Cold Calling Motivation/Call to Action

Takingnames,
You can count me in, I was also on the phone during the holidays, went wild and got more than I expected. Let’s hope a few more can move up to the bat and join in.
All The Way

I think we can make this a fun competition to keep us motivated while dialing…Ill be more then happy to share weekly stats on my campaigns. count me in.

Cool. What do you say to tracking:
Dials
Contacts
Prospects
Follow up calls
Follow up contacts
…or something like that?
Kicking and Taking…

Thats sounds good. When I track I have these criteria…Ill fill in yesterdays totals

$ found - 2.9 Million
Cold call Contacts- 39
Follow up contacts- 16
Appointments set- 1
Dials- 200
NNM/Clients opened- 0

residential…I also try to hit the 50 contact a day mark. I dont think Dials are a huge deal only an indicator of the quality of your list to make sure your not wasteing too much time dialing vacant homes/bad numbers

Takingnames, I just joined this forum and read your post - great advice. I am in a position where I need to increase my AUM and I have run out of “contacts/referrals.” Social networking or other networking has become a dead end for me. I am faced with no other alternative but cold calling. I have cold called in the past with some success; however, it has been awhile. Since I need to suck it up and cold call, your post and advice is very helpful.

With Residential Dials (which is what I did exclusively this week)
my lists are well scrubbed so I track dials because I know I can dial 50 - 60 residential an hour and it keeps me focused.
I take an approach of Leads/Dials/Suspect/Prospect and then do follow up call/mail/call to qualify over time to thin the ranks and qualify
Dials =800
Contacts=64
Suspects=12 - 4 gave email contact information; 8 will get a written note (I prepare note cards in advance - Thank you for taking my call, blah, blah, blah. All that has to be done is add name and date.
Prospects, undertermined
Followup calls on prior cold calls = 40
Follow up Contacts = 21
Appointments set = 4
Known and qualified asset total for appointments = 4 million

650 dials
180 contacts
1 appointment set
8 million qualified and found on phone.
13 seminar rsvps.

I really hit the pipeline hard for a couple seminar events this month (that was why it was a high contact ratio) but I also mixed in cold calls to add some new cherrys to the pipeline bc I got rid of a lot of dead wood. also qualified people to attend the seminar as suitable for 250K and above. did a mail/call/mail to pipeline and call/mail/call to cold call contacts

Had a bad cold call day today so will have to pick up the slack to get the contacts up for the rest of the week.

All the way were you at?

Howdy - Let’s build some momentum!
Business calling this week (I’m alternating business and residential).
758 dials
63 conversations/contacts
6 suspects (will move next step, gave email contact - call in 6 months, etc.

Dial back calls/emails from old calls netted a 6 million appointment and an 800k appointment.

Had two days blown up for calling. Had a client’s son show up with announcement one of the clients his parent died - always a great way to spend time…had an unexpected meeting with the highest net worth prospect I have - he wanted to get together for lunch…hmmmmmmmm I wondered to myself - lunch with UHNW prospect or make dials…

Reminder - MLK day is a great day to make calls - market closed, no trades, no ops staff in, most advisors aren’t working - but lots of businesses are open and lots of people who are not working are home. Pick up the phone, dial, repeat.

had a rough week keeping track of dials due to seminars and other team responsibilitys with meetings from new clients that brought in some more money. I’ve got to be more organized in keeping track of dials/ time doing it and results then just picking up the phone. I wont have any seminar distractions this week or appointments scheduled so It should be a good week for dialing ill post results end of day fri. Good luck

1126 dials
75 conversations
12 suspects
2 prospects - one of them is a whale…an elephant…a monster. Couldn’t even believe I hit him.
Booked one clean appointment from first call and booked another on a call back.
Two presentations next week to people that I initially cold called. One was about 6 mopnths ago and one was more than 2 years ago. Finally in a closing meeting.

It works - keep at it. stay focused.

