don’t think it could have turned out better.  With the help of everyone at the event, from those on Tom’s team to the staff at the San Jose Convention Center, the experience was certainly one worth writing home to Mom about.

On Facebook.
One fact I learned from Tom Ferry: the fastest growing demographic of Facebook users are women over 55.  Now it makes sense to me why my mom, sister, aunts, and their friends are all getting down on FB like they are.  Their lives are hectic so time is of value.  Social networking appeals to the busy lifestyle; texting ”hi” is easier than taking five minutes out of your day to try to catch a person by phone.  Our lives today require not just instant communications, but convenient and reliable ones.  That’s why Facebook and Twitter are becoming staples of our daily lives. That’s also why Mojo is becoming the experience thousands of people are counting on every day make their day-to-day operations more reliable and convenient.
While I’m not a real estate professional, I took away an enormous amount of insight in just the few moments I was able to catch what Tom had to share.  Not only was he able to keep my ear to the ground in regards to what’s going on in social media, I also gained knowledge from web design and internet practices to how choosing your interactions with those around you helps better enable you to become the master of the market you’re in, not a victim of it.
The highlight of the trip was meeting people who already had their Mojo.  Michaelangelo Guevara was attending the Business by Design event and I had set up a Mojo account with him a week or two prior to the San Jose event. He let me know that within the first two days of using Mojo, he landed a listing appointment for a house valued at $2.2 million.  The look of excitement was clear on his face; he knew what having his Mojo was all about.  His experience made me think, though, if that was the 79th call in a list and he became too frustrated with hand-dialing by call 78 of that day, would he still have had the same look on his face?
Michaelangelo is like most professionals out there - looking for solutions that will stand up in today’s business world and keep them on track to where they want to be in a year, as well as a decade, from now.  So many of the people at Tom Ferry’s Business by Design mega-event were looking for the same solutions.

They all walked away with that, and a little Mojo.

~ Josh

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Posted in Realtors, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Telemarketing sales ethics no different than face-to-face business ethics

Friday, December 18th, 2009
One disreputable telemarketer tarnishes us all.

One disreputable telemarketer tarnishes us all.

The Federal Trade Commission is suing three companies that have been making automated recorded phone calls to sell “worthless” credit card interest reduction programs, charging customers an up front fee as high as $1,495 and delivering zilcho.

Here’s a snippet from the official government press release:

“According to the three FTC complaints, Economic Relief Technologies, LLC, Dynamic Financial Group (U.S.A.) Inc., and JPM Accelerated Services (JPM), and related defendants made illegal pre-recorded robocalls to consumers, using names like “card services,” “credit card services” or “account services.” The robocalls allegedly claimed the defendants’ services could lower the interest rate on consumers’ credit cards. In each case, consumers who pressed 1 after hearing the automated call were transferred to live telemarketers who allegedly misrepresented that consumers could dramatically lower the rates on their credit card.

The telemarketers also said consumers would save thousands of dollars in a short period of time by lowering their interest rates and would be able to pay off their debts faster – for an up-front fee ranging from $495 to $1,495. The defendants then falsely stated that if consumers did not save a “guaranteed” amount – typically $2,500 or more – they could get a full refund of the up-front fee. However, after securing the fee, the defendants allegedly did not negotiate lower rates on behalf of consumers and provided few refunds to those who were dissatisfied with the service.”

Here’s the deal.  Every time consumers get ripped off by sleazeballs using telemarketing technology, it makes all of our jobs harder. Getting robbed on the phone is certainly preferable to getting mugged on the street, but that is little consolation to these scam victims.

What’s more astounding is that companies are still choosing to use pre-recorded sales calls at all.  Since Sept. 1, 2009, recorded sales pitches have been illegal with the exception of a few rare instances — such as the customer previously requesting such calls in advance (like that’s gonna happen!)

The reality is that sales calls are about building personal relationships and talking to machines is a total turnoff.

The reality is that targeted leads often welcome telemarketing calls, such as is the experience of stellar Arizona real estate agent Curt Stinson.

With Mojo lead management software and power dialer technology, you project the friendly human interaction as your first impression — even on the first hello.  No robotic recordings.

The Mojo power dialer with lead management will make 250-300 calls an hour, constantly feeding you the live customers as they pick up!

Moreover, with no robot interaction, your sales staff will encounter far fewer hostile responses — making their work shifts less stressful and more productive.

Now if we could just invent a device to weed out the unscrupulous scam artists!

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Posted in Insurance Agents, Power Dialer Technology, Prospecting 101, Realtor Prospecting, Realtors, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Telemarketing gets an image boost

Wednesday, December 2nd, 2009

Telemarketing

Deserved or not — and we think NOT — the telemarketing professional is burdened with many negative stereotypes. Particularly the image of the telemarketer as a short-term, unfocused employee who is just biding time for another “better” job to come along.

The reality is that telemarketing is simply a sales tool — a way to more efficiently sell your products and expand your market base. If your product is exciting, if it solves a problem or even entertains your prospective client, the scripted call can easily transform into a fun conversation.

But back to the stereotype that phone sales is the kind of job that nobody wants, like say cleaning out a chicken coop (no offense to chicken coop cleaners). Turns out that now more than ever, telemarketing careers are becoming appealing to more college graduates and professionals in other industries.

This year, Time Warner Cable in Milwaukee built a huge call center dedicated to retaining the company’s TV, phone and Internet customers — and to convincing them to go for service upgrades. Here’s how the Business Journal of Milwaukee explains the decision to create a new state-of-the-art telemarketing center:

“Cable companies have been losing video service subscribers in recent years, but are capturing more revenue by selling profitable broadband and phone services, said Chris Marangi, an analyst with Gabelli & Associates, New York City. With satellite television and services like AT&T’s U-Verse taking cable customers, the cable firms have had to become creative in pursuing subscribers via telemarketing and other strategies, he said.

“They’re being aggressive about courting subscribers,” Marangi said.

While telemarketing jobs have a reputation of being low paid and their work force transient, Time Warner officials are proud of its benefits and workplace environment. The Time Warner positions require a high school diploma, but many of the new hires have college degrees and post-high school training, (TW vice president Bev) Greenberg said.”

When your company needs to be aggressive about courting new customers — and keeping the ones you have — it makes sense to give your phone sales team the sales tools they need to be most productive.

For starters, Mojo lead management software and power dialers ensure that your telemarketers are never wasting their time with busy signals, answering machines or hang-ups. Our power dialer technology ensures that your sales reps spend 100 percent of their time talking to live people. And after all, it is live people, and not answering machines, who make purchasing decisions!

And our Triple Line Power Dialer is so fast, it lets you hear the first “hello,” not the third or fourth, so your prospective customer isn’t turned off by those awkward delays that telegraph that a sales pitch is on the way.

Give your phone sales team a little Mojo!  Click here for a free Mojo software demo.

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Posted in Prospecting 101, Prospecting Tips and Tricks, Realtor Prospecting, Uncategorized | No Comments »