Jeremy Weisz 3:57
who’s not a fit. I know we were talking before we hit record here, there’s there’s certain types of companies or campaigns that are just not a fit at all.
Richard Blank 4:09
It comes in many shapes and sizes. The first thing is price of America. If they expect a Costa Rican agent to work for offshore prices in Philippines in the India, what would happen is no one would accept that offer and I couldn’t be able to scale and fill that campaign. Secondly, a lot of my potential clients may not understand the Costa Rican labor laws. So there are certain expectations in the United States that we just cannot fulfill here. And then thirdly, once again, revolves around a company culture. I do agree and motivation I grew up in Philadelphia so I can take a punch, but a certain sort of vocabulary tone, or something that may be effective in the United States might be offensive here in Costa Rica, so we just have to make sure that we lay out certain parameters and boundaries and expectations initially, so there’s no surprises with my clients.
Jeremy Weisz 5:00
Um, what about from a service perspective people calling maybe, maybe they’re a fit from a company perspective, the type of company you serve, but they’re looking for a different type of service, what are the the service type of services that maybe people are expecting that you’re, you tell them, we don’t, we don’t really do that here?
Richard Blank 5:19
Well, a lot of it has to depend on their workforce. I mean, if somebody in their office is starting out as just a one man show, I can scale for them. A lot of the times people need to offset certain work or to be able to, once again, give a certain sort of a company a chance to be able to compare apples to their metrics at home office. But we offer all different types of services. As I mentioned before inbound and outbound support, my difference is the infrastructure, I do have redundancy in regards to our internet, we do have backup electricity with generators, and also have immediate IT support. And so a lot of the people if they’re just starting out, or if they have a limited budget, wouldn’t be able to use us in regards to making their company grow. Now, the only difference is, and it’s really not a difference now, because most people are working from home, that these agents can fulfill these needs virtually, what I tried to do is to extend all of my resources, my experience in regards to script writing rebuttals, a quality assurance department, I, I’d like to see if we could find some consistency with the client to be able to find areas of improvement. And so a lot of it, my friend is just an investment in a process. And sometimes the client just gives me a plug and play operation where they already have things in place, which makes it very easy for me. And then on the flip side, it is my pleasure to be able to build a custom made campaign for my clients.
Jeremy Weisz 6:48
Let’s talk about culture for a second. And when when COVID hit again, like you have the tools and opportunity to do things virtually, obviously, because people call you your call center and you’re doing things virtually. But what about in house? Did things change at all? With COVID? Did you find that more people were able to work from home? And then you know, or do they come back in the office? How did that transition look like kind of during COVID? And then post COVID?
Richard Blank 7:19
It’s an excellent question, Jeremy. Well, nobody knew what was happening. You’re a doctor. I mean, nobody really knew what was happening when COVID first did. So the Costa Rican labor law gave me up to 50% capacity, my call center, I chose to make it 20%. I did need people here for PCI compliance, onboarding, something happens at home, they can have a turnkey station. What we lost his the camaraderie. This is a very social environment, I do believe in synergy. And unlike certain vocations, where people can just sit in a cubicle and get their job done. This is a very open floor plan where people were feeding off of the energy, and we’re all public speakers. And so it really reduced my effectiveness in regards to on site training, where I could just walk the rows and stand there and give someone shadowing or some sort of positive reinforcement. But I also saw the isolation side of it, people once again, loved coming to work to eat lunch and spend time with their best friend. And we also had some people here that were so influential that if you sat next to him, you are definitely going to be better. Like, you know, when you’re playing basketball, if you play with someone better than you, you’re probably going to hit better shots. And so the positive side of it has a lot of people that lived far away could save their time and money, spend more time with their family. And once again, they showed some sort of composure and maturity, to be able to work from home, even though we are able to monitor their work. And so it was really a give her a take you and I what we had to do was just adjust accordingly. And so besides just following the labor laws, we had to open up a lot more communication channels, we had to be a lot more active. And in the best way that we can try to continue our company culture of empathy, of caring about the agent, and letting them know that we’re still investing in them and they’re not expendable, are we capable of doing it? Sure. And I think everybody needs to adjust to this virtual world. It’s, it’s a shame my friend because I think a lot of it, we’re losing a certain artists perspective of what it’s like to do something live in front of people, compared to just doing something virtually. And so as long as people once again, can make sure if they’re on a zoom call to represent themselves properly, or if they are working with somebody just take the extra efforts to let them know that you’re thinking about them, and that you support them in that sort of way. And, and those sorts of messages, doctors, you know, go a long way.