430 dials
73 contacts
1 appointment (insurance review)
Not good on the dials as far as generating cherrys ran into a lot of trash and DQ them so I wouldnt clog the pipe. My goal was a min. 100 dials a day for the cold calls. Im going to continue to ramp up the calling so i can get back to 50 contacts a day. I know in previous campaign/blitzs that I have done in the past real results come from a steady 50 contact a day days to see real results. I will now focus my efforts for 1/2 seminar campaign and 1/2 muni bond fund campaign. So I can spread my efforts around.

260 dials
73 contacts
1 appointment
1 seminar 17 people…looks like might have been 2-3 real prospects rest just like a free meal.
(might move the seminars into the office to get rid of the pikers shed some cost and just focus on the real people who want help. idk
Need to get my calls up, meetings and seminars are sapping a lot of my time. However having success in bringing more assets in from current clients (from previous CC) brought in a good chunk this week. but the well will run dry if i cant keep replenishing the pipeline. Hope all is well looking forward to hear about other results.

Hey Teeks; You are rockng and rolling.
455 calls
Forgot to note all contacts
6 suspects.
Also did a presentation (informal one to a Chamber group) - and picked up three prospects.
Booked one appointment from an old cold call from a while back.

670 dials 159 contacts 3 solid leads 6 for later, booked 2 appointments one from a cold call for a seminar and 3 months later got an appointment. the other was from a website lead…that got direccted from one of my mailers. then i got a really HNW prospect that would like to have an appointment in 2 weeks, so im pretty jacked bout that one 6MM doctor that so happened to have an off day that day and caught em at home). i ve been doing all muni bond calls this week and i think its a lot easier to gage who is for real and who is a piker that wants a free meal. however i believe it is essential to have both going because a lot of my muni leads usually end up being seminar attendees and then in for the appointment. My closing ratio is much much higher if the lead was generated from a muni call bc i know there is cash available and theyre for real. Im lucky to have the resources to be able to pull off both and will continue this strategy through seminar season. i know im rambling on but i would like to use this site as a mind dump at the end of the week and for others to see so they can offer advice, critique or talk about there experience.

For the week:
1300 dials
165 contacts
2 same day closes, both munis, a fifty & a hundy.
1 prospect (opened their account paperwork without money or commitment, calling back Mon to see if they actually WANT the bond and how much, if it’s zero or under 25k, that’s ok too, they’ll be dropped.)
Btw, people that claim they’re interested but not committed, let them know this is a great time to get the paperwork out of the way and give them a couple days, these work nice for many reasons.

You guys should be in real estate. WIth all the effort you put into making calls and prospecting you would be killer real estate agents. My mother is a realtor made 100k last year and works probably 30 hours a week. She lives in a small town 20 mins outside of a decent size city. Work half the hours you do now and make as much if not more??

Curious for some input from all of you who have been calling with some success. ATM: Read your other thread and it’s inspired me to get back to dialing after a year of avoiding it like the plague.

I work for a very reputable mid-size BD in a branch of an OSJ group. I’m only in my 3rd year of the business but have used most of that time to learn. I assist an FA managing roughly $45MM and have built a book of approximately $3.25MM since the fall of 2011 through a few referrals and building relationships with old house accounts that were neglected. I finally feel 100% comfortable in my ability to foster and manage prospect/client relationships effectively (and ethically), so I am ready to really hit the pavement in 2013.

I know most of you pitch munis/muni-funds, and I have a few that I prefer, but I wanted to focus on my firm’s strength to gather a small portion of assets via cold calling, then continue to drip with superior research/service to gain the rest of their portfolio. My company participates in multiple initial offerings of preferred-shares (as well as access to fund and equity IPOs). We generally have at least 1-2 come across every week. Due to the interest rate environment, risk of rates rising for bond holders, and lower correlation to treasuries in a rising rate environment, I think preferred shares are attractive.

Here is the script I intend to start with… any criticism would be great:

Good morning/evening, this is belovedkid with IBD. We help investors in city/town prepare their investments for the rising interest rate environment on the horizon. How have you positioned your portfolio to be better protected when rates start to rise? …

That’s great. We currently have a preferred stock offering from XYZ Corp that pays X% every quarter for Xyears before converting/maturing. This stock can be redeemed at any time and offers many of the same qualities of bonds and dividend-paying stocks. The minimum investment is $X (normally 10k) and we must provide indications of interest to our desk by m/d/y. Would you be interested in making an investment in this offering?

