Are People Really Still Making Calls?
[by Suzanne Sease and Amanda Sosa-Stone]
A mutual client of ours recently worked on her brand, portfolio and marketing strategy (with Suzanne). Then she came to Agency Access to work on implementing her marketing through Campaign Manager (with Amanda – a year long plan to make sure marketing is being done). After getting her beautiful portfolio printed, through PushDotStudio.com, she was ready to start showing her book. She was ready to tackle her local market first. We trained her to make the calls using a dialog that has been perfected over the last couple of years (available on AgnecyAccess.com). After her first attempt of calling, this was her report:
First attempt: local market
-called & emailed 11 contacts today
-had a response (within 10 minutes) saying ‘nice work, what’s your day rate’
-had 2 more responses in the next hour:
1: scheduled an appointment with an art buyer in her local market (NOT NYC)
2: scheduled a meeting for the next week with a very popular Magazine in her local market
Second attempt: trip to the South:
-8 calls to South Advertising Agencies today
-2 meetings set up for next week
Things to focus on when attempting to make these calls:
-Despite the fear of rejection, it feels SO GOOD to be making these calls and actually ‘doing’ something.
-Having a beautiful well thought out book gives you the confidence to make these calls!
Our client emailed last week with her final report and said “THANK YOU, your Your magic formula is working!” Nothing feels better than knowing that a client is working hard and it’s paying off.
So the answer is YES there are still meetings that are happening – it’s just a matter of how much energy are you willing to put into the calls. It’s a numbers game.
We also prepared our client for those UNCOMFORTABLE questions (like who have you worked for in the past, etc…) and after her trip to the South, we followed up and she said having those UNCOMFORTABLE situations planned out had her prepared and she felt confident going into those meetings. You have to be honest, but put a positive spin on your greenness, your lack of commercial work, your fear of location shooting, major productions or whatever your concern is. Remember we all fear something, look it directly in the face and tackled it. What do you have to lose? You don’t have this client now, so go in and conquer!
GOOD LUCK!
3 Responses to 'Are People Really Still Making Calls?'
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Just wanted to share my experience with “making calls” Each time I go out I do feel good about the experience because each time there is at least one person that makes me feel good about my work and that is impressed that I am making calls. On one of my outings I did pick up a new client. They spent an hour talking to me and I have been invited back for meetings and have rec’d great endorsements by their internal people so I am hopeful that will turn into a good stream of business within the next 6 months.
Calls are definitely worth the work.
[...] • After a week ASMP posting varying opinions on the topic of cold calls being an integral part of a photographer’s sales repertoire, Amanda Sosa-Stone and Suzanne Sease have an article on ASMP’s strictly Business blog about the results that their clients have gotten through calling programs. [...]
Thanks for this post. It was encouraging and instructive!