Jeremy Weisz 9:49
So when you talk about gamification culture that you have there, tell me more about that.
Richard Blank 9:56
My job is my second half. I mean, the first thing of this company is by more machines and finding places to put them. I grew up in the 70s and 80s. And unless you were really, really good game or your $5 really had to last you an entire Saturday. And so once I started my business and making some money, I got to choose my own pastimes. And one of them once again was this gamification. And so, one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, Jeremy. So I’m constantly looking for retro pinball machines, arcade machines jukeboxes, and I’ve created such a wonderful neutral environment. So agents can meet people from other departments, they can let off steam recharge batteries, and one of the greatest things is to spend time with the half day down in the game room. And so prior to any sort of first day training class, the dozen agents will spend time in the arcade to get to know one another and relax. So when they do enter the training room in the class for the first time, instead of just absorbing information, they’re so comfortable and having a great time, they start contributing. So I really start with a very strong momentum, and can reduce any sort of fear that people can have without knowing individuals. So strangers or friends you haven’t met yet. Once you have recess and play with somebody now that’s your best friend. And chances are your attrition rate will be reduced because you’ll be working with people that you enjoy being with.
Jeremy Weisz 11:19
Yeah, I want to talk about the training process since I know you’ve trained over 10,000 Bilingual telemarketers. But so if you have a staff member that beats you in pinball, is there some steaks on the table, they get a promotion? Or how does that work?
Richard Blank 11:37
Well, what I see is someone that has dedicated practice in order to beat me at pinball on my own machines, they must have been play. So obviously I wasn’t around, I think it’s a great thing. But in regards to training, a couple of things happen. The first thing I like to do, Jeremy is just to put fear into perspective. If somebody is not properly prepared for an account, then they have uncertainty. But I take it even a step before that somebody that walks into my call center is bilingual, which to me bears the mark of higher education, it really shows structure and discipline. So what they have done by becoming bilingual is 10 times harder than any campaign I can put them on. And also, secondly, I like to invest in their vocabulary, because English is their second language. So we study the source to increase their similes and vocabulary for more diplomatic and strategic deliveries. And if somebody is showing promise, my main thing is to delegate responsibility. So then I can find ways to promote from within. So it really doesn’t matter how long you’ve been with me, young or old, black and white, male or female. If you show the potential and you show merit, you will make a name for yourself very, very fast. And as I mentioned before, this is a very strict Catholic country here. So we’re exceptionally selective of the campaign’s that come into the center. So once again, I have to be able to fulfill the need of the agents so they can go home and tell their parents what they do for a living. Because we compete against Amazon, HP, Intel, an Oracle, we’re a hotbed for BPO, processing and nearshore. And so what I have to do besides give them their dignity, I also have to make sure that their work environment is something to where they can recharge their batteries, and be able to confront any sort of issues that they may have outside of the office currently, that could potentially be affecting the work inside the office.
Jeremy Weisz 13:28
You talked about I’ve heard you talk about different things on educating people diplomatic phrases, I love to hear some examples, because I think we can all at least I can speak for ourselves, can always improve on customer support, whether it’s spoken or written. And you had several, I heard you say several different versions, not just like, Can I help you? But there’s other things that you tell people they could say that comes off really well, you know, really good as far as customer support and in diplomatic way.