If yes: great, due to the timing of this investment, I’ll email you account paperwork to make sure we can get these preferreds for you. You can email these right back to me, or I can stop by tomorrow when you’re available to formally introduce myself and help you complete the forms.

If no: That’s okay. We get offers like this every week. What’s your email address so I can let you know when another solid offer comes up?

/end

Let me know what you think. Also, I noticed ATM builds his own lists… what services are you other callers using to buying/building a list? I have a few lists that were provided with mailers we used with CIS Marketing in the past that I have gone through and color coded for perceived wealth (google maps works wonders for qualifying potential wealth). I tend to start with those, but I need a much larger list if I really want to do this correctly.

My plan is to make 50 calls an hour from 10am-2pm Tuesday-Thursday. After calling through the list twice (3-4 rings and hang up without leaving a message), those that I have not contacted, I will then continue the 10-2 calling, but also use Tuesday and Thursday nights from 6-8 to try calling as well to gear when they are available. After 3-4 calls, depending on the area, I’ll leave a message and move on.

My time is somewhat limited due to my role as an assistant to a much larger book, but I feel pretty confident that at 600 calls a week, I can make 60-80 contacts a week and qualify 6-8 prospects, and get 1-2 meetings. I have a very good closing rate when I actually get to meet the client, and a great track record of generating referrals from existing accounts (and helping my mentor to gain referrals as well).

My goal would be to add $2.5-5MM in new assets this year from calling alone. I’m still young (25), but I’d like to hopefully make a breakout in the next 18-24 months to get me past $10-12MM so I can really focus on leveraging my relationships for organic growth.

Belovedkid, your approach and script seems extremely solid. Leverage the firm’s expertise, your obvious intelligence, and the fact that while you may be 25 you have hundreds of years of expertise backing you up.

My only concern is whether the person you assist will respond well to this much business building on your own. Unfortunately. if you start kicking it to the tune of $5MM added a year, be prepared for objections by those who aren’t prospecting with vigor. Just something I’ve learned in my 45 years of life. You might adjust your schedule to call on Saturdays instead of so much time during the highly visible mid-week time period. Good luck.

Scholar - good advise there to Beloved. I’ll chime by saying that week night and weekend calling will is the right approach.

600 dials
29 contacts
3 prospects
3 meetings with cold call prospects from prior weeks.
Closed one 100k (not my miniumum - it’s all they are willing to move).
East coast blizzard had a negative impact on my schedule this week, had to cancel appointments and power outages impacted my calling week.

[quote=KingBobby]For the week:
1300 dials
165 contacts
2 same day closes, both munis, a fifty & a hundy.
1 prospect (opened their account paperwork without money or commitment, calling back Mon to see if they actually WANT the bond and how much, if it’s zero or under 25k, that’s ok too, they’ll be dropped.)
Btw, people that claim they’re interested but not committed, let them know this is a great time to get the paperwork out of the way and give them a couple days, these work nice for many reasons.[/quote]

Good stuff KB - agree with you. Sending and leaving paperwork puts the ball completely in their court.

Beloved, my feedback is your overall plan looks very solid. For the script, for prospecting I really don’t like your first paragraph, but your second paragraph is absolutely excellent. For prospecting I’d lose the first paragraph so you can get to the second while they’re listening. After your name and IBD I’d go right to ‘we currently have…’ Unless of course the plan is strict qualification, but I’m afraid you’ll lose too many people before getting to the juice Test it both ways though.

B-Kid
I’m with KingB on this…try both….but since it’s seconds to get attention on a call, my thoughts are…kill the first paragraph…go right in, and see where it takes you.
Seriously, you got to keep us posted as this format looks great. Don’t be a one off…….great post, then ….nada……when KingB takes the time to review and comment….it means a lot and King is the real thing….we hope to hear of results by Friday as to results and tweaking. Go get’em ……should work phenomenal.
All The Way

Sorry for the delay… been a crazy start to this week. I will definitely take your advice, and the more I thought about it, the more it made sense anyway. Thanks for the input.

