I'm a local energy advisor in your area, hope you're doing well today...
Ew.
Still have a landline? Even know what one is? One I came to answer rang the other lunchtime heralded an opening of this blog's title.
A bright and breezy chap. Not sounding in first flushes of youth either. Rattled off the above in unaccented, clear, smooth English no less. In itself notable for not being the grainy mispronounced staccato from a far flung corner of the world.
In what ought've been a giveaway, the incoming number was withheld.
This call was actually illegal. Where I was you can register to not receive such unsolicited domestic intrusion. Any firm flouting that liable to criminal sanction. From fines through shutdown to prosecution.
Contempt doesn't begin to portray my feelings towards these people.
Beyond the heartwrench headlines of preying upon the vulnerable, among such travesties, is the shredding they wreak on reputation for those of us who legitimately wish to ring people from whom we might earn genuine, mutually beneficial business. Toxic spray from consumer to business prospecting heavily stains.
Even worse - if possible to go any lower - when I searched, it turns out these proliferate with the 'offer' of fake grants for home improvements, typically loft insulation. Those scammed targeted for their personal details and money.
They may even have been a robo call. A human scammer taking over should the recipient do anything other than not instantly hang up.
The above title feels like an evolution from a while back. When the description was up front. Name-checking the grant element itself. Probably changed as that particular scam angle has run its course.
This scripted opener even had tagged on the obligatory <pause>.
It's difficult to overstate how wide of the mark this format is.
The 'hitrate' must be high enough to justify the operational costs? What would that mean? Securing one appointment a day? Leading to a deal a week? Who knows. It's just filth. The perpetrators, scum.
Imagine you rang a company and your first words were, 'I'm a local [insert your field] advisor...'
Take the setting I've touched on lately. Namely, helping salesteams run their AI bot output through the filter of someone actually knowing flannel from fruitful. How successful do you think it'd be saying,
'I'm a local Sales AI advisor...'
Maybe I should give it a go!
There within lies a false sense of optimism.
I recall three decades back as cubrep, a freelance buying consultant who won work with pretty much this intro,
'I'm an Enterprise computer system purchase advisor...'
In those days the numbers were well trodden. System life was so many years. Which was so many quarters. So you could know with some comfort how many organisations of the requisite make-up would be looking inside any three-month spread.
So who's to say a variant couldn't offer you a side door entry?
In B2B we should always lead with the problem we resolve. Not everyone will recognise it. Let alone wish to act upon such. But the conversations it leads you onto are golden.