coinvestor Posted September 17, 2011 Share Posted September 17, 2011 Up until now I have grown primarily from buying out other smaller vendors, and referrals from existing customers. I have had zero sales experience and I am not one of those people that it just comes to naturally. In the past I would find an account I was interested in then start calling on them (as in actual phone calls). I may get interested and stop in to try a "sales call", I would get the "I think we're okay right now" I would say thanks and leave a card. This would be the end. I may make a follow up call that would not go anywhere. Out of frustration I would give up and go back to looking for other vendors to buy or ask for more referrals. I realized my weakness in this area and thought of how strong my business would be without it, so I set out to improve it. I have known RJT for several years from back when he was workin for the man. We would talk periodically on the phone and I knew he knew his stuff. I had contacted him in the past to do some employee council presentations for a multi-site account that I didn't have the time to fit in. Being that I was short on funds I ended up making time and did the presentations myself (and closed them for those wondering). I knew RJT could help me out on my sales 101 quest so I gave him a call. We settled on a two day plan, two weeks apart. I told RJT that my plan was to learn so I didn't really care if we closed any or not. I didn't need a fish I needed to learn how. RJT had me make list of accounts I wanted to visit and make up some goodie bags. He got to my house around 9am and went on to our first stop. RJT was leading the way and was just watching. I am not sure who was more stunned, me or the people we were talking to. RJT would walk in and start talking. He was not pushy, but somehow he would start talking and people would listen to every word. It was like they were in a trans. He was quick and thorough he would get all the answers we needed. People would do the "we are happy with our current vendor" and next thing I knew we were walking to the back to look at their machines and talking about what we could improve for them. We made a handful of stops then the inevitable happened. I pulled into a manufacturing account and RJT said its your turn. I walked in and did my spiel and the secretary said "have a seat and I will get him" (a clear sign they were not happy). The man was interested in me making an appointment to talk to him the following week. We ended the day at lunch time with one proposal, one appointment, and several contacts to follow up with. In addition to this I had gained lots of info on my competition and got to see how the sales thing is done. I was more than happy with our results for the day and felt great about the money I spent to hire RJT. But that was not the end. This past week I closed the manufacturing facility with RJTs guidance. Based on the commission payments I expect it to do 20-25k a year, now without a commission I am still working on the other location from that day with a good possibility of closing it. I wouldn't say I'm now good at it, but I am confident enough in what I've learned to keep making cold calls. This was money well spent and I plan on making it part of my plan to have RJT come work with me for a day every few months to help develop my sales skills. I just thought I would share my experience and say thanks RJT! JD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mission vending Posted September 17, 2011 Share Posted September 17, 2011 Up until now I have grown primarily from buying out other smaller vendors, and referrals from existing customers. I have had zero sales experience and I am not one of those people that it just comes to naturally. In the past I would find an account I was interested in then start calling on them (as in actual phone calls). I may get interested and stop in to try a "sales call", I would get the "I think we're okay right now" I would say thanks and leave a card. This would be the end. I may make a follow up call that would not go anywhere. Out of frustration I would give up and go back to looking for other vendors to buy or ask for more referrals. I realized my weakness in this area and thought of how strong my business would be without it, so I set out to improve it. I have known RJT for several years from back when he was workin for the man. We would talk periodically on the phone and I knew he knew his stuff. I had contacted him in the past to do some employee council presentations for a multi-site account that I didn't have the time to fit in. Being that I was short on funds I ended up making time and did the presentations myself (and closed them for those wondering). I knew RJT could help me out on my sales 101 quest so I gave him a call. We settled on a two day plan, two weeks apart. I told RJT that my plan was to learn so I didn't really care if we closed any or not. I didn't need a fish I needed to learn how. RJT had me make list of accounts I wanted to visit and make up some goodie bags. He got to my house around 9am and went on to our first stop. RJT was leading the way and was just watching. I am not sure who was more stunned, me or the people we were talking to. RJT would walk in and start talking. He was not pushy, but somehow he would start talking and people would listen to every word. It was like they were in a trans. He was quick and thorough he would get all the answers we needed. People would do the "we are happy with our current vendor" and next thing I knew we were walking to the back to look at their machines and talking about what we could improve for them. We made a handful of stops then the inevitable happened. I pulled into a manufacturing account and RJT said its your turn. I walked in and did my spiel and the secretary said "have a seat and I will get him" (a clear sign they were not happy). The man was interested in me making an appointment to talk to him the following week. We ended the day at lunch time with one proposal, one appointment, and several contacts to follow up with. In addition to this I had gained lots of info on my competition and got to see how the sales thing is done. I was more than happy with our results for the day and felt great about the money I spent to hire RJT. But that was not the end. This past week I closed the manufacturing facility with RJTs guidance. Based on the commission payments I expect it to do 20-25k a year, now without a commission I am still working on the other location from that day with a good possibility of closing it. I wouldn't say I'm now good at it, but I am confident enough in what I've learned to keep making cold calls. This was money well spent and I plan on making it part of my plan to have RJT come work with me for a day every few months to help develop my sales skills. I just thought I would share my experience and say thanks RJT! JD Good for you JD. Based on my dealings with him, I would agree that his knowledge and wisdom is a great asset to this forum. