Five Points for Those Seeking Quality Merchant Services Leads
? Dear Scott:
Any recommendations to generate sales leads for the merchant services industry? I just started marketing this opportunity and need lead generation techniques to generate qualified credit card processing leads. I thought it would be easier to get small business leads when so many could get a better deal from a credit card processing service provider. Any suggestions to kick start my merchant account sales?
Charged Up
Answer: Let me give you an answer you may not like about selling credit card processing services. Trying to get merchant account processing leads falls into the category of perceived commodity services that pretty much any small business is a potential customer for. You would think it would be easier to generate quality b2b sales leads in this environment.
B2b Sales Leads a Challenge in the Credit Card Processing Service Industry: 5 Problems.
Five huge problems exist prospecting and appointment setting for merchant account solutions. First is that it is an over called industry and business owners are swamped with calls for card processing services.
Second, sad but true, the vast majority of salespeople who call trying to find interested new prospects and deals to close, do it very poorly and waste the time of business owners.
Third, the vast majority of the sales pitches and sales scripts used over the phone are poor and similar to each other. They communicate little new value or benefit options to the merchant so little incentive is given to entertain a new credit card processing service.
Fourth, the merchant account prospect, as soon as they recognize the sales pitch is about trying to get them to switch to a new processing service, assume they “know all about card processing” and stop listening and start rejecting the salesperson. Why listen to someone who calls you with the same old same old pitch about your merchant account?
Channellism: Don’t Let Potential Quality Merchant Services Leads Lump You in with the Knuckleheads
Here is a Channellism for you. don’t make it easy for high quality merchant leads to lump you in with the idiots. If you say the things that idiots say appointment setting for b2b sales leads, that waste the time of business owners, they will lump you in with the idiots. If you want to improve your marketing platform and earn the attention and time of a high volume quality credit card processing prospect, don’t say the things that other idiot callers say. You won’t develop a steady stream of quality merchant leads sounding like everyone else.
Your “We Will Save You Money” Sales Pitch is Costing You High Value Credit Card Processing Leads. Contrarian Yet True.
Fifth, similar to the above points but important to sales teams seeking qualified business sales leads. Contrarian but true, emphasizing cost savings and competing mostly on price considerations is the weakest point to get you an appointment with a business you might close.
Since virtually every salesperson pitching them says “we will save you money,” that message carries little credibility and weight. So don’t deliver just a “save money” sales pitch as if it is new, exciting and unheard of and will deliver you the perfect merchant services lead, it won’t. Convey multiple benefits that would be meaningful to a merchant that may including cost competitiveness, but don’t make it your main or sole message.
Your Best Shot Prospecting and Appointment Setting for Credit Card Processing Leads…IMHO…
– very very niched business targets
– high card processing volume
– a unique twist or industry specific component valued by your target. It takes something not commonly offered to consistently generate quality business leads. “Lower rates” is not enough to win b2b sales leads.
– using a contact manager or crm
– very very tight call process
– dead on high impact merchant processing scripts that sound different from what the other callers typically say. (sound like an idiot, be perceived as an idiot.)
-actively “disqualify” sales leads. don’t waste time with those less likely to close. There are plenty of business owners out there looking for a better merchant account solution. Find them. Better to not make the sales call and not close the business than to make the sales call and not close the business.
– have a follow-up system for those worthy of your time and sales efforts.
Sales teams that try appointment setting to a wide pool of prospects with the rationale that “every business needs this” with a usual call script without benefit of a contact manager are absolutely doomed. DOA. No shot.
If you try to get merchant service leads by calling low processing volume smaller businesses that you may be more comfortable with, you will fail. The margins simply don’t justify the time.
It is hard enough to be successful b2b appointment setting for merchant services, due to its perceived commodity nature and low margins. If your targeting, call process, scripting and follow-up isn’t very very tight, you are toast.
Been doing this a long time and here are some other observations about generating merchant services leads…
The wash out rate is extremely high in the merchant services business and the potential of these “positions” are many many times over-hyped and even borderline scams. Credit card companies get people to work on commission hoping they will sell to their warm market and work their butt off prospecting and calling to make a few sales before the Ramen noodles run out and they have to find something else to survive.
My first thought when someone calls me and seeks help selling merchant account solutions and it is clear they have drunk the company cool-aid is “poor bastard.”
I don’t know anything about your company but will say generically that if you believe the hype and sell the way most credit card companies tell you, you will fail. If you follow and do what most of your fellow salespeople do to develop a qualified credit card processing lead you will fail.
Most of the Guidance and Merchant Services Sales Scripts Provided by Most Credit Card Processing Companies Amount to Sales Training Malpractice
I have seen the guidance and merchant processing scripts that a number of merchant services companies provide their commission only sales reps and it amounts to sales training malpractice. Abysmal and wrong. Anybody with half a brain would look at this stuff and say “this company really has no clue in how to sell this stuff” or they would not be recommending this. It amounts to throwing crap against the wall and seeing what sticks. And guess what? You are the crap.
Follow your own path. Be in charge of your own destiny. Be really tight with every step of your sales process as there is virtually no room for sloppiness or mistakes trying to sell credit card processing services.
Make sure that this is really a viable opportunity with your company. Speak to people who started in your situation, worked hard and generated the financial rewards. Can’t find any? Bounce fast.
Also, hiring a 3rd party to do this for you is pretty much guaranteed to fail. Economics don’t work and you don’t control the call process or the data. Figure out your system first, get some traction toward success, if you hire someone hire someone directly but only when you have built a system that is working and the economics make sense.
Readers, if you have a question you would like me to answer leave it here.
– Scott
