Day 7) HOT Prospect List Continues to Grow

Well, Friday and yesterday (Monday) were busts as far as cold calling.

I was just exhausted.

I'm finding that the calling and the following up (even when calling "just" 15 prospects a day) takes up at least one-third if not half of my day.

I mentioned last week that I needed to work on my time management. I think I've come up with a "system." I'm located in Pennsylvania and so I call all East Coast prospects starting at 9 a.m. sharp. I'm usually done by 10:30 or 11 and I then work on current client work until about 2 p.m, when I  call prospects in the Midwest and on the West Coast. That seems to have worked, at least for today.

I've always been typing up my call notes immediately after making the call and continue to do so. Waiting until later in the day or until after all calls have been made means I may forget some important information.

I also send a follow-up e-mail immediately after talking to someone or leaving a voice mail message.

I'm feeling less tired at the end of today than I felt all of last week.

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A cold call from my first day of cold calling is now a prospect. This is a more "interesting" prospect in the company is asking me to take a writing test, unpaid. 

When my contact e-mailed me about the test, I told her I was OK with not being paid for the test, but needed to know if her firm could meet my rates (which I gave in the e-mail). She e-mailed back that my rates were fine. 

Normally, I don't write without being paid. But the company will meet my rates and I'm curious about what a two-hour writing test entails. I'm not worried about doing well, so I'm hopeful I'll have a new client soon!

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Today was a day of 15 calls, plus work for a regular client. Of the 15 calls, I have another three hot prospects. Again, it appears that quality for me is beating quantity. I'll take a look at how many new clients I have at the end of April to see if I can go down to five cold calls a day. I believe I'll call a minimum of five clients every day (as possible) in order to keep momentum up. I know some folks call just once a week once they feel they are established, but I  believe I need to do more than that. We'll see.

I read a blog post last summer (sadly, I don't remember the name of the writer) by a free-lancer who did an informal survey of her readers, the vast majority of whom are free-lance writers or wannabees. Her survey asked if they were busy during the all-too-often deader-than-dead summer months.

Of those surveyed, those who said they stayed busy during the summer also reported that they marketed in some form or another "consistently." As for the whiners -- the ones who kept saying "There's no work" or "No one wants to pay me a decent fee" -- the survey giver found that they didn't market consistently.

So, consistency is key. Key, KEY!

I had a very bad summer business-wise last year. Mostly because of my parents' health issues. My marketing was haphazard and I earned very little.

Lesson learned!