As for building/buying a list. I’ve been browsing the lists available from CIS… has anyone purchased any lists from them? If so, which lists, and if not, what providers are you using? I’ve pulled a list from Lord Abbett’s “Insights & Intelligence” tool that includes Wealthy-Ultra HNW individuals. That should come in handy from time to time once I scan through and delete large corporate offices that list 40+ names on the same number.

I’m hoping that Apple will decide to raise some cash via Preferred as Einhorn is suggesting. If we got to run some of that offering it would be one of the easiest sells to anyone who invests.

To those who stated concerns about my mentor… he is a really good guy and we have a great relationship. He wants me to succeed. I’ve already told him about my plans to call and he supports me. We are potentially looking at purchasing some books this year as well, so I may end up being lucky enough to build that way.

Let me know what you think for buying lists. I want to be able to come in the first week of March and have everything ready to go.

What are you guys selling/pitching for munis? What kind of YTW? 2%? 3%? 4%?

Just curious how you are balancing yield to maturity date and still getting interest from people…

No, I’d never mention the numbers 2,3,4 on a prospecting call. Go with the highest yield, or better yet, tey. 8,9, 10s. The reason to use munis is to go as high as possible to generate interest. 2,3 and 4 gets beat out by Dell at 6. I guess that answers the pitch question. For the actual sell question, it depends on what they want. Many forgo the highest interest for perhaps a shorter maturity or outstanding credit rating, so we cooperate, are flexible, and sell what they want. In other words, if they balk at a feature of the bond in your pitch, you could be close to a new account.

Gotta love annual license renewals, renewals and all hands on deck meetings with management. Not a bad week, but some operational hurdles as aforementioned. Had two fabulous appointments with 2 good prospects; and got a weird referral. Don’t know how that will pan out. Only did 258 dials, but hit 17 people and got permission from 8 to move the ball along. Teeks, I’m with you on part of that becuse of the time and cost involved.
My $.02 is that I will send along the initial piece of mail (IF I cannot get an email address). I do that to get my card and bio in front of them. It’s the door opener bit. I promised to do something and I did it. When I call the next time (and sometimes it’s months or even a year before my next check in) they have a face with the name and recollection is better than just with a disembodied voice on the phone. I’m dialing like loco today with the holiday; and wish you all “Happy Hunting!”

Fracking loved Monday folks - President’s Day. Great day for calling. Only picked up two truly qualified prospects - but one - holy cow - is perfect. Guy is selling his business and has been thinking he’ll need an advisor. You think? Maybe? Yeah - it’s a nice sized deal folks. Ok - enough posturing. I did just under 500 dials this week; talked with 42 people and developed 9 prospects, 2 outstanding. Might have made more dials - but imagine this - I dkidn’t have time because during one day, I closed another deal from a cold call. Ayup - one closed this week from a call placed only two weeks ago. Nicely qualified, assets north of 250k. With everyone getting snow all over the country I expect you all to be hitting the phones next week. People will be sitting at home waiting for your calls!
Until next time - I"m kicking A and Taking Names…

Takingnames that a boy! I like the energy in that posting! I had a light week for coldcalling and focused on a client campaign of getting some of the accounts over to a fee base (which managed to bring one over from my effort) however, I did work on a lot of call backs from my pipeline and generated 3 appointments. 1 second appointment 2 new. All hnw prospects. Hope everyone is throwing some new opportunitys out there and hitting there hurdles!

