Put That Phone Down, Quit Cold Calling, and REALLY Start Prospecting

The days of traditional cold calling are going by the wayside. People are too busy to accept cold calls and really listen to a sales person pitch their services or products. Sales people get frustrated by doing cold calls and the time usually associated with any type of success from cold calling. So, what can both parties do to make this easy on one another?

The internet has provided us with awesome resources that bring sales people and customers together. The resources found in this article are excellent tools to generate new business.

The following five companies provide excellent methods to reach new customers as well as networking partners. In addition, each firm provides unique features that appeal to different ways of generating new business. The companies listed provide different methods to building new business, avoid painful cold calling measures, and most importantly provide a comfortable way for customers to be contacted without receiving tons of cold calls:

1. Linkedin (www.Linkedin.com)
One of the best services we have ever seen. The name saids it all. People link with one another. The service helps promote users by allowing them to build their own profiles and receive testimonial from people who do business with them. The service also notifies users when they login who within their network has added new contacts, thus educating members on how their networking is growing. There are free and fee-based service levels.

2. JigSaw (www.JigSaw.com)
This company has a large membership where people can find prospects within well defined target demographics of their choosing. The service provides a unique feature. The play feature allows the member to refer other members to the service and receive credit for the referral, thus providing free points to be used to find additional contacts.

3. Fast Pitch Networking (www.FastPitchNetworking.com)

This Florida firm has created a community of business people who can not only connect with one another but Bill Jula, President of Fast Pitch Networking, has added services that help people promote their business. There are services where people can connect within the Fast Pitch community but services such as event promotion and press releases are also sent to online resource such as Google, Yahoo, etc.

4. SendOutCards (www.SendOutCards.com)

What if there was a B2B card service that allowed you to personalize each card or send our personalized cards for your business to hundreds of people with a click of a button? Well, there is such a service called Send Out Cards. This web-based service allows you to build a card online and the company prints the card (even in your handwriting if you choose) and mails to your customer for you.

5. Elance (www.Elance.com)

This online service truly brings buyers and sellers together. Initially, the service appears to work best with independent consultants but many larger firms use the service as well. Customers post projects within defined categories and vendors review the postings and bid on the projects. The service also comes with quality control measures that protect customers and help promote the good vendors.

Cold Calling is tough and lets be honest most people do not like it. This article is not suggesting all sales people should stop calling and simply use these services. Sales people must use these services to help supplement their current prospecting efforts. These tools take time, but can accelerate a sales person new business within a short period of time.

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