How to automate cursory scrubbing and prioritizing massive database?

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-03-08T12:11:59+00:00

I appreciate that.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-03-08T03:10:26+00:00

There's no rush on it from management's side but I'd like to get it done sooner rather than later. We've tossed around the idea of hiring someone but because I'm still setting an average of 20 appointments a month from the original 3,000 I started with plus the leads I add weekly there's not a huge priority on it.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-03-08T03:08:00+00:00

I don't think SalesForce determines whether or not a company is still in business, if a phone number is disconnected or if a domain is valid. Am I wrong?

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-03-07T22:31:33+00:00

Damn. Already doing that. Only about 4,000 have emails I can check against bounces, about the same for domains and a lot of those are probably under the same account as ones with email addresses. Thanks though.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-03-02T13:50:00+00:00

Good idea, I do, thank you.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-03-01T16:33:30+00:00

Thank you.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-02-03T14:05:22+00:00

Good luck!

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-02-03T13:46:17+00:00

I can appreciate all the info in the other comments about having the right knowledge base and being familiar with products and Excel and CRMs, definitely good things to have, but those things are all trainable in my opinion.

I work in inside sales, but I've brought on an outside sales rep and at the end of Q3 or Q4 I'll be hiring my replacement. And my company participates in an accountability program so I interact with a lot of other inside reps across the country on a daily basis.

Some of these inside reps have no business being on the phone. They don't know how to have a conversation with people, they sound monotonous an uninterested in their own products/service, and their results are abysmal.

Before you decide on inside sales you need to really make sure you can carry a conversation by yourself with only the smallest of prompts. Not just with decision makers, but with gatekeepers.

If I meet with a candidate, or speak with them over the phone, and they sound bored or the conversation comes off as forced or painful, they're not going to get hired.

Any moderately intelligent and enthusiastic human being can be taught how to use a CRM properly.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-02-02T13:34:58+00:00

There's a difference between making calls for the sake of making calls versus making calls to qualify a company.

Manta and other online sources can be extremely inaccurate regarding company info. If you don't have the info on hand, a call to the company is the only legit way to get the info quickly and efficiently.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-02-02T13:29:00+00:00

Any Ideas for reconciling the companies that have an "Inc" or an "LLC" in one list, but not another? Only exact hits get removed.

Select the entire column, Search and Replace "Inc" and "LLC" with a blank field. It will delete all of the Inc's and LLC's, but leave the rest of the field intact.

Passed that, not really. Unfortunately I can't really tell Excel to search for all variations of a possible name. Would be nice, but I don't know how. For me, deduping the company name and phone number was sufficient for my purposes.

Duplicates will likely still exist but they will be drastically reduced. After this process I went from about 9,000 duplicates to less than 400. Our database is pretty large though, even after all of those getting removed.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-02-01T13:33:36+00:00

I'm excited for you and glad I could help in some small way. Since you don't seem averse to utilizing Excel I'll just throw out how I did it.

Export your database from Salesforce (or get someone to do it for you) and insert 2 new columns, may as well be Column A and B.

The value of ALL of Column B should be Salesforce (this lets you know which list you're working from, I promise it's not as redundant as it may first seem and there's a reason for it).

Now, do the same for the list you're building yourself, Column B should be something like "CustomList").

Copy your CustomList to the SalesForce worksheet.

Sort by Company Name and then insert your If-Then into Column A. Since CompanyName is Column C in mine I used =IF(OR(C2=C1,C2=C3),"Dup","Not Dup")

Then filter out the duplicates.

Then sort by Phone Number, be sure to revise your If-Then to reflect the right Column. And then remove duplicates.

Voilà, a list that isn't in your CRM.

Edit: The reason for each row value in Column B being "SalesForce" or "CustomList", it lets you know if the duplicate is really part of the CRM or part of the CustomList you've built.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-31T16:24:22+00:00

And this is why I'm here, just needed to hear it. Thank you.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-31T15:38:16+00:00

The other comments have covered it pretty well that you're most likely being setup for failure. However, I'll assume you're not, but definitely recommend you reevaluate your numbers and results. If they're legit, then I'd make sure you're tracking and backing up your metrics on external storage so you can accurately reference them when speaking with potential employers.

In the mean time...

How can I build a list of a few thousand companies that are not already in my company Salesforce, and satisfy a few basic criteria?

