There are lots of ways to open sales calls, and I detail many of them in my books, such as Reach Out & Sell Someone®.

But I’ve discovered one of them, the “inactive account” approach, is flawed.

Here’s what I mean.

You look at your database and you see lots of accounts that you haven’t talked to in a long time. Gee, you think, they must be upset with us, or minimally, they’ve taken their business elsewhere.

This seems logical, doesn’t it?

So, you rehearse what you’re going to say when you call.

“Golly, Frank, we haven’t heard from you in quite some time. Is there anything wrong?”

It’s not a terrible opener, and you might get a reply—exactly the negativity you’re expecting to hear.

But in lots of customers’ minds, they don’t classify themselves as inactive, at all. This is what I’ve found after doing several outbound telemarketing campaigns aimed at these “shadow clients.”

So, if THEY don’t think there’s anything wrong, why plant the seed that there is!

Now, I recommend using the “Thank You Approach.”

“Hello, Frank, this is Gary Goodman with Customersatisfaction.com, and I’m just calling to thank you for all of the business we’ve done together; I appreciate it!”

If they have heartburn, believe me, you’ll hear it in their voices. If not, you’ve just set a great tone for catching up with them and handling any reorders they may have.

In the middle of one outbound telemarketing campaign, the light came on for me, and I switched from the inactive account opener to thank-you opener.

And the results were nothing less than amazing. With the former, we hunt for problems. Using the latter, we’re upbeat, and ready to do more business.

Big difference.

Try it!

Dr. Gary S. Goodman, President of www.Customersatisfaction.com, is a popular keynote speaker, management consultant, and seminar leader and the best-selling author of 12 books, including Reach Out & Sell Someone® and Monitoring, Measuring & Managing Customer Service. He is a frequent guest on radio and television, worldwide. A Ph.D. from USC's Annenberg School, Gary offers programs through UCLA Extension and numerous universities, trade associations, and other organizations in the United States and abroad. He is headquartered in Glendale, California, and he can be reached at (818) 243-7338 or at: gary@customersatisfaction.com