[Music] chapter 16 three obstacles eight steps in the last chapter we put together our telephone opening statement which means you're ready to deliver a meaningful and easily interrupted monologue to Vito this is certainly a critical piece of our approach but it's time for a reality check before we actually get to deliver that monologue we may need to navigate three significant potential obstacles they are number one a receptionist gatekeeper number two one or more of Vito's private assistants very different from the receptionist gatekeeper as we shall see number three the possibility of getting stymied by voicemail with all of this on our way it's no wonder we may hesitate just a little when it comes to prospecting for new business by making the dreaded cold call not even like the name cold call to you let's learn how to warm things up a bit stairway to sales heaven if you take the following eight steps your calls will be put through to Vito period what you're about to discover is a simple process this process is going to take some work but the rewards of having a conversation with Vito will be well worth the effort step 1 create your Vito correspondence you've already done this right if not go back and do it now creating correspondence for Vito serves you in several important ways first it helps you create equal business stature before you make your call second it will make sure you navigate swiftly and sure-footed leap past the gatekeeper receptionist as you'll see in a moment third you will impress Tommy Vito's private assistant and that's certainly going to help your cause fourth and perhaps most importantly creating your correspondence will help you when it comes time to deliver your opening statement to Vito you can send your correspondence using US Postal Service first-class mail or any one of the many slick professional-looking inexpensive email services here's some easy-to-follow guide lines postal format don't use your company logo at the top or anywhere else of the correspondence or envelope yeah yeah I know your logo is cool and you've been doing a lot of advertising lately and you're sponsoring the regional champs in the local La Crosse tournament but guess what if you put it on your envelope and one of Vito's gatekeepers sees it they will pass judgment as to what's inside that's a bad thing to avoid this outcome you must promise not to use your company stationery or envelopes deal deal for a return address on the envelope just put your name and your address don't put your company name and don't worry no one's gonna send you anything anyway and virtually no first-class mail gets lost these days by the way don't write anything on the outside of the envelope like personal and confidential or or to be opened by addressee only finally use an eight and a half by eleven or larger envelope for your letter you want this correspondence to stand out use real postage stamps not a postage meter and please remember because your Vito correspondence is in a large envelope it's gonna require a little additional postage email format keep it simple keep it short if you're planning to email the Vito correspondence that we created together a little while back you'll have to edit it down everyone including Vito expects email to be a little bit shorter than regular mail safety tip make sure you put your email version through a spell checker before hitting Send on many email systems what you create and see on your end may not be what Vito will see on his or her end if you use any links make sure their tail it to this Vito and make sure they work stay away from catchy one-liners that are in your subject lines such as increased revenues and lower expenses with our new zip line processors the subject line should be a short version of your action PS it could read like this our e our conversation on Thursday May 14th at 9:30 a.m. step 2 find prospects in your territory that match the persona of your best customers you've already done this right if you are able to answer yes honestly then congratulations you have identified a list of good solid prospects that are predisposed to buy from you send your Vito correspondence only to the organizations that fit that persona make sure you separate them into industries or niches step 3 find out Vito's name for each of the prospects in step 2 this gets easier and easier to do with each passing day there are tons of lists some available for free some for a small fee that you can use it's much easier to get Vito's name than most salespeople think here's my general rule if you really can't get your hands on Vito's name if Vito's hiding behind a wall of secrecy then you probably don't want that veto as a customer step 4 find out the name of Vito's private assistant you'll need this for two very important reasons first to create your action PS and that special handwritten message second you'll need this name to interact effectively with the gatekeeper receptionist sometimes you find these names on the same business list that Vito's name is on sometimes you want the fastest and most accurate way to discover Vito's private assistants name just call Vito incorporated and ask step 5 find out Vito Incorporated's fax number why do you need this because you'll be faxing your Vito correspondence to Vito incorporated one hour before you're called to Vito and on that fax copy of the correspondence you will circle the headline and right above below or along the side is this important to you and your operation in the next 90 days circle or draw an arrow to one or more of the benefit bullets are these results on your list of to do's this month underline the time of your call in the action PS looking forward to our first conversation exclamation point step 6 find the name or names of each of the decision-makers who represent your perfect shunt target which decision-makers are most likely to be empowered by Vito to take a closer look into your ideas for example in my case that's the VP of Sales or the CPO chief performance officer or CMO chief marketing officer why do you need to know about any of this well if at any point in time anyone including Vito suggests a shunt to anyone other than your ideal shunt target you can immediately stop the shunt in its tracks that skill by the way is critically important to controlling your sales process and the size of your Commission checks we'll discuss shunts in more depth in a later chapter step 7 internalize your telephone opening statement don't memorize it internalize it if you memorize it it will sound like you're reading it from a script when you internalize an opening statement you'll never say it the same way twice filler words like um you know are okay in moderation we're looking for a casual relaxed and much less than perfect delivery step 8 prepare your voicemail message to Vito yeah I know you've been struggling with all of this voicemail Jail I also know that no one's been returning your calls all of that is about to change as you'll see and here in a later chapter Vito rule number 22 once you complete all eight of the pre correspondence steps and not before you will be ready to send your Vito correspondence I strongly recommend that your first wave of Vito letters be sent out to at least 20 Vito's if you want to get on the fast track and get all those c-suite appointments you've worked hard for and deserve so you could sell more faster and crush your quota in the process then all you need to do is go to our site Vito sales training com click on the take action tab scroll down till you see the Vito University logo and check it out and in the meantime have yourself a masterful rest of the day bye-bye [Music]