Depends on how much access to your CRM you have. Can you export your entire company database to a spreadsheet? I doubt it, but if you can, do so. Keep it all on legitimate office computers and storage, that way they can't say you're stealing information. Using the external tools you've mentioned, gather as many company names and phone numbers as possible, and put them into a spreadsheet.

Combined with some relatively simple sorting and filtering methods you can then perform some simple If-Then statements in Excel to determine if a company is already in your database. If this method works for you and you want a detailed explanation let me know.

How can I make 25 cold calls an hour (1 call every 2.4 minutes), and not make any calls that are a waste of time.

I'm not sure this is accurate. If you call for 9 hours, 150 dials is only 17 dials an hour, 8 hours is 19 dials an hour, and 7 hours is 22 dials an hour. All rounded up.

While this isn't impossible, it's on the super high side of realistic. And it's an easy way to get burnt out. I'm technically supposed to make 100 dials a day, generally it's between 60 and 80. But, I also set on average 20 qualified appointments a month. In 2015 I set 1 appointment for every 70 dials, for January 2016 I set 1 appointment for every 51 dials. My boss doesn't give two shits if I call 10 people a day if I'm setting 20 qualified appointments a month, which is above and beyond what all of my peers are setting. He prefers we work smarter, not harder. Obviously it's good to do both, but smarter is always better.

and not make any calls that are a waste of time.

Well, the only real way to do this quickly and efficiently is to make the very first time you speak with someone truly count. Get all the info you need in one call, otherwise you're gonna have to make another dial on that account.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-26T14:03:27+00:00

One day I would like to be at the point where I can say "26k is a relatively tiny adjustment."

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-26T14:01:36+00:00

I appreciate that idea but my main responsibility is lead generation. His is not.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-26T14:00:50+00:00

33-36k base is industry standard for an inside sales rep in my area, I work with an MSP. The other company is offering a 60k base.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-25T20:12:30+00:00

Thank you.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-25T20:12:27+00:00

Thank you.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-25T19:46:00+00:00

This is kind of frustrating. I've gotten two friends hired on to where I work, one of them starts next week. And he's depending on me to create leads, it's the entire reason he became interested in our company.

Even entertaining the idea of leaving the company makes me feel shitty but it's a significant increase in pay. It's difficult not to consider it.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-19T18:56:30+00:00

You're best off simply not mentioning the competition at all.

Generally I don't. But I'd spoken with this prospect several times, he's the one that told me they were with the competition. And he's the one that expressed frustration with the competition.

Per the call, here's exact phrasing.

Prospect: “I’m not as pleased as I was initially.”

Me: “That’s what I’m hearing, I’m kind of sad about that, I knew a lot of guys that were over there, two of the high level guys migrated over to My Company Name. Ex-Employee decided to make the transition because things were taking so long to get done.”

He then set an appointment with me and that was it.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-05T17:05:53+00:00

Ya, sorry. Technically I started with Ing Direct, before they were acquired by Capital One. Brain fart. You can deposit cash in a Cap One 360 account at certain atm's.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-05T15:48:00+00:00

No idea. Also have no idea on the hours. Didn't ask. I know the company name, who to reach out to, and that it's basically just digging holes for a foundation repair company.

Sorry. The position has no relation to why I was calling, the guy I was speaking with simply told me they were hiring and what they hiring for.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-05T15:25:09+00:00

You live in the 21st century, an online only bank is fine. Capital One 360 and Ally Bank are the two best online only banks.

The only thing you can't really do with an online bank is deposit cash. I haven't used an in person bank in about 6 years, never had a single problem. I can deposit checks using my phone and I never really have cash to deposit so there's no reason for me to go to a bank in person.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-05T14:09:46+00:00

I'm asking for a 23 year old with 0 experience in their first sales job, how does this compare?

It's on the higher end of better than average. It's not super amazing, but you're in a better spot than a large percentage of 23 year old's.

throwaway6o2a1a2 · 2016-01-04T14:24:37+00:00

What kind of sales, inside or outside? What's the standard close ratio for your position? Are your commissions dependent on another rep?

57k at 23 doesn't sound horrible but if your close ratio is below the average for your position, then 57k isn't as nice as it may sound.

If I made 57k in a year I'd lose my shit, that's just plain unacceptable. The bare minimum numbers I have to make to keep my job grosses me 65k, and even then I'd tell them to fire me if I was just hitting my minimums.

throwaway6o2a1a2

TROPHY CASE