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When you work in sales every interaction with a prospect is important. So, when you send an e-mail filled with overused phrases, you’re not making the best impression on a potential client. To avoid losing a client over your poor communication skills, avoid these phrases in your sales e-mails.

• “We guarantee the lowest price.”

One thing you can guarantee is that every salesperson in the universe includes this sentence in their sales e-mails. Salespeople should try to get clients to think of the value instead of the price, so don’t make your pitch centered around the price you can offer.

• “We can help you increase revenue and reduce costs.”

Similar to the low price guarantee, this promise is made by every salesperson in the business. In fact, your client could have a dozen other e-mails in his or her e-mail inbox that say the same thing. Don’t fall into this trap of approaching clients with the same pitch as everyone else you are competing against. Make your e-mail stand out by showing how your product will benefit the client in detail, instead of skipping to the outcome of increased revenue and reduced costs.

• “Click here for more information.”

When you direct the client to a link for more information, it shows laziness and disrespect. You may feel you are being helpful by providing a link that can answer all of their questions, but a client will feel you are too lazy to type up the information and present it to them in the e-mail they are already reading. You should position yourself as the only source of information the client needs, so don’t send them somewhere else to find what they need.

• “Just checking in.”

To salespeople, this phrase is a great way to start a conversation when you haven’t heard back from a client in quite some time. However, to clients, this signals that you are stressing out about meeting some sort of sales quota and need to follow up with everyone who you forgot about over the last few weeks. If you want to reach out to a client who you haven’t heard from in a while, try to present new information to them. Did your company recently release a case study showing how effective your services are? Use this as a reason to reach out instead of “just checking in.”

• “If you have questions, don’t hesitate to contact me….”

You are a salesperson, so your job is to get in touch with clients. You don’t need to reiterate to the client that you are available to them if they have questions. Instead, end the e-mail with your signature, which should include all of the contact information the client needs to reach you. If you need a sentence to end with, try “please let me know if you have questions” instead.

Are you guilty of using any of these phrases in your sales e-mails? Are there any annoying phrases that aren’t included in the list above?

Sales Voice Mail Tips to Get More Callbacks

When you pick up the phone to call a new client, you prepare to have a conversation with him or her, but rarely do salespeople prepare to leave a persuasive and convincing sales voice mail. They end up caught off guard, stumbling through a voice mail with “uhs” and “ums” instead of getting to the point and delivering the message. But, this doesn’t have to be your reality anymore. Follow these tips to leave the perfect sales voice mail.

• Don’t start with your name.

As clients check their voice mails when they get back to their office, they will listen to the first few seconds and decide whether to continue to listen or delete it and move to the next. If you start your voice mail by saying your name and what company you are calling from, the client could easily hit delete if he thinks it’s just another sales voice mail. Instead, start with “Hi Ben, I’m calling you about….” State the purpose of your call first and then give your information at the end of the call.

• Stay calm.

Salespeople and wholesale distributors are often taught to sound overly enthusiastic and energetic on the phone so clients can sense excitement, but this is not a smart strategy to use. You should sound calm, cool and collected when you are leaving a voice mail for your client so it seems more natural. Clients should not sense you are being fake or phony, which is often how enthusiastic tones can come off. Make clients comfortable by speaking to them normally throughout the voice mail so you don’t scare them off from ever returning your call.

• Don’t promise a follow-up.

When you are closing out the voice mail, don’t end with “I’ll check back with you tomorrow,” or “I’ll try calling again next week.” Although it’s natural to want to end the conversation with how you will be in touch with them next, don’t do it. If you tell the client you will be initiating the next phone call, he has no reason to return your call when he gets your voice mail. Why would he call you back right away if you have already said you will call again tomorrow? To make sure the client calls you back, end the conversation with your phone number so he knows where to reach you.

• Always leave a voice mail.

The most important tip of all is to always leave a voice mail. If a client sees a missed call from you and then realizes you didn’t leave a voice mail, this may come off as strange to him. He has no reason to call you back because you didn’t tell him why you were calling in the first place. This is a very ineffective technique, so it’s always best to leave to a voice mail, even if you’re not prepared at the time to give your best pitch.

MANA welcomes your comments on this article. Write to us at [email protected].