Selling to Anyone Over the Phone

Taking Charge

Technologies such as Internet-connected cameras, text messaging, Web-posted slide presentations, and e-mail show a great deal of promise and might even be considered replacements for the telephone. However, each one has potential glitches and shortcomings. This standard technology, the telephone, is still the best because it works—landline or mobile phone, the technology works. You can find people, engage them in conversation, conduct business, and close sales over the phone.

Contacting customers and selling to them over the phone is a type of strategy game. It’s a good game with a good payoff, because everyone has access to a telephone.

The strategy part of the game can be viewed as follows:

• Reaching people whom you do not know ...