Ryan Dohrn explains quick hooks, brief personalized insights from a prospect's website or social media used to open calls more effectively. He advises someone required to make 120 calls daily to comply while testing new tactics, and notes that call volume is unusually high unless selling direct-response products.
Questions this video answers
First, do what your boss asks to keep your job, but ask to experiment with new methods. Use "quick hooks"—brief, personalized insights from a prospect's website, social media, or competitor activity—to improve call effectiveness. Understand realistic sales math; 120 calls/day is unusually high unless selling a direct‑response product. If you consistently can’t succeed, evaluate whether the product, market, or role is a poor fit and consider a new opportunity.
Chapters
Hey friends, Ryan Dohrn, your Global Sales Coach. How you doing? Glad to have you here as we answer our listener questions that have been sent in to ryan@ryandohrn.com. We also answer these questions on Facebook. Hey, are we friends on— do you like my page on Facebook? It's Ryan Dohrn Live over if you're a Facebook person. We do a bunch of live Q&A and coffee hangouts on Fridays. So if you're not a part of all that, hey, you got to get over there and check it out. All right, listener question. Hey, what's going on? This is from Reggie. I didn't read this in advance. From Reggie from Baton Rouge. Baton Rouge asked this. Hey Ryan, I'm battling it out with my boss. Uh-oh, I think I know your boss, Reggie. Battling it out with my boss about call volume. I just don't see the point to blindly calling 120 people every day. Really, what should I do? So Reggie, good question. First and foremost, I think you want to do what your boss tells you to do. You know, if you want to keep your job, do what your boss tells you to do. Now, maybe you could do some experimentation. Maybe you could work with your boss on trying some different methods, but first and foremost, do what your boss wants you to do. Now, what I do to improve my call ratio when I'm asked for big call volume like that, I'm looking for something I call a quick hook. Okay, a quick hook, like a hook, a quick hook. And what that is, is very quickly between those calls, going over to a customer's website, going to their Facebook page, their company Facebook page, going to their LinkedIn profile, and I'm looking for anything that's some kind of hook. Let me give you a couple of examples. I was recently working with a great team up in Spotlight Media up in Fargo, North Dakota, and I was working with one of the reps and we were calling on a wedding venue. One of the things I noticed on their website is that they didn't have pictures of what social distanced setups looked like for that wedding venue. So my hook was to call them and be able to say, hey, I'd love to get the word out about how people are social distancing within your venue, and we can help you with photography and things like that. That was my hook. Maybe you're selling software or something like that. Going to their website to see what type of volume do they do at their business, and maybe your software is something like a CRM software or something like that. The hook might be the amount of money you can save time for them. A very easy hook is a competitor. So if you're trying to sell in some type of environment where there are competitors, a quick hook is to call up Company A and potentially say, hey, I see that Company B out there is doing this and this. I've got an idea to help you be highly competitive. Competitors are a real quick hook. So, uh, Reggie, as much as I could say, I'd love for you just to tell your boss to go fly a kite. You want to do what the boss says, but you want to try to find quick hooks because in a lot of cases, call volume does work. Just recognize your sales math. Typically, you're not calling as many people as you think you need to call, and your boss is just trying to move the conversation forward. Now, for Reggie and everybody out there, if you're in a circumstance where you just cannot find success in sales, maybe you've had some training, You've had some coaching, you just can't find success. It's not sales that's the problem. It could be the environment, the product, or the circumstance that you're in. So try to use every day to learn something about your CRM, about products, but inevitably you might have to find a new gig. Now, Reggie, don't leave or something, your boss will call me. But think about this, there's no reason to battle it out with the boss. Try to find a quick hook. Try to find fast ways to connect with people and just recognize Quite honestly, I mean, call volume does work. Now, 120 calls a day, now that's a little bit stout in almost any circumstance unless you're selling a direct market product like a direct response product. But Reggie, be positive, look every day for learning experiences, things you can learn and that you can grow from. And I know that you can do it out there, Reggie. So good luck to you. All right, friends, keep your listener questions coming to ryan@ryandohrn.com. If I can motivate you, coach you, train your team virtually or live, Reach out to me over at ryandohrn.com. And don't forget about the podcast over on iTunes, Spotify, iHeartRadio, you name it. Just search for Ryan Dohrn, D-O-H-R-N. Hey friends, don't forget, if ad sales was easy, if sales was easy, everybody'd be doing it, and they're not. So we're either crazy or we found careers that'll feed our families for a lifetime. All right, friends, we'll see you for another tip next week.