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spdydre Posted September 17, 2011 Share Posted September 17, 2011 yeah I need someone like that here in houston to help me out lol. Sales is my biggest weakness Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted September 18, 2011 Share Posted September 18, 2011 JD, thanks for the review. It is a pleasure to help and work with folks like you that seem to really care about the vending industry as a whole and want to do it right. Guys like JD like to shoot customers straight, under promise and over deliver which is the way it should be done in business and life. Selling is not hard if you practice it like anything else. I will say some people will never be sales great people but they can get by if they put in the effort. The thing I try to stress is leading the customer but not being pushy. If you are friendly and sell in "help mode" amd not "hope mode" type approach you will close more deals. If you lead those people in "help mode" that say "we are pretty happy with who we have" you can lead them into letting you take a look at what they have and if you can improve on it. Help mode is what it sounds like you ask questions like you can "help" them possibly with better price, service, selection, etc and that usually opens the door. The hope mode is you tell them what you offer and you "hope" they bite and give you a chance. Hope mode usually never works unless they are very unhappy with their current vendor and in that case it was a blind pig finding an acorn. JD, again I thank you for the review and look forward in working with you another day to see if we can snag another accout or three..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThankYouComeAgain Posted September 29, 2011 Share Posted September 29, 2011 Question for RJT and the OP...would you say to stay off of the phone and get your face in front of the customer's face? My idea is that it is better to get in front of as many motivated prospects as possible instead of the phone. They need to see you. I never have made a sales phone call, and the Lord has blessed me when I got my face in front of the prospect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogcow Posted September 29, 2011 Share Posted September 29, 2011 Question for RJT and the OP...would you say to stay off of the phone and get your face in front of the customer's face? My idea is that it is better to get in front of as many motivated prospects as possible instead of the phone. They need to see you. I never have made a sales phone call, and the Lord has blessed me when I got my face in front of the prospect. i try to make appointments by phone, i think that is a good use of my time and more respectful of theirs i understand its easier to say no over the phone buy people are busy and i did not have much luck getting face time, in person in the few hours a day i had to devote to sales. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted September 30, 2011 Share Posted September 30, 2011 Question for RJT and the OP...would you say to stay off of the phone and get your face in front of the customer's face? My idea is that it is better to get in front of as many motivated prospects as possible instead of the phone. They need to see you. I never have made a sales phone call, and the Lord has blessed me when I got my face in front of the prospect. I do both but mostly use the phone for accounts like hotel/motels to try and set apointments. Unless you really know the area it is hard to work the phone only. I want to see the account and then knock on the door. I am looking for cars in the parking lots. Most vending sales to the better accounts is done face to face knocking on doors. You might not get to see anyone but you can gather informantion and call back. My line going in to the gate keeper is "I am Robert with Cafe Express Vending I was wanting to know who I needed to speak with or make an apointment with about your vending." Notice I said make an apointment with? This approach is less offensive and it goes over better. Sometimes they say let me see if they can see you. Sometimes they say you will need to make an appoinment with so and so. Polietly say thank you leave some info and maybe a goody bag for the contact person and leave. The next day call them and try and set an appointment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThankYouComeAgain Posted September 30, 2011 Share Posted September 30, 2011 I like the goodie bag suggestion before hand. You do have to give first, and even if they say no to you, they have something from you in case you need to go back later and try again. I also like the "or" portion of your opening line. Should work great. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coinvestor Posted December 2, 2011 Author Share Posted December 2, 2011 I just thought that I would give an update on this. I got the account installed. It is averaging $525-550 a week. It will be slow through the holidays as they are taking 3 weeks off, but will be a very solid account for me. I am still optimistic about closing another of the leads generated that day. Thanks again RJT! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngryChris Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 I just thought that I would give an update on this. I got the account installed. It is averaging $525-550 a week. It will be slow through the holidays as they are taking 3 weeks off, but will be a very solid account for me. I am still optimistic about closing another of the leads generated that day. Thanks again RJT! That's great! About how many employees do they have and what are the demographics? If you don't mind.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coinvestor Posted December 8, 2011 Author Share Posted December 8, 2011 That's great! About how many employees do they have and what are the demographics? If you don't mind.... ~ 90 employees in a hot sweaty blue collar manufacturing facility. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngryChris Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 ~ 90 employees in a hot sweaty blue collar manufacturing facility. Wow, so about $5.5/person! It's nice to hear that you got a good account. I think accounts like those are gold mines because they may seem too small for the huge companies and too big for the smaller companies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 Wow, so about $5.5/person! It's nice to hear that you got a good account. I think accounts like those are gold mines because they may seem too small for the huge companies and too big for the smaller companies. All vending companies are after these types of accounts. Its ironic that this one was taken from the "worlds largest vending company" Canteen. Their are fewer and fewer of the "large" accounts anymore that had hundreds of people in them. In a lot of cities these type accounts are the majority of what companies consider large accounts. It wasnt so alwful long ago most vending companies required at least 100 employees and up to put in a cold food machine. Now, it is not uncommon to see cold food machines in 50 person manuf type accounts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogcow Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 All vending companies are after these types of accounts. Its ironic that this one was taken from the "worlds largest vending company" Canteen. next time ur down near disneyville see if you can help me pick up one these LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted December 8, 2011 Share Posted December 8, 2011 next time ur down near disneyville see if you can help me pick up one these LOL I will be in that area at some point with my son to visit Mickey. I would be glad to see about spending a half or full day with ya doing some cold calling. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngryChris Posted December 10, 2011 Share Posted December 10, 2011 All vending companies are after these types of accounts. Its ironic that this one was taken from the "worlds largest vending company" Canteen. Their are fewer and fewer of the "large" accounts anymore that had hundreds of people in them. In a lot of cities these type accounts are the majority of what companies consider large accounts. It wasnt so alwful long ago most vending companies required at least 100 employees and up to put in a cold food machine. Now, it is not uncommon to see cold food machines in 50 person manuf type accounts. Don't get me wrong, I never said that no one wanted them . It's just that in my area, these companies that currently have less than 100 employees used to have 500+ and have downsized amidst the recession. As the super-sized manufacturing and industrial companies left Ohio, so did the super-sized vending companies such as AVI (the largest privately owned vending company in midwest eh?). The problem is that these companies were SPOILED with coffee machines and food machines and they want all of that stuff, new, and the larger vendors simply don't want to mess around and the smaller vendors simply cannot afford it and many of them don't even have the licensing to get coffee and food machines. I'm just saying that I only have to compete with the mid-sized guys over these accounts and there are only about 4 companies that fit that description in my area and I know that one of those companies is in no financial situation to grab any decent accounts right now and the other 3 companies have been around for so long that many of these companies are looking for some new players, like me. After I handle my debt situation in 2012, I am certain that I will grab a nice sized account in 2013. You all just wait, assuming I don't go bankrupt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogcow Posted December 15, 2011 Share Posted December 15, 2011 picked up a snack acct today, just want to say thanks to RJT for all the help and guidance hes given me over the last year or so, couldn't have done it without him. Also would like to say thanks to mission, bill and others on here who have given me invaluable advice whether they know it or not Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted December 15, 2011 Share Posted December 15, 2011 picked up a snack acct today, just want to say thanks to RJT for all the help and guidance hes given me over the last year or so, couldn't have done it without him. Also would like to say thanks to mission, bill and others on here who have given me invaluable advice whether they know it or not Congrats on your account, I hope it does well for you. Thank you also and you are welcome!!! Let us know how the process goes..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogcow Posted December 15, 2011 Share Posted December 15, 2011 Congrats on your account, I hope it does well for you. Thank you also and you are welcome!!! Let us know how the process goes..... yeah install first week in jan, i wish i could get their drink business too but they are using a bottler through a corporate office contract, i am gonna try working on that tho. got the in room coffee tho, volume is not huge but every little bit helps Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted December 16, 2011 Share Posted December 16, 2011 yeah install first week in jan, i wish i could get their drink business too but they are using a bottler through a corporate office contract, i am gonna try working on that tho. got the in room coffee tho, volume is not huge but every little bit helps Are you going to use that coffee company I told you about?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dogcow Posted December 16, 2011 Share Posted December 16, 2011 Are you going to use that coffee company I told you about?? yeah Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nrpick44 Posted December 16, 2011 Share Posted December 16, 2011 Just wanted to add that I bought RJT's book and to be blunt, its an awesome tool to have for a new vendor like myself. The only problem that I find is that I needed it about a year or so ago and I now have a " to do list " a mile long! Just wanted to say thanks becuase it sure makes it easier having all this info just sitting in front of me in one book. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJT Posted December 17, 2011 Share Posted December 17, 2011 Just wanted to add that I bought RJT's book and to be blunt, its an awesome tool to have for a new vendor like myself. The only problem that I find is that I needed it about a year or so ago and I now have a " to do list " a mile long! Just wanted to say thanks becuase it sure makes it easier having all this info just sitting in front of me in one book. Thank you very much!! I am glad you liked the book and it was helpful. I wish you much success!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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