If you are good on the phone you are good at communicating full stop. That means you can think on your feet and engage well in face to face conversations and presentations too....To run a successful business you need to operate from courage not fear!
I agree wholeheartedly, and I'm surprised at the number of people who appear to be scared of the phone! I'm also surprised to read that some people ignore incoming phone calls from customers. What a fast-track way to lose business!
Just imagine, for a moment, that you sell insurance and you run a small office in the city. Someone enters the office and asks you a question. Instead of answering, you point to a mailbox; the customer is expected to write a short note with her question about insurance and put it in the mailbox. In your own sweet time, you get around to reading and answering the note. When the customer next happens to be around, she drops by and reads your response - which may or may not answer her question. By sending and receiving notes in this way, the transaction goes on for days. In reality, the customer would just get ticked off and go to someone who acknowledges her as a real person with real needs and can answer her questions right away.
Imagine next that, while the customer asks you questions, you don't look her in the eyes. Instead, you perform other tasks while she's talking: You write notes, file papers, pass along instructions to colleagues, and so on. Right away, the customer realises that you are too busy to listen and that she's not important to you. She storms out to find someone who will listen.
If, instead, you greet the customer with a pleasant smile, ask what's on her mind, listen to her concerns and suggest some appropriate services, and make her feel that she has your undivided attention, you establish rapport with the customer, understand better her needs, and win her confidence.
We may be living in an electronic age, but the principles are the same. Demanding that customers use email when they want the immediacy and interaction associated with a phone call is just like demanding that customers put paper notes in a mailbox. It's impersonal and it puts the focus on your convenience instead of on the customer's needs. By sending IMs or writing email messages while speaking to someone on the phone, you're not giving your undivided attention to the customer, and customers notice right away and rightfully get upset.
So why is everyone so afraid of using the phone when it's the most powerful way to communicate with customers anywhere in the world? Having read the messages in this thread, and forgive me for being direct, I suggest that we're operating from fear and not from courage - as the previous poster noted. OK, in some fields, email may be adequate; however, there's nothing like direct and friendly contact with a customer to win and keep business.
