After you have caught up on your ad answering and have it under control, start your telephone training program (TIP). You should maintain the program for two weeks, or as long as it takes you to become comfortable and proficient in speaking with PE-related people on the telephone. Shoot for talking with 20 executives (not their secretaries) per day. Try to get at least one interview a day in this fashion. If you follow this regime every weekday for two weeks, you will have talked with 200 executives; and if you have done it right, you will have lined up at least ten interviews.
Meeting with Employment Agencies and Headhunters
Start setting up interviews with employment agencies and headhunters at the same time you begin your TTP. Do not interview with more than five agencies unless it is for a specific job. Otherwise, your resume is likely to be scattered throughout the job market. Like most products that appear to be in great supply, you will not have the image of being in much demand.
Keeping Records of Sales Letter Results
Your record keeping will begin with the receipt of "rejects" about one to two weeks after you mail your first batch of sales letters. You will use these records to update your list of names (several executives will have resigned, retired, or been fired or transferred), and to start building a new mailing list of executives for a second mailing. Your records will show you how effective your sales letters are and whether you should revise them before your next mailing.
Writing the Second Sales Letter
You should write your second sales letter about three weeks after your first mailing. If you received good results with your first letter, you will need to make only minor adjustments. If the results were poor, you may have to make major alterations. You should not hesitate to do this. The factor that distinguishes good from poor results is not replies, but interviews. You should plan on about two days to write a new sales letter.
- Printing the Second Letter
- You should have the second sales letter printed just as you did the first.
- Mailing the Second Letter
Setting Up Interviews
You will begin to set up interviews generated by sales letters about three weeks after your first mailing. Invitations will come from the executive you have sent the sales letter to as well as from personnel department people and staff personnel. The majority of invitations will come by telephone. This is one reason the TTP is so important. Most executives will want to talk with you by phone before seeing you, especially if the interview requires travel at the PE's expense.
You should continue to set up interviews until you get and accept a superior job offer. You can always cancel an interview. It is much more difficult to arrange an interview after you have told a PE that you are declining because you expect a job offer. You may then have to answer embarrassing questions about why the offer was not extended. Of course, after you interview and have made a "sale," you are free to say you are expecting another offer or have received one.
These alternative ways of getting interviews are important to your campaign and should be integrated into your overall plan.
Preparing for the Interview
Once you have an interview lined up, you should learn everything possible about the hiring executive, the company, and its products. You should also develop a list of questions to ask and prep yourself for questions that are likely to be asked of you. Plan on several hours of preparation for each face to face interview that you schedule. One successful candidate I know spent two weeks in preparation. It resulted in an $80,000 a year offer a 100 percent increase over his former salary even though he was out of work at the time.
You will accept every interview offered, unless you are offered so many that time limitations force you to pick and choose. Even if you are pressed for time, you should try to make every single interview you can, even if you must schedule two interviews a day. Remember, interviews and interviews alone will get you job offers. Also, if you apply yourself, you will get better with every interview. By the end of your campaign you will be getting job offers you would not have received when you first started interviewing. Finally, you will learn more about the job and whether you really want it from the interview than from any other source (short of actually working for the company).