Richard Blank 13:59
Well, not trying to correct a doctor, but I would initially say How may I you know, so these are certain things I would replace the can to the may replace the help with guide assist or lend a hand? Instead of asking you to repeat something I would say Jeremy for my clarification. Was it ABC or 123? I would make sure to do a five to one name, drop the pronoun and I would constantly saying your your your are. Does that make sense? Jeremy at the end, so there are certain checkpoints. And also if you’re making outbound phone calls, and imagine if I was calling inspired insider and you had somebody answering the phone for you, I would definitely try to do a positive escalation. So once I got transferred to you, I would let you know how amazing these individuals are that are working with you. I will do it verbally. And then at the end of our conversation I would also have mentioned to that in writing. Why so when the Richard circle comes back and I call the inspired insider This individual answers the phone a, they’re going to remember me, they’re going to thank me very much for that compliment. And we’re going to separate ourselves from the other people trying to angle their way into meeting you. And also these individuals working with, you could be giving you additional company information in regards to anniversaries, promotions, or company culture. And so instead of trying to squeeze a fit, just do some due diligence on a website or LinkedIn profile, take a little bit of extra time to show some more active listening. So when I’m repeating questions to you, it shows that I’m up to speed with you. And there’s certain checkpoints. And so a lot of the times with my agents, they might come into the center with bad habits German, and that’s okay. I mean, they’ve worked in other places, and they have the experience. But what I like to do is not to have them so well rehearsed, they should always be more raw, and have that sort of essence, where they can once again be more of a painting, and make almost every call unique. And there are certain areas of a call where since people working from home, you could hear something in the background like a dog. And instead of just asking about the dog asked the dog’s name, and find out certain things to anchor topics in common a knee to technique. And so besides just grading your performance on the questions to qualify the client, I’m more focused on the soft skills of when you used rebuttals or positive escalation, or certain areas for clarification in order to be able to prolong the conversation for first call resolution. And so as long as somebody that is increasing, those sort of active listening and participation skills, they should become phenomenal on the phone and their earnings potential. And the marketability should be limitless.
Jeremy Weisz 16:47
What are some examples of bad habits people come in with?
Richard Blank 16:53
I think that what happens is they’ll give up too easily, I think of a phone call, if someone hangs up on you, that’s neat. But if somebody is there, and even if they are, let’s say their tone may be aggressive, you can adjust that compared to matching that we spoke about more diplomatic vocabulary. But that again, if somebody can use deductive reasoning and do listening twice speaking, one, I can almost know what you know, and then focusing my attention on that for you. And, and a lot of the times people will leave a door open, they will just be rushing so much to get an appointment or to get a yes out of somebody that they overlooked an area where they could have done a follow up question or gotten some more information out of it. But I will tell you, what’s a terrible habit that certain companies do. They only communicate with their clients via chat or email. And that’s okay, in certain circumstances if you have to fill out a form first to be able to get assistance. But in my opinion, what what can happen is it can elevate stress, if you’re not speaking with a client or eliminating any chance for retention of referral and upsell. And how about this in a mature way journey and exit interview. Worst case scenario, we lose the business, but somebody is willing to walk me through areas of improvement, or what our competition had done in order to earn their business. So even though people think that today, it should be just texting, texting can be very much misinterpreted. And you’re also not getting the sort of mileage out of the relationship that you could, if you would build a certain rapport through speech. And so some of the bad habits we have today are that a lot of the agents are coming in preferring that sort of inbound support that’s nonverbal. And so for me, I believe that they’re almost limiting their potential, at least give it a shot. And just to see if you have the sort of skill set, to be able to have a specific conversation with somebody to be able to get a positive resolution out of it.
Jeremy Weisz 18:57
So Richard, let’s say there’s a company and they have a list of whatever every month of clients who decided not to use a service, they can hire a company like you to go, Hey, Richard, here’s the list right now, we don’t offer support via phone, here’s a list of these clients every month, and your company would call them and almost do kind of like an exit type of interview. Is that right?
