It is no wonder that sales often gets a bad rap. Desperation, lack of training, perhaps pressure from sales management…whatever the reason, it isn’t difficult to find examples of shoddy sales techniques being used on unsuspecting buyers every day. At a minimum, I receive one sales spam email like the one below that I’m showcasing today. It’s more common to receive two or three more just like it.
Take a minute to read it through. You tell me. Would you buy from this individual? Does this sales representative even know if I’m the right type of customer for him? Does he know anything about my business?
“Barbara - I was checking on this This ends at 5 PM PST today. Let me know if you would be interested Regards XYZ Representative
Barbara
2010 BlowOut Sale on Training and HR Executives Email List
We have new contacts (VPs ,Dir and Managers ) within the Training and HR Departments in corporations within the US. We are offering these contacts, which you will own and can use as often as possible.These are all new contacts and have nt been sold before.
We are offering a 60% promotional discount on this list (valid thro Friday 09/24/10).It is being offered as given below.
- 5000 New Training Contacts for $350(Regular Price- $1100)
- 10,000 New Training Contacts for $600(Regular Price-$1800)
- 20,000 New Training Contacts for $1100(Regular Price-$3500)
- 40,000 New Training Contacts for $2000(Regular Price-$5000)
- 5,000 New HR Contacts for $350(Regular Price- $1100)
- 10,000 New HR Contacts for $600(Regular Price-$1800)
- 20,000 New HR Contacts for $1100(Regular Price-$3500)
- 40,000 New HR Contacts for $2000(Regular Price-$5000)
We will also provide a 120 day guarantee on the contacts and will replace each contact you find is inaccurate with an updated one. Just to make sure that the new contact is valid and accurate we’ll guarantee it for 120 days as well.
With each record you receive:
Complete data: Name, Title, Direct E-Mail Address, Physical address, Phone Number, Company Name etc
Unlimited license: Most companies only rent you the data for one time use, we allow you to use this database as many times as you want, however you want.
If you need a more specific list - let us put together a custom contact list for you using geography, industry, revenue or titles.
If you are interested in the type of companies and titles we have I will send you a list with everything else removed so you can get an idea.”
To the sender…
Spam as a sales tactic is not an effective strategy. Yes, you might get some takers, but on the whole, you are far more likely to offend. I’ll remember you, of course. But, I won’t be buying from you. I only buy from people that I know, like and trust. I don’t buy from people who spam my inbox. Oh, and thanks for the competitive pricing information. You never know, it might come in handy someday. I probably should give you a break for making such a dumb sales mistake, but given the product you sell, maybe I understand why you feel sending email spam is a sound business practice.
Thanks Barbara for this interesting article.
Yes, I have also receive numerous similar emails as well.
I agree with you that this is not only the least effective strategy, but it tends to irritate people as well.
As I have also mentioned in my Facebook status, I have received 3 calls from Insurance companies and bank companies within an hour, trying to promote all kinds of services ranging from Bank Transfers, Credit and Loan or insurance policies. As what you have mentioned, they did not try to understand me before pushing all the services to me. This is not spam, but it is actually irritated tele-marker calls.
I am suggesting to them how ineffective this strategy is, just like Spam on your case.
Once again, thanks for this great article… appreciate your thoughts : )
Cheers,
Ngee Key
Thx for your comments, Ngee! In your case, you are receiving phone spam and that is just as bad. I don’t begrudge anyone the right to sell their products and services. Heck, that’s why we are all in business. I do think that there is a more professional way to go about it.