Steve Hoffacker's Sales Quips

I just got another email promising me targeted leads. It's aggravating to keep getting these emails, but it is funny.

I put these in the same classification as the ones I get from the widow in Africa and the other phishing schemes.

I do not believe in buying leads - especially ones that I didn't request - for two very important reasons:

(1) no one knows exactly what I'm looking for in a referral or how I might develop a lead into a sale. A service appraching me and wanting me to buy leads from them would only be guessing. They don't know anything about what I need my next sale to look like - for the simple fact that I haven't shared it with them. There's no way they can know. I don't know who they are, and they certainly don't know me. We've never met, and I have not engaged them to perform this service for me.

(2) I don't believe in paying for something that is my responsibility. Part of my job description - a very large part - is generating new business. I'm happy to take referrals, but the onous for producing business is mine. I can't assign that to anyone else except people that I employ and have trained just for this.

I do wish that the people in the lead selling business would get into a legitimate business to use their sales talents more productively.

Now, if you really do need some help in generating leads, I can definitely give you some ideas and point you in the right direction - but then it would be up to you to follow-through and actually produce them, just as it is for me.

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For more information on my coaching and educational programs and services, visit my website stevehoffacker.com, or go to my other blog homesalesinsights.com for additional sales tips, insights, and commentary. Listen to my free podcast messages at Steve Hoffacker's Happenings.

Steve Hoffacker - Consultant, Coach, Author, Blogger, Photographer, Motivator, Teacher, & Strategist - for Realtors, Real Estate Sales Professionals, Home Builders, New Home Salespeople, Entrepreneurs, Small Business Owners, and Independent Sales Representatives.

© Steve Hoffacker, 2011. All Rights Reserved.

Hardly a day goes by without me receiving at least on solicitation for someone to find and generate leads for me. Wow, is it really that easy? Just pay these people and start making sales with their super-qualified leads?

Do they have access to more phone books, directories, and search engines than I do? Do they have stacks and stacks of names of people that don't want to be contacted and have not consented to a phone call or email from me but will be sold to me anyway?

Imagine! They already know what types of leads I need and they have not asked me the first question about my ideal referral. And how many of the so-called leads are going to be be given to me and 10 other people (or more) at the same time?

If I want to cold call, I don't to pay for names. I can just start.

Unless these name brokers and list generators know exactly what I am looking for in customer and can convey that to potential leads, and give me someone who at least knows of me, has agreed to to be contacted, has a demonstrated need, and a budget that will allow us to seriously discuss our services and solutions, I will stay with generating serious leads the old-fashioned way - one at a time by myself.

The idea of having someone else generate leads for us is very appealing - too appealing. We should stick with what works - an aggressive on line presence, active referral base, and intentional lead generation on our own,

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For anyone in new home sales that would like to start generating their own leads but is not sure where to start, my book "Making New Friends" contains strategies, scenarios, letters, and scripts that you can use to meet strangers and devlop those contacts into sales leads.

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For more information on my coaching and educational programs and services, visit my website stevehoffacker.com, or go to my other blog homesalesinsights.com for additional sales tips, insights, and commentary. Listen to my free podcast messages at Steve Hoffacker's Happenings.

Steve Hoffacker - Consultant, Coach, Author, Blogger, Photographer, Motivator, Teacher, & Strategist - for Realtors, Real Estate Sales Professionals, Home Builders, New Home Salespeople, Entrepreneurs, Small Business Owners, and Independent Sales Representatives.

© Steve Hoffacker, 2011. All Rights Reserved.

In sports, when we sit back and wait for the ball to come to us we often miss out or have the ball intercepted or deflected. In baseball or softball, waiting for the ball to come to us when we are in the field may mean that the runner has the advantage in the extra time it takes for the ball to get to us.

In soccer or basketball, when one player passes the ball across the field or court to his teammate, the ball easily can get intercepted by the opponent if the player receiving the pass just waits for the ball to get there instead of running up to meet it.

In football, if the receiver on a pass play just waits for the pass to get to him, it might be tipped or intercepted by the defender. He needs to be ready to go to the ball.

In sales, if we wait for the customer to come to us - for the phone to ring, the door to open, or the email to arrive - it may be too late. We may not have enough business to sustain ourseleves. We have to go after what we want and make new contacts, devlop the ones we have, and pursue our business. We can't wait on the ball to get to us on its own.

We all have the power to generate enough leads for our businesses. We just have to want it and then do it.

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For more information on my coaching and educational programs and services, visit my website stevehoffacker.com, or go to my other blog homesalesinsights.com for additional sales tips, insights, and commentary. Listen to my free podcast messages at Steve Hoffacker's Happenings.

Steve Hoffacker - Consultant, Coach, Author, Blogger, Photographer, Motivator, Teacher, & Strategist - for Realtors, Real Estate Sales Professionals, Home Builders, New Home Salespeople, Entrepreneurs, Small Business Owners, and Independent Sales Representatives.

© Steve Hoffacker, 2010. All Rights Reserved.

As a long-time student (you really don't want to know how long) of lead generation, I am amazed by all of the shortcuts that people want to employ. I guess I really shouldn't be surprised, but still.

There is only one successful way to generate leads and that is to do it ourselves.

I know that there are many people who like lead generation services, and if it works for you - fine. It's just not for me.

I have read about outsourcing lead generation. This seems counter-intuitive.

I repeat, it's our business, our homes or products, our reputation, and our relationships that we are creating. Why would we even think of entrusting them to anyone else?

I have several programs that I present for local Realtor and Home Builder Associations on specific techniques for lead generation, and I am putting the finishing touches on 4 books on this subject.

It's human nature to want shortcuts, to desire a quick fix, and to have things made as easy as possible. Unfortunately, lead generation is not an area where anything short of a full commitment of time, dedication, and resources will do to produce the desired results.

Not all leads become serious customers, and not all serious customers become purchasers. Still, it is up to us to keep our pipelines full and not to rely on anyone else to do this for us.

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For more information on my coaching and educational programs and services, visit my website stevehoffacker.com or go to my other blog homesalesinsights.com for additional sales tips, insights, and commentary. You can also listen to my free podcast messages at Steve Hoffacker's Happenings. © Steve Hoffacker, 2009. All Rights Reserved.

To be in business today, not unlike other times, we have two choices for lead generation and ultimate sales success.

We can sit back waiting for the phone to ring, or for the door to open, or for the email to arrive in our inbox - or we can go after new business.

Given the 2 choices, I'm going for the second one. The first is easier, but since when is growing a business necessarily easy?

Active Rain and other social networking sites give us an opportunity to reach out and connect with people - many of them unknown at present. Using the "6 degrees of separation" principle, we have so many ways of meeting and reaching out to potential new customers.

Then there are so many opportunities just in our daily comings and goings to meet people and generate new leads if we just are receptive to them.

Join me in choosing to be proactive and assertive in attracting new leads and customers.

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For more information on my coaching services or sales tips visit my website stevehoffacker.com or my blog homesalesinsights.com.