Richard Blank 19:23
We can, I’d be very much interested to see the tone of the script, the voicemails and the email templates that you have to offer me. If I have to start that I’d like to start off positive, or one of the first things I could say is, hey, we didn’t forget about you. And unlike other companies that just send emails I’m giving you a personal courtesy call may have a few moments to be able to find out what we could do in order to earn your business, what the competition did to get your business and I’d like to see if I could match it or to be able to exceed those sorts of expectations. And so as long as I mentioned before, that you could almost custom make To this, you’d have to give me the exact vertical, how long you communicated with them the sort of communication they gave to us services we’re offering. So as I say, before, there’s certain ways, there’s a philosophy of Wu Wei, where it’s Least Resistance, I don’t want to call you and badger you. And while you’re not giving me the business, but if you’re kind enough to spend the time with me, even if I’m starting five touchdowns behind, there is a chance we can come back and win this game, it’s just a matter of earning time, at least, let me get the first 30 seconds. And if I can get the 30 seconds, maybe I can get a 10 minute conversation out of you. And we can take it step by step and piece by piece. And even if I have to stop midway, to reschedule it, or to follow through with information to pick up where we left off, that’s your protocol. And I’m okay with that. As long as your clients can build a pipeline, depending on sense of urgency, and the sort of company culture, I think you can then once again, readjust your prospecting accordingly.
Jeremy Weisz 21:02
Richard, in that situation with a company go great, we want you to actually, you know, these are customers that aren’t using decide not to use us anymore, for whatever reason, at what volume, does it make sense for them to call you like, let’s say they have one a month, that probably doesn’t make any sense, right? To have them use your services? Is there a certain volume of calls that makes sense for a company before they, you know, I guess, a baseline of volume, you’re like, Yeah, this makes sense to work with us.
Richard Blank 21:34
I think as long as I get full time work for somebody, because I buy labor laws, I don’t do part time work here because they won’t be able to get their benefits. But if somebody only has enough leads to call for one month, and it’s an individual working out of their home, and it’s a startup company, not saying that I have a preferred child, but I was in those shoes back in the day. So I guess I have more empathy and compassion towards the startup company that might even almost be embarrassed that they’re not able to give me 100 seat tenure commitment. Well, once again, everybody had to start with their first step. And it’s almost like when somebody says, How do I get job experience, if somebody doesn’t hire me, not saying I’m willing to take any campaign, I’m extremely selective of those that come in here. But if they make their case, and if they’re willing to, you know, invest in a process, and there is no surprises, and we can share resources, it’s my pleasure to see what happens. I mean, Pete Rose should have been in the Hall of Fame for singles, it’s still okay. And 100 singles opens up to a huge 100 seat account. And so as I mentioned before, a little bit of time equals a lot in the end. And from time to time, a client may be testing you small, or it might be an iceberg, where they want to see how I would react to a one seater before they give me 100 seats. And for me, as I mentioned before, everybody gets the same red carpet treatment, and everybody gets the same sort of attention. And I would love to earn their business. And so I have had certain clients, as you were mentioning, test me on a certain volume just to see what my reactions are. And I’ve earned that business. And so anybody out there, you should be extremely appreciative of anybody that walks into your door that orders one slice to 20 pies, you just never know. Because the 20 Pie Guy comm is a one and done, the one slicer could be there for the next 20 years. And so as I mentioned before, I believe in good faith, and stars being aligned and energy. And if somebody has that sort of interest to contact me, it’s my obligation to be able to share ideas with them. So on an educated point of view, Germany, they can make a decision to move forward with
Jeremy Weisz 23:52
Richard, you mentioned that from an outbound perspective, there’s different kinds of parts to the call. So I’d love for you to break that down, especially the opening part. Because, you know, you’ve mentioned before, if you don’t get past that, it doesn’t matter what you have planned for the rest of the call.
