The more I thought about it, the more I felt offended by this approach.  The tone of the call was what sales people call "the assumptive close".  He began the conversation with the assumption that most customers would feel that, since the manager of the branch was calling, they probably should agree to a meeting.  When I didn't immediately agree, he shifted into various "closing" lines that he had.  The end result was not only that I am not going to meet with him but I feel even less inclined to meet with him than I did originally.

In fairness, this manager was probably following the instruction he received on how to build up his branch business.

I have a better suggestion on how he could have accomplished this:

Any time that one person is trying to persuade another person to take a certain action such as come in to the new branch to meet the manager, it is a sales situation.  Many people think that selling is about persuading.  Very often sales is done that way but a better way is to find out what your prospect is doing; how the prospect does that; why that works for them; when and where and with whom they tend to do them.  At that point, you are in a better position to show them how they can do it better using your proposed action.

Instead of using the power of his position as the manager of the new branch to try to leverage an appointment, he should have used that implied connection to get a telephone interview right there and then.  That would have created a situation in which he could create more focused meetings at the branch.

For example:

"I am Joe Bloe, the Manager of the new branch of your bank.  I am pleased to be able to tell you that your account has been transferred to our branch.  To be able to serve you better, I would like to ask you a few questions.  Do you have a few minutes right now?  Yes?

Great!  First, I am just curious, do you do all of your banking with us?  Who else do you bank with? Do you do more of your banking with us or them?  What are the benefits for you of doing it that way?  Do you do most of your banking through bank machines and your computer? Or do you prefer live contact with a branch?  Do you already have some form of savings plan to set aside money for the future?  What type of plan do you have?  How does that work in achieving your goals?

You know, based on what you have been telling me I believe that we can show you some ways for you to get a lot more value for your banking dollar.  I'd like to show you what I mean by that could you drop in to the branch for a few minutes this Thursday at 3?"

This is a very general approximation of what such a call would look like.  The bank itself would develop more specific questions but the idea is