Teeks & Taking,
You too are on fire…keep it up…here all goood, did 80k , did another 45K this week, got some others on the go…love this thread…this thread is all Chin Up and Cheer up…go get’em
All The Way

Of my 4 appointments one opened, one cancelled, one rescheduled and one was ready to open for 20K. (all from cold calls at various stages). The one that was ready to open I had the meeting at there home but they werent ready to change brokers bc of being friends and I found there was lil opportunity in that account with the structure of my wire firm for 20K Even though he asked if he can open the account and ready to sign but I had to turn them down.(I think he was doing it as a favor for being on his butt to buy a muni for so long) As much as I hated to do it it was just too small for my wire could have been the wrong move or could have been right idk Maybe just keep on my mass mail list and until they decide to have a second opinion on there overall portfolio.(however it was good practice and on the way to work). The one that did open was qualified north of 300K fee based. I also had some good luck with generating 2 appointments one a 1st appointment and another from an old time prospect that was in the pipe for a while who is finnally ready to come in and get an overall financial plan both approx 1 million nw. I have been struggleing to pick up the phone and put new prospects in the pipe. this will hurt me in the near future. I have been dropping people in my pipe like crazy with no replacements and despite the work being done to open some new accounts I must delegate some time to putting new ones in the pipe or It will bite me in the A#$.

I’ve been knocking AND people are home. Not a bad week at all. Just north of 400 calls, 31 contacts, 1 appointment and it was AWESOME - we met the next day and are you ready for this? One and DONE! 500k. Felt like a puffed up old rooster.
Have a whole lot of follow up calls to make and a lot of mail to get out. I’m feeling lean, mean and thinking I might bring in 20 mil this year if I keep this up. Keep it up for you guys that are doing this too - and to the ones that aren’t calling? Keep it up! Then there is more out there for Teeks, ATW and I. In no time there will be a new firm on the street. TKSATWKATN Financial Services - cuz we will OWN the business.

Until next time, I’m Kicking Ass and Taking Names.

wow, TN one and done for 500K thats unreal!!..talk about calling someone at the right time! lets have a great week! that just pumped me up!!!

Alright guys, where are you getting these phone numbers to call? I have to buy a list, and then have it rescrubbed by my firm every 30 days. It seems like I spend more time on managing a database than making calls. Any advice?

Yeah, ATW, I’m feeling all swagger and spurs these days - . Closed another k plan this week and a couple. Proposed 2 annuities and a fee based account. Did two presentations. One for 20 people, one for 50 - just got a text message from a friend who attended the one for 30 saying they learned a lot and just opened up a referal door for me. Received a referral from a mortgage broker (always make sure you make friends with other mortgage guys if you can do them too - if they can’t do a deal, they will pass them on) so this referral is for more than 3 properties. Sure, I’ll take 3 mortgages, thank you. Then, I got referred to a couple and a guy retiring into my state. OH YEAH - and I cold called this week. Holy cow - not too much - but I knocked about 300 dials out and talked with 9 people; just sending out two pieces of follow up though.

104 Contacts CC;4 call backs; 14 client calls; 6 prospects. Got back in a lil groove with the cold calling and adding some qualified people in the pipe. See how it goes, got seminar dates next couple weeks. Will be mixing calls with seminars/muni calls see what I can get. Lets have a good week!

Sorry for not getting back on here. Glad to see the success some of you are having. I’ve been busy with multiple things… our team building a succession plan for a local advisor looking to retire being one of them. I do recruiting on the side, also. Since my last post I’ve brought in $600k in assets via referrals, existing clients adding business, and picking up a few accounts that were neglected by ex-advisors. Only about $500k of that will produce revenue outside of this year due to $100k of that going into EIA’s at the client’s requests. Still… not too bad for the activity I put in.

Finally ready to kick off my calling campaign. Will purchase a list this weekend from infofree and scrub for DNC. Going to be calling a combo of business owners, households with income of $150k+, and then a few other smaller demographics. Keeping it all within a 15 mile radius of my office.

Plan is to call from 10-12am & 6-8:30 T/TR every week and 10-2 on two Saturdays a month. Should get me close to 600 calls a week. We’re also working some angles with a local community bank and a CPA to get some center of influence relationships running. Looks like this could be a great year for our office regardless of the calling campaign, but the calling should hopefully solidify that outlook.

