I’m sure you are victim of the kind of email and social outreach I get. What spurred this post was an InMail I received this morning. It was a prospecting post, the same one, word for word, this individual sends me every month. Each time, my response is the same, “Thank you, but I’m not interested in learning more. I wish you the best.”
Then I reflect on much of the email prospecting I get. There are those with a message, followed weekly (because we are supposed to have 12-16 touches) with “Did you get my email on this topic?” Soon, I recognize them by the subject line: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:….
It’s always the same email, the same content.
If I didn’t respond to your first email, why am I more likely to respond to the same thing the third, fifth, tenth time you send it to me?
Why to do you keep telling me the same thing, when I’ve demonstrated my disinterest either explicitly bye saying, “I’m not interested,” or implicitly by my lack of response.
Perhaps a better way to attract my interest is to build a story. If I express no interest in one thing, build on it and tell me something different. And if that doesn’t provoke interest, build further and introduce something new. You might just hit on something I’m interested in.
My favorite story on this approach is from the best book on sales I’ve ever read: Green Eggs and Ham by Dr. Seuss. Sam asks if we want Green Eggs and Ham, he says we will like it. When we don’t respond, he goes on to ask, “would you like them in a house, would you like them in a box, would you like them in a car, would you like them in a tree, would you like them in a tree…….you might just like Green Eggs and Ham.”
Build on your prospecting story, don’t repeat the same message over and over. Help your prospect learn more about how you might help them. Just like Sam, you might find your prospect responding.
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