Network Marketing – Tip No. 3: keep your call log organized
Remember that cold calling is challenging enough without further complications to reduce your effectiveness as a network marketer. Are you having trouble keeping track of who you called, when, what they said or if they answered the phone, if you have to answer them, or where did you get that contact in the first place? Do you need to report your activity to someone on a regular basis?
Join the club! You, like me, need to keep a call log.
You probably have contacts from a few places, in a variety of formats. Perhaps most of them come from your autoresponder service, but they are printed on cut sheets for each contact. And I bet you, like me, scribble your notes on the edges of those papers.
Join the 21st century, I did it! You must start a Microsoft Excel workbook for your call log. That is how!
Open Excel and save your new blank workbook as Call Log 09, or whatever year or month you want. Now customize your columns and rows. Row 1 (left to right, horizontally) will contain your category headings. You can put them in any order that suits you, but I like it this way:
Column A, Row 1: Report Time Period
Column B, Row 1: Contact name
Column C, Row 1: Date called
Column D, Row 1: Contact Email
Column E, Row 1: Contact phone
Column F, Row 1: Time Zone
Column G, Row 1: Company
Column H, Row 1: Contact Attempts
Column I, Row 1: Sent to call (or other action)
Column J, Row 1: Notes
Column K, Row 1: Close Attempts
Column L, Row 1: Contact address
Now that you have each of those cells filled in with their headings, it’s good to color them, so you can easily refer to whatever information you want. Click Column A Row 1 and drag the mouse through that row, to Column L Row 1. Keep that row highlighted (don’t click it again) and click the fill color icon on the bar Toolkit at the top of the page. Pick a color and click on it. Maybe you would also like a section to have a special highlight or your own color, so you can instantly see it. Call date, maybe. Just click on that cell, click the fill color icon again, and choose a different color. And of course you can bold the text in your header if you want.
Depending on where your contact information comes from, you will have to enter it manually or (much more preferably) download it from your autoresponder on a daily basis. This is easy to set up with your autoresponder; if you have problems, use their live online help service. You will need the name of the Excel file you just created.
You probably want to keep a separate worksheet for each month, or whatever your reporting period is. All you have to do is add a worksheet to your file: click the Insert drop-down menu and select Worksheet. Then copy your original formatted sheet to the new sheet: click on the cell that is the axis point for the columns and rows, this is in the upper left corner of your worksheet. The entire worksheet will now be highlighted and you can right-click and select Copy, or click the Copy icon on the toolbar. Go to your new worksheet – the locator tabs are at the bottom of the workbook, click that same axis point cell again, and right-click and select Paste, or click the Paste icon on the toolbar. Clever! Now all you have to do is rename each worksheet so that it has a separate name for the time period you want (Jan 9, say, or 9/1 to 9/14) – go to the little tab at the bottom of the page that says Sheet 1 (or Sheet 2 etc), right click on it and select Rename. Now you can type whatever you choose to call that individual worksheet.
You can send your worksheet by email; you can print and complete it by hand; or write your updated information. Remember, though, if you’re printing, be sure to format the file so it looks good when printed. Click the File drop-down menu and select Page Setup. You probably want to select Landscape for Orientation, and you can also adjust your Margins, etc. here.
Imagine how productive you will be and how much time you will save!
Good luck!