76 contacts: quiet week. shed through some pipeline.working on seminars. Had a small campaign of small business owners going in the early part of the week. Had excelent contact ratios of almost 50% but got eaten alive on the phone. Then actually googled mapped there place of Biz and realized that these people arent qualified. So I think I will attempt again with small biz owners but perhaps better screening of my lists. Would love to hear some more guys on the thread just hearing a lot of crickets and spammers

I’m feeing like the biggest slacker @$$ in the forum right about now. Just finished up a meeting proposing to two prospects from a seminar. Did mostly sweeping back calls this week, follow up from the two seminars and call backs to the bites from the last two weeks. Picked up a 250k and a 200k this week. Not crying. Not crying at all. Calling tomorrow boys! Kicking and taking.

pipeline calls 38 contacts generated 8 leads Coldcalls added 4 leads on 43 conctacts. So i guess overall 81 contacts 12 leads…all keeping it simple Hey bob its teeks. from xyz financial and Im just giving you a ring becasue our firm is issueing out some general electric bonds at 4%…are you investing in bonds?..no what kind of strategy you using with this type of market?..o ok If i can send you some info and follow up with a strategy we are using for___idea would that be ok if I gave you a ring? ok ill talk to you soon.

Hi All, I was on a vacation but back to the phones now. Last night in an hour and a half, dials 150, 14 contacts, 1 cherry. I’m using the tax free bond fund script.

Did campaigns to fill two seminars and ran those. Ran 1000 calls and calls back very tightly. Had 18 people in seats, 3 qualified prospects to work in now. Booked more seminars for the next two months and then booking into the fall. Next campaign is on DB plans to cap 401k in specialized space.Nice campaign to run for plans to close in the next 18 months. Think about your campaigns and how you time them. Winter - spring - great for residential assets, fast moves, bond assets, etc. Summer - great for moving the dial for retirement plans - they won’t close then - but will take calls then to plant seeds for fall winter.

DO NOT lose momentum at this time of year. I see it all the time - people back off because it’s summer. DOUBLE UP your efforts now and be amazed at how you eat the lunches of the guys on the golf courses who are “networking”.

Until next time, I’m

Kicking.Ass

Been a while since getting on here. Been trying out multiple different days/times/pitches alternating between recruiting/residential/small business calls.

Finally got everything organized to really ramp up. Plan is to alternate weeks between recruiting/business calls. Have had some success with recruiting and have a few prospects… one in the final stage of closing. Recruiting is a very lucrative alternative to building a book as once a deal closes it’s income for 3 years without doing any work… and if I’m successful enough I plan to negotiate a lower payout but on a perpetual basis. Looking to bring on 5-10 reps a year.

As far as building the book, was really just trying out different pitches to figure out what I’m comfortable with. Have a few leads in the pipeline, and the two most promising would be great clients to have for assets and referral purposes. I have decided to simply pitch IPOs for preferreds to small biz owners to get the foot in the door… seems to work as most reps can’t offer it and there is no fee/commission to purchase a fully liquid investment with 2-3x the yield of a 30 year govt. Now that I’ve been focused I’m getting 3-5 info leads a day (sending literature) to follow up on and 1 solid prospect a day. Once I go through the list, I’ll circle back with a muni fund pitch.

After filtering down my target client on the residential side, the list I got was fairly small… so I plan to take one week a month to hit residential on Tuesday & Thursday night followed by Sat morning. Will pitch retirement income planning (i.e. annuities) to those 50+ in age and preferreds to those under that age.

All initial pitches are to get some assets and then go after the whole pie once I ask for statements “to make sure I’m recommending something that fits with the bigger picture.”

Brought on a CPA/Attorney client and my team is meeting with an Estate Attorney next week to discuss referral networking. Hoping to turn these into advocates who will both refer 1-2 prospects each quarter.

Glad to see you guys are still kicking! Will try and get on here once a month or so to update you. I’m juggling so many different tasks between prospecting/recruiting/servicing/assisting that I am not tallying every single call I make. I run the metrics in my head, i.e. if I am getting decent responses and generating one solid prospect every 1-2 days, I’m doing fine. As Bill Good says, as long as your list is profitable, stick with it. Goal is only to generate $2.5MM in assets by next April from cold calling to supplement my other growth strategies, so I don’t need to murder the volume.

I’m posting in his thread for motivation in the coming months. Way to kick some ass out there, I need to hit it just as hard if not harder.

