cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) (09/08/89)
I find junk calls easy to deal with (I get the usual 5-10 per week) ---
it is just a matter of taking a similar attitude as toward junk mail:
finding a bunch of ways to quickly (and low-stressingly) dispatch with
the things. One technique I've found that has worked perfectly for a
month or two now is very simple: if *anyone* calls asking for me by
name ("Is Mr. Cosell at home?"), I simply say "NO". The call usually
ends about two seconds later and I'm done with it... no need for
rudeness or aggression or anything.
/Bernie\
[Moderator's Note: Absolutely! Why be rude and aggressive when you can
simply lie about it instead? Personally, I prefer being rude, crude, lewd and
aggressive, in the slim hope the caller understands English. PT]davef@brspyr1.brs.com (Dave Fiske) (09/12/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0363m05@vector.dallas.tx.us>, cosell@bbn.com (Bernie Cosell) writes: > I find junk calls easy to deal with (I get the usual 5-10 per week) --- > it is just a matter of taking a similar attitude as toward junk mail: > finding a bunch of ways to quickly (and low-stressingly) dispatch with > the things. One technique I've found that has worked perfectly for a > month or two now is very simple: if *anyone* calls asking for me by > name ("Is Mr. Cosell at home?"), I simply say "NO". The call usually > ends about two seconds later and I'm done with it... no need for > rudeness or aggression or anything. Here are some tips I've used--as well as some pitfalls to avoid. When the telemarketeer for a local newspaper calls, they often pretend they are checking on your subscription. "Hi, this is Julie from the Times-Union. Are your papers being delivered all right?" This person doesn't have any idea whether you subscribe or not--it's just their way of finding out whether you are a potential sucker for their spiel. I always say "yes" and the person thanks me and hangs up. One time, though, I goofed, and told the person that I bought the paper every morning on my way to work, and didn't need a subscription. I forgot it was an afternoon paper, so she pointed out that I was thinking of the wrong one, and I had to listen to the spiel. Now, sometimes you get someone doing a telephone survey about something, and you don't feel like spending 20 minutes trying to rate the texture of buns from McDonalds hamburgers on a 1 to 5 scale. Usually they ask if you or anyone in your family works for an ad agency or anything. I've sometimes told them my wife does, even though I'm not married. The cruelest thing I ever did was just to stop talking. When the poor woman realized I wasn't responding, she started saying "sir, sir, are you all right? Sir?" After about a minute she hung up, but I think she really did get worried. For some reason I never have used what I worked out to be my best strategy. The whole idea is for us to make the callers waste as much time as possible on an unprofitable call. Remember the person calling is often just a person who needs a job, and maybe didn't have any experience for anything more exciting. There's no need for you to initiate a nasty exchange. If the person really gets obnoxious, I'd say anything is fair, though. Anyway, I always figured it would be good just to ask them to hold on, because someone's at the door, then pretend that you forgot all about the phone. Chances are they will hang on for quite a while, expecting you to come back on. If they wait 3 minutes for you, before hanging up, they will have lost time which they could have used to call several other people. Eventually (in theory) this form of marketing will lose its cost-effectiveness, and the company will go back to direct mail or something. -- "ANGRY WOMEN BEAT UP SHOE SALESMAN Dave Fiske (davef@brspyr1.BRS.COM) WHO POSED AS GYNECOLOGIST" Home: David_A_Fiske@cup.portal.com Headline from Weekly World News CIS: 75415,163 GEnie: davef
tad@ssc.UUCP (Tad Cook) (09/18/89)
Here are some methods I have used with phone solicitations. I respond in a hurried voice, telling them that I got their call on call-waiting, while on a long distance call. If they ask, "Is this Mr. Cook?", I say, "No, he's dead!", and hang up. I got the idea after answering calls at my folk's house after my dad died :( If I am in my ham radio room in the basement, I tune in some weird sounding howling signal on shortwave (Radioteletype is nice!) and gradually increase the volume, acting distracted and unresponsive. When they ask what is going on, I tell them that I am receving some messages from overseas operatives, and they have called at a bad time. My favorite is when the long distance carriers call. I tell them that I recently did a comparison of their carrier with the one I currently subscribe to by using 10XXX codes, and that their bit-error rate and call setup time are unacceptable. They don't really want to get into a discussion of nuts and bolts technical aspects of the system, and they go away real quick. Another way to deal with solictors is to listen to the spiel, and tell them flat-out that I am not going to buy. Oh yeah....I just remembered another cute ploy.... I have call transfer on my line (hookflash, dial the number, hang up) and have transferred them to dial-a-prayer. :> Tad Cook tad@ssc.UUCP
chip@vector.dallas.tx.us (Chip Rosenthal) (09/22/89)
tad@ssc.UUCP (Tad Cook) writes: >X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 384, message 3 of 5 >If they ask, "Is this Mr. Cook?", I say, "No, he's dead!" Boy...I was on the other end of one of those. I was staffing the phone bank for a political campaign last fall. I was working off old contact sheets rather than cold calling. But apparently the contact sheets must have been *very* old. The person I talked to was pleasant about it, but I sure felt crummy. Chip Rosenthal / chip@vector.Dallas.TX.US / Dallas Semiconductor / 214-450-5337 Someday the whole country will be one big "Metroplex" - Zippy's friend Griffy
cramer@ames.arc.nasa.gov (Clayton Cramer) (09/26/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0402m05@vector.dallas.tx.us>, chip@vector.dallas.tx.us (Chip Rosenthal) writes: > tad@ssc.UUCP (Tad Cook) writes: > >X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 384, message 3 of 5 > >If they ask, "Is this Mr. Cook?", I say, "No, he's dead!" > > Boy...I was on the other end of one of those. I was staffing the phone > bank for a political campaign last fall. I was working off old contact > sheets rather than cold calling. But apparently the contact sheets must > have been *very* old. The person I talked to was pleasant about it, but > I sure felt crummy. > Chip Rosenthal / chip@vector.Dallas.TX.US / Dallas Semiconductor When I was hunting heads, many years, we would get together one night each month and call people who we were unable to locate at work during the day. In some cases, the resumes were very, very old. I called one such resume, over a year old, and asked for Mr. So-and-So. "I don't think that's possible." "Why?" "My husband's been dead for over a year now." "I'm so sorry to have bothered you." I was almost done calling for the evening, and that finished the evening. I wouldn't assume the contact sheets were old -- dead people vote with great regularity. Voter lists are purged in California of non-voters after general elections. Once, while walking precincts (for my own election campaign), I found that the person registered to vote had been dead four years -- long enough to have been purged, unless someone was voting in his place. Oh well -- vote early, vote often! Clayton E. Cramer {pyramid,pixar,tekbspa}!optilink!cramer What shall it be today? Watch Three's Company? Or unify the field theory? Disclaimer? You must be kidding! No company would hold opinions like mine!