Richard Blank 24:10
That’s a great point. Well, every conversation has an introduction, a body and a conclusion. You can’t land that intro, there is no body and conclusion. Doctor, I also believe that every conversation and attention span is 30 seconds to two minutes. Okay. And so when we’re touching base with somebody, there is a given a tick, initially before that positive escalation for the assistant that’s answering calls for your company. What I love to do as a company name spike, I’m not anonymous for the entire phone call. But the first thing that comes out of my mouth is the name of your company, how your company is doing, you know, before I even introduce myself, so I’ll say better than somebody that answers the phone at your company. And then from there, a lot of the times they’ll be asking me questions, and what I have here is a certain technique. It’s called the buffer boomerang technique. Hypothetically, Jeremy. If somebody is answering with a negative tone, there’s a way to be able to buffer that negative tone. Do a name drop? Let them know. That’s an excellent question. Repeat the question to show active listening, and then boomerang back as a plus two. And so initially, somebody could ask what my name is. And now I’d say, Jeremy, that’s an excellent question. My name is Richard blank as an example. And so what happens is, you’re able to show the active listening readjusted tone of a call. But then in the middle of a call, there is something that I like to consider micro phonetic micro expression reading. And what I have here is an actual chart, it’s very simple. You’re focusing on phonetics, which is your tone, rate, pitch and duration, your tone should be the consistent variable of empathy and confidence. There is a mirror imaging technique, but I believe that should be done every 30 seconds, two minutes, with your rate of speech, and your pitcher speaking level. Now, I need to match you with this as because if you do a spike, or dip, that’s usually when I ask a tie down or a pin down question if it makes sense or sounds good. And then also, when people are on the phone, and they’re explaining their services, a lot of times they’ll do desert pitching Jeremy will, they’ll just talk without any sort of oasis for drinking and resting. And so what I like to do is to give my list, pause in between each one like a dessert tray to see if there’s a reaction. At the end, say, in a brazen way, I’m sure you’d like at least one so I can break the sort of questions that I have. And then gauge sort of positive or negative reinforcements in these conversations. Once you see it, you can’t unsee it after three weeks, it becomes practice, I believe in a five to one name, drop to pronoun, where in every sentence, you’re either saying are or you’re and then usually use a name drop for the tie down question. And then at the end, you can also write one last time by saying listen, since you have me on the phone today, join me Are there any other additional questions that you have? Usually you might mention something else. After I repeat the list, I repeat information and military alphabet, because instead of concluding the call, there’s a very good chance that we could be talking about how proud we are of the military and those that have served. And then as I mentioned before, giving you a positive written escalation in regards to those that are working with you. So these are things that I believe won’t compromise ethics, values and morals. Naturally, I’m skimming over this quickly. But there are certain things as expression reading. And since we’re losing three of our senses over the phone, our taste, touch and smell. The doctors and scientists say that your other senses should be expanded. Besides your active listening, I believe in Image Streaming, where they say that books are better than movies. And there’s no reason why your imagination, your adjectives and your descriptions could be incredible. It’d be illuminating, it could really put some insight and where you’re going on some of these phone calls. And so as I mentioned before, as long as you become animated, engaged, and you are this individual’s biggest fan, and you really take in the information and energy that they’re giving with you, you’ll find your job very fulfilling, as because most people today see a telemarketing job as transitional, or they look down upon it. But there is a ton of people that make and receive phone calls for every type of business. And some of the greatest people that you could speak with in the world do show this empathy, because I’ll share an example with you. I have a law firm account here. And we have intake coordinators for it’s a disability and wrongful termination. And so what happens is, and you being a doctor as well, you might be meeting people when they’re most vulnerable, and having the worst day of their life. And so if you are capable of having somebody come down, find their focus and move forward with you. You could be one of the greatest individuals there when they need to do the most. And so a lot of FBI agents and said they can earn a living so many different ways. But if they can get this sort of fulfillment, by knowing that success is built on a million thank yous, and that they get all these positive written escalations Door Company about how great they’re doing. They know that they are on the right path, and that once again, their karma is going to kick it. And that if they do leave this company, and I am the last boss that they ever have, they will be prepared to build an incredible organization.
Jeremy Weisz 29:30
I love the law firm example. Richard, I’d love for you to talk about I know you do lead generation for industrial real estate. And I’d love for you to walk us through what that looks like.
Richard Blank 29:42
It’s changed a bunch, because a lot of the times people are working from home or it’s just going through an answering service or just sending in emails. And so our call to contact ratio dropped considerably. And so what we’re doing right now is, as I mentioned spending a little more time on LinkedIn, and company websites to custom make emails and voicemails for people. Now, as I mentioned before, our efforts are bringing a little bit less of a return because of lack of contact ratio verbally. But I have seen this when people do custom make an email, or leave an incredible voicemail. For example, if you sent me an email and mentioned my pinball machines, you’ll get my attention, it’s almost yours to lose. And so a lot of people have thanked us for taking the extra efforts to research their company or to complement a promotion. And so what we had to do was just adjust accordingly, in regards to that aspect after COVID.