Dow breaks 15,000 and goes down. Takingnames pipeline goes past 1/2 billion dollars and keeps going up. I’m bringing in more than a million a month right now and just keep dialing. These are people taking calls, opening accounts, agreeing to keep the dialogue open. This week, I tweaked a campaign to add a component. I’m also providing some guidance to an internal partner who is enthused to get started. I took a highly specialized, focused list that he spent hours drilling into details for and dialed it to show him the results of that. Gooseeggs. Then, I pulled up a random list and made calls. Results. Survey says? DON"T WASTE TIME RESEARCHING THE PROSPECTS. Call people. Get them to agree to talk with you. Get to know them FOR REAL.

.

So after 3 months of calling, I’ve got it broken down.

In order to average 25 contacts/day (not including meetings/follow-up calls) I need to be dialing around 175 times a day…which for me is approximately 3 hours in the mornings. That coupled with follow ups/meetings/networking should round my pipeline out a little better. Starting my campaign tomorrow.

Kick it Sweaters. Calls you make now are deals you will have between Sept and Dec. End your year on a high note.

Seminar: 9 attendees 2 appointments. 300K NNew, Got some campaigns brewing for the summer. Glad to hear everyone is doing good!

Seminar: 9 attendees 2 appointments. 300K NNew, Got some campaigns brewing for the summer. Glad to hear everyone is doing good!

Only one day of true cold calling on a very specific set of cases that I’m tapping with a colleague for interest.

Did 4 events - all nights. Did a lot of circling back on old contacts and deals that needed a touch. Got a 600k to commit to making a shit or get off the pot decision on the company 401k plan and we’re talking next Friday. Also lit a candle on on 500k that I thought was dead and revived a multi million dollar deal from last summer that had slowed down. Two seminars coming up. Had two clients commit more assets.
Better than me commiting hari kari.

Called on my seminars this week. Have 10 people slated for something next week with commitment and a boatload of follow up work to do. No rest for the wicked. Closed 600k from an initial cold call from 2009. Keep good records, be a light touch, not too salesy and keep touching them. Kicking Ass and Taking Names

Just for good measure, I knocked out 150 dials this AM cold. Goose Eggs. So for anyone who thinks it’s magic; it’s not. Even the ones who do it all the time wind up with nothing sometimes ;-).

good job takingnames… I got a seminar this week and got just 6 people so far…had some really good appointments last week with one that got a good chance to move 2.2Mill from an initail cold call then came to 2 seminars…and one appointment…a lot of contacts…so hopefully it pans out

Phew. Monster week. 4 events; 1 seminar, 800 calls. 3 future prospects from the calls, developed a huge prospect at one event and deepened relationship at another. Gooseggs in the seminar. WRONG AUDIENCE. Made the best of it and created raving fans. Feedback was the best I’ve ever gotten. If any of them hit the lottery, I’m their advisor, LOL. Booked 1.2 across three deals from prior calls to come in; pitched to close a 401k that I first called in 2010. Had a client commit more assets. Nice week.
Keep swinging, folks!

96 contacts 9 leads/ calling on semianr at end of month. 2 prospects appointments set from previous calls one cancel.
Hope everyone is doing good. havent posted in a while had change of game plan but back online and makeing the dials

On the seminars, do you guys just call and invite? Or send an invitation in the mail?

Do both! is you got the $ do mail/phone if not do phone/mail/phone

On the seminars, do you guys just call and invite? Or send an invitation in the mail?

Bt is to do call mail call. Call first to determine interest; then mail , then call to confirm. Works for a lot - seminars, uncovering assets, determining interest. If they continue to take calls after you send lit; you’re in. Stay in by staying in touch. Never underestimate the power of persistant contact. It’s not hard - but it’s not easy.
Kicking A and Taking Names

Dudes, I’ve been remiss in posting - it’s been a monster few weeks and some whales by the tale. To quote the actor formerly known as Charlie Sheen - “Winning” - and that’s not being facetious. Lots of good stuff and great traction. I’m ramping up a line of corporate plan calls for the next few weeks. Will keep y’all posted. Kicking A and Taking names

Takingnames,

Are you calling just residential or both businesses and residential? I started cold calling this month and can’t seem to ever get past the secretary. And this time of year, a lot of retirees are back up North, so businesses become even more important to reach.

