Protect yourself and your sales team from this sales prospecting technique that is used to trick you into giving away the details of your best sales prospects and customers. It’s devious, underhand, and a scam that can catch out even the most experienced of sales people. In fact the more motivated and career focused you are the better this sales trick works. If you want to know more read how it works.
How this sales prospecting scam works
The sales person receives a call from a head hunter that is looking to recruit a top sales person for a client that is a major competitor in the same market. By using the listener’s motivation to earn more money and gain greater rewards they influence them to reveal all kinds of sales information. They use a bait of a really good sales job with terrific benefits.
Like you, the listener wants to know more. Then just as the sales person thinks they are going to be put forward for this great position, the head hunter becomes concerned that the sales person may not be good enough for the job. They raise concerns about the level of value of the customers and prospects the sales person has experience of selling to. The fully motivated sales person is now ready to do anything to get a shot at this fantastic job. This is when the scam clicks in and the sales person falls straight into the trap.
They are asked about their top prospects and customers they have sold to. They are asked to prove they sell to high level customers. The head hunter wants to know more, and the sales person tells them all. They give company details and buyer’s names. Then they reveal everything about how they are approaching the sale, and even what prices they are tendering.
The caller now has priceless information about prospects, customers, prices, and actions taken with buyers. It’s a lot easier than door knocking and cold calling to get prospect information. And the sales person is left waiting for a follow up call from a head hunter that doesn’t exist.
Protect yourself and be wary of this prospecting technique
If you feel motivated by a caller claiming to give you some kind of benefit and then asking you for details of your sales prospects, take a breath and let your common sense click in. If you are at all suspicious tell them you want more information about them and try to arrange to meet with them. Genuine recruiters will appreciate you wanting to know more and how you guard your sales information. They will actually see it as a positive attribute.
I’m Stephen Craine and I’ve seen this sales prospecting technique used in various ways over the last twenty years. Ethical and rewarding prospecting techniques take time and work, but if you choose effective ways to prospect you will fill your sales diary with potential money earning sales appointments. If you want to know more about sales prospecting, cold calling, or appointment setting, click the link.
The above article is part of the free sales training I offer on my website. If you want to know more click through to http://www.sales-training-sales-tips.com. As a working sales manager I offer free tips and ideas with a different perspective for sales individuals and small businesses.