Jeremy Weisz 30:45
So it’s kind of like just as far as a quality over quantity mean, the quality interactions over Yeah, we can go ahead and call 1000 people, but maybe we research and call 200 people and have a closer connection, it’s more targeted,
Richard Blank 31:03
I would prefer you did 1000. But instead of doing 150 calls a day, I’d rather you do about a buck 20. And so give about 30 seconds per person, so you don’t have to reduce it that much. Because you need to have a certain sort of momentum, you need to have a certain sort of metric there to get a certain return. So maybe only doing 20% might not be good enough, because you were working before, you know, at 100%. But I could reduce it to about an 85%. And use that 15% As you were mentioning to make a custom made, and that could potentially offset any sort of, you know, latency that you might have in regards to the phone calls. But I also I always believed in a quality phone call. And I don’t want somebody it’s, it’s almost like a painter, when you’re commissioned compared to doing it on your own, you might have a different sort of way to create that work. And so I just don’t want somebody on the clock, I don’t want them to be on the phone for five hours, if it happens, you know, so be it’ll be an amazing phone call. But they should never rush, the middle, or the ending of the call or when they’re getting a referral. Or if they’re talking about a company’s promotion. Because that my friend is where I give the most points when I’m grading their calls, not that they go through the motions to see if they had that breakthrough with that individual. So when we’re taking notes and putting in the system and have to call them back, they’re going to compliment us on our note taking skills, because they’re so detailed. And we’ve taken the time unlike other people to remember certain facts about them, that when they take our offer into consideration, they realize how we work prior to any sort of contact. So talked about,
Jeremy Weisz 32:54
you know, the integrated approach as far as Will you when you do the outbound calls, will you also do emails and texts as well? Or is it or the company handling those things, and you’re following up with a call,
Richard Blank 33:09
it really all depends. A lot of the times we’re logging into their system, so something is automated, or if they’re not doing it, I would make a suggestion to do it just to make sure it’s not too labor intensive. But then again, I just don’t want them clicking an email template and just sending to you calling you sir. I mean, that’s that’s nothing special, you’re probably not going to look at it’s like almost like junk mail, and you’re going to throw it away. And so if I could have some takeaways, as I mentioned together on a phone call, a positive escalation, where if I didn’t speak with you, but I spoke with your co workers, I could almost once again separate myself, and instead of doing half court, not even three point now you and I are looking at foul shot percentages. I’ll never give you 100% Slam Dunk. I mean, nothing is 100%. There’s not even straight lines in nature. But what we can also do is just increase our percentages. By doing things that are not too aggressive, or misleading. We’re just once again trying to separate ourselves from others that are trying to earn your business
Jeremy Weisz 34:12
from an inbound perspective. So that was outbound from inbound perspective, talking about some of the things that you do in the movie and music space.
Richard Blank 34:22
Well, this is a wonderful demographic to 55 plus females so they get like almost a phonebook size book of movies and music that they get to go through every year. And this company is actually out of Chicago. They’re an incredible company. We’ve had them for over a decade. And what’s beautiful about this account is that these are existing clients, and they already know so we call we you know, once again, their contact information so we can get into their account. But when they’re explaining the sort of movies that they like, and the music most of the agents here are so young that they’ve never seen a Humphrey Bow guard movie before our they don’t know who John Wayne is or even Elvis Presley’s Aloha special. And so the agents little by little when they’ll go home at night, though YouTube some of the stuff and get to know it. So the agents that have been on this campaign for a long time will know these genres and the most beautiful thing. And I will say this is how excited the client gets when we can find their movie because then they for a moment, tell us on the how that was the first date they went to with the drive and with their husband X amount of years ago. This is the music that they danced to at their wedding back in 1960. Or this is what reminds them of Sunday afternoons with their grandmother watching that movie. And I love it. I find it fascinating because you’re learning so much about these people. And when we do have their information and what they’re looking for in stock, you should really hear the reactions of them are the talk times longer. Of course they are because besides double checking prices and shipping information and what they ordered, I want them to explain the passion per each thing that they’re purchasing. And you remember Columbia House, it was like when you’re ordering those CDs for a penny. As I say before, most people can order things online with Amazon. And they could just click