[quote=Comeback Kid]Takingnames,

Are you calling just residential or both businesses and residential? I started cold calling this month and can’t seem to ever get past the secretary. And this time of year, a lot of retirees are back up North, so businesses become even more important to reach.[/quote]
Comeback - Sorry - have been flat out this summer. I make friends with the secretary. Sometimes on the first call, I’m happy just to get their name and don’t even ask for the target. I make notes about the secretary and will call at different times to see if I can get past her. Also, I’ll tap around different extenstions if it’ a main number xxx - 0000 - so I’ll try xxx 0001 and see if I an get someone in a different department by “accident”.
Kicking A

Hey gang,

Have been busier than a centipede in a toe counting contest. Life is good and winning some great business. Made about 400 dials residentially over the past 2 weeks and not getting much traction, but have picked up a few great first step prospects with permission to move forward in the future. Opened the door to a whale, and like any good whale hunt - it will take while. Overall, no complaints - now that we are in the fiercest part of summer I will double down on calling efforts to load up the fall. Expect to see calling days with 400 - 1000 dials in the next few weeks.

Kicking and Taking

Any updates on this thread from you folks? Its been over a month.

New parent. Out straight in my off time. Dialed about 2200 last month - hit about 20 reasonable prospects. Kicking and taking. Keep at it, guys.

Bumping this up. Calling businesses only in my hometown, central NJ. I am at ML in SNJ, 90 miles down the GSP. Today, 150 dials/50 calls hr. 4 info leads, 1 green cherry in there that recognized my last name as a customer of his shop. I don’t blindly mail, I qualify for interest, current firm, successful investments in the past prior to mailing. The deliverable is usually my card, FA fact sheet or brochure and basic monthly investment research-not customized. Again, its all in the follow up.
I typically ask to pencil in a time for a follow up call.
I am looking into corporate dirs also.

Typically I call 8a-10a, sometimes 12-1 and 330-5-530 or so.

My pitch is as follows; it’s an open-ended call and I am able to take it a few different ways:

“This is xxx from xx in xxx. I work with private and family owned businesses”. “Would you be interested in a complimentary report, our best ideas for investment in 2014?”

From there, I drill down–particular areas of interest is usually my first question-could be stock, bonds, dividend payers, etc. I use the Bill Good process of ‘thankyouverymuch’ to anyone not interested or qualified, as well as his scripts verbatim on the folow up calls and subsequent. Will close for an appointment if am able; otherwise, I try to get an idea where they’re currently, what is working/not, pain points, etc.

200 dials today, about 510 for the week. A few appointments, callbacks mixed in reduced the number. Contact ratio sucked today; calling Burlington County, NJ today; nobody’s in or I am getting screened heavily. Likely many people taking off for an early weekend. Back at it Monday AM at 730.

Taking,
At the end of your seminars, do you use a feedback sheet with boxes of areas of interest for following up? Also, at the end, do you before the attendees exit, ask them to schedule a meeting? I’m asking as I have one scheduled later in October. Thank you for taking the time to respond.
Stillview

Stillview… you do want to have areas on your feedback sheets where people can indicate interest. You also want a section where they can indicate if they want to meet with you. I personally have never scheduled appointments at the seminar but know of advisors that do.

.

Hello Takingnames,
This was such a good thread. Just seems like it’s
gone soooo quiet out there in cold calling land. I’m calling business owners for on site meetings, getting 2 to commit a day is a huge success and I focus most of my energy on morning calls. Some say yes, right way (not always the best leads), and most required a few call backs, but overall it’s all worth it.

It’s really too bad that this forum has kind of lost it’s energy and hasn’t been focusing on sharing best practices on a regular basis. Maybe there aren’t many callers out there or they just got a bit tired of some of the senseless back and forth.
Never Quit.

Let’s get another thread like this going!

I really enjoyed reading this. I am going to do this with my associates.