How to Generate Leads on the Telephone

Gathering leads by phone is a simple process.

Generating leads is an important task for any business that relies on person to person sales. A lead is a potential customer who may be interested in your product or service. When you have leads, it gives you a targeted group to approach with your sales pitch. This makes it much easier to make sales than if you are pitching to just anyone. Generating leads is a time consuming process, but it is fairly easy to do by following a basic set of instructions.

Things You'll Need

• Telephone
• Yellow Pages Directory
• Pen
• Paper

Instructions

1. Find your customers. Open the Yellow Pages directory to a relevant section. For example, if you are in the business of selling commercial pool chemicals, you should look up local sports facilities.

2. Call the first business on the list. Do not skip over a business. If you are selling pool chemicals, you might think to yourself, "But I know they don't have pool facilities." This might be true, but if that is the case you should still find out if there are any plans to build them.

3. When someone answers the phone, politely ask a question that will tell you if they could use your services. For example, "Hello, could you tell me if your facility has any pool facilities?" If the answer is no, you will want to ask if there are any plans for them.

4. Find the person in charge. If the person gives you information that tells you your product or service might be of use, ask for information about who does the purchasing for the organization. For example, "Could you tell me who is responsible for purchasing your pool chemicals?" Follow this question up by asking for contact information. You may not get any information or you might get partial information which you will have to research further. It is also possible that the person answering the phone will just pass your contact information on.

5. Write down the information that you have gathered and cross the number off in the Yellow Pages. Continue calling numbers using these steps until you have called all he relevant organizations.

6. Use the sales leads that you have gathered to contact people either by phone or in person to try making your sales pitch.

Tips & Warnings

• Remember to always be polite when speaking to people on the phone. It is remarkable how much more helpful people are willing to be if you use a simple please and thank you. Remember that if you want to do business with this organization you might end up dealing with this person frequently in the future.

• Be aware that some people may respond rudely to your inquiries. Don't let this upset you and do not behave rudely back. You need to maintain composure and act business-like at all times.

References

• What are sales leads?