I was in the bookstore the other day and saw a book that said Cold Calling is Dead. It automatically caught my eyes, because I know for a fact that cold calling is dead. With all of my years in sales and marketing, I never have had much success cold calling. I actually haven’t seen anyone have much success cold calling. I don’t think there is a bigger waste of time and effort in sales than cold calling. I agree, cold calling is dead. But unfortunately, many companies don’t believe that. They preach prospecting, penetration and searching for that needle in a haystack and eventually you will find something. The problem is that when you waste all that time cold calling, you could be spending that time managing accounts, closing warm leads and making money for you and the company. So if you don’t have access to warm leads, how do you get them?

Well, if your company won’t give you warm leads, the best thing to do is go out and get them yourself. It doesn’t take much to set up a webpage with a lead capture form and get your own qualified leads. Remember, in sales you are basically in business for yourself. It is important to remember that and start getting out there and building your business. Here are few ideas for setting up a great web based lead capture system if you are a sales professional that wants to make money:

  • Have a website with a great blog. A well managed blog will help you promote yourself as an expert in your industry. The visitors you get to your website, the more warm leads and referrals you get.
  • Offer your visitors something to entice them to submit their information. A free e-book, analysis, review will work wonders.
  • Have your contact information on the website. For the visitors who don’t want to fill out a form, give them the option of calling you or emailing you directly. That is a hot lead, not a warm lead.
  • Don’t sell your product on the website. Don’t start an e-commerce website, just talk about your product and the industry. You will have all types of visitors that will lead to new opprtunities. But if you only talk about your product and it seems like your website is only there to sell your product, people will get turned off and leave.
  • Be very active on social networks. One of the best ways to get traffic to your website is through social networks. Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook are always great options, start there and see where it takes you. You will eventually have too many leads to handle.

Starting a website for lead generation is not that hard or expensive. Our sales professional website service will get you in the right direction. Also, be sure to sign up for our mailing list and get our maximize traffi e-book.