a button. But but not these clients, they love to go through the book, they love to call us they usually ask for the same individual that assisted them a couple months ago because they have that sort of relationship. And the reason I believe that I grew so much was the upsell. When we were on the phone with them, you might hear as I mentioned in this, I have a funny story. They were ordering Elvis Presley. And we heard dogs barking in the background. So the agent mentioned the dog. And then this client loves dogs. So we had this Beethoven special of like six movies that you could just include without the shipping. And we just told them about it. And this this individual loved her grandchildren love dogs and realize the Beethoven, you know, movie pack was perfect for her. And so how did Elvis Presley go to Beethoven, just as easy as anything else. There’s 1000 topics to talk about in regards to movies and music. And if somebody lived a life, we can make a suggestion. But the reason I was able to grow so much was because of that upsell that was done flawlessly. And just without resistance and just making a mention. And the client realized that we had not only the act of listening skills, but the assertiveness to make that sort of suggestion. And to be able to convert that sort of sale one. They love this account. And the attrition on this account is next to nothing. And some of my oldest supervisors that have been with me over a decade are managing this account. And so for me, it’s it was really a gift to be able to work with this company for so long out of your amazing Chicago. That,
Jeremy Weisz 38:03
you know, there’s there’s such an art and a science to this. And you talked about upsells. Right? How do you teach upsells when there is an art to it as well, like what are some of the parameters or guidelines you give? Because you have to give some type of guidelines. They went from Elvis to da to Beethoven the you know, but you probably gave them training and guidelines. So what’s your process for at least giving guidelines for the upsells
Richard Blank 38:35
its composure, its timing. I mean, I can’t start mentioning dog movies before this individual sort of talking Elvis Presley, if her dog never barked, I would have never known, I could have heard something else in the background could have been anything. But as long as the agent is in the moment, because a lot of the times they’ll be stressed because of the past anxious of the future or thinking about lunch. And if I didn’t hear that dog bark for two seconds out of a 15 minute phone call, I would have never sold those additional movies. And so almost like a boxer, you need to be focused 100% When you’re on that call in between calls on your break and lunch zone out as much as you want. But you will be getting the sort of clue that are on these calls in regards of an upsell sometimes is not even offering additional stuff an upsell could also be retention. Because if I can keep you and get a referral, that’s an upsell because we’re getting business out of that or you’ll be calling us back again to order a second time. I can consider that a client upsell in regards to Fidelity and loyalty. And so as long as they use their common sense to me if they have the sort of manners that we were raised with with our parents and grandparents are amazing grandparents, then what we can do is we can relate with individuals in a natural way. And we have a huge menu. And all we have to do, and we don’t have the time to go over every movie. But as long as you’re not hanging up, and you’re excited, and we just keep talking, we can make suggestions. And some of the best as you want to say salespeople are the ones that will let you know that it’s not the right fit. You play basketball, not every shoe is perfect for you on the court. And so the greatest sales, men for sneakers will look at your size and the way that you play and make their sort of suggestions. And almost the takeaway is what adds to your credibility because you’re not just throwing everything at the wall to see what fits when someone is not just a yes, man, but can be almost a devil’s advocate and explain why today are at this moment, this is not a perfect fit for you, that individual not only will come back in spades, but tell all their friends, hey, I finally got someone that calls the balls and strikes, and will tell me if my tie is not straight. And so I’ve earned so much of my business by being forthright with my clients. And as much as I’d like to earn their business, a lot of times by default, I’m not able to take the account because of one reason or another. But then again, when I am capable, we’ve established such trust, before even working together that if any sort of complication or challenge comes up. It’s nothing. We’ve already established that sort of working relationship where we can get through it together. And so upselling is not a forced fit my friend, I’m not forcing a hand or telling you I only got two left and you got a minute to buy it. That’s a one and done. You’ll have them one time. But if we’re talking about long term clients, these are the individuals that you need to walk with. Not hit the ball and drag.
Jeremy Weisz 42:03
Richard, I want to be the first one to thank you everyone should check out CostaRicascallcenter.com to learn more and more episodes of the podcast and Richard, thank you so much.
Richard Blank 42:15
I had the best time today. Thank you so much, Jeremy.
