Comments on: What’s a “Gatekeeper” and Why Do I Need to “Get Past” Them?

By: John Tabita

John Tabita — Thu, 09 May 2013 02:24:25 +0000

Clinton,

Everything you’ve said is spot on. I have a magician friend who taught me a lot about marketing, and he also excels at cold-calling. I suppose it’s because magicians are performers and communicators at heart that makes you more of a natural at selling and marketing yourselves than us web geeks. Thanks for your comments.

By: Bambi

Bambi — Thu, 02 May 2013 07:09:21 +0000

You nailed it! Haha Great response!

By: John Tabita

John Tabita — Thu, 02 May 2013 03:15:11 +0000

Alex,

Thanks for your reply. I’ll be training two of our sales teams later this month and I’m definitely going to share your insights with them. Much appreciated!

By: John Tabita

John Tabita — Thu, 02 May 2013 03:09:50 +0000

I suppose a digital gatekeeper is easier to get past than a human one—as long as you have access to the source code.

By: Alex Fraundorf

Alex Fraundorf — Wed, 01 May 2013 18:43:19 +0000

Great article John.
I am the “gatekeeper” at my day job, and if more of the unsolicited interruptions used your approach, they would certainly have a much better chance.
Several of our current vendors were first unsolicited walk-ins. What the successful ones had in common where that they were in person (not over the phone), they were dressed professionally, they where knowledgeable about their product/service, they acted as though they respected my time (or actually did), and they understood that they had to pitch me first as the gatekeeper instead of insisting on “needing” to speak to the owner.

By: Clinton W. Gray

Clinton W. Gray — Wed, 01 May 2013 18:09:00 +0000

The technique you’ve outlined works great for my business. I am a comedy magician and I do a lot of cold-calling to see if a company or organization would like to book a show for a holiday party, staff meeting, etc. But the gatekeeper often doesn’t think that the boss or HR would be interested in a “magic show”. So I’ve developed a box of tricks (excuse the pun) to get past this person to the decision maker.

In-person cold-calling is usually easy… I do a simple trick for the gatekeeper, she wants me to show it to the other employees “in back” and suddenly I’m in. The fact that the employees gather around to watch is proof that my service might be of interest to the HR manager.

But on-the-phone it’s a lot harder. One little bit of phone business I do is to sneeze or yawn just as the gatekeeper finishes saying “XYZ Company, how may I help you?” It catches him or her off guard and they’ll often laugh. I make my apologies, saying something like “Wow only 11am and I’m already yawning,” and suddenly I seem a little more human… not a salesman on autopilot. From there I can try to get to the decision maker and it’s usually much easier.

One final point: It’s important to get the name of the individual BEFORE anything. Don’t ask “May I speak to the person who does marketing…”, but rather say ” Who does your marketing…” This way, if the person isn’t available or the gatekeeper won’t put your call through, you can call back a few days later and just directly ask for that person, side-stepping the gatekeeper altogether.

By: cmb

cmb — Wed, 01 May 2013 07:58:07 +0000

I was asked to take over a website – and the first thing I noticed was a bloody great gatekeeper on the website itself. A Flash intro preventing iPads, smartphones and Google et all indexing the site (no sitemap either). Perfect candidate!

By: John Tabita

John Tabita — Wed, 01 May 2013 03:47:08 +0000

Thanks!

By: John Tabita

John Tabita — Wed, 01 May 2013 03:45:55 +0000

It doesn’t work like that. I’m not going to “refuse to tell you,”—I’ll gladly explain. In fact, I’m going to point out yet one more concern I’ve discovered to reinforce the need for you to refer me up the chain of command.

It’s not about selling you something you don’t need; it’s about making you aware of a problem you didn’t know existed—and having it concern you enough to want to bring to the decision-maker’s attention. It’s like telling you that your company truck has two flat tires, and you deciding that’s important enough for your boss to know about. Except in my case, it’s your marketing that has two flats tires, which is not so easily fixed. (Hence, your potential need for my services.)

And actually, if I had walked into your business yesterday, before you read this, there’s a 60 percent chance it would “work on you.” That approach has been tried, tested, and measured by experienced sales reps and found to successfully land an appointment with a decision-maker exactly six out of 10 times. But I’m sure you’re one of the four it wouldn’t work on. ;)

By: NomDeGuerre

NomDeGuerre — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:47:38 +0000

Wouldn’t work on me (a “gatekeeper”). In the example given, I would ask you what it was you found, and at least pretend to take your information. If you refused to tell me what you found, I would respond that we’re all set and politely tell you to take a hike.

By: Adan

Adan — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 15:16:58 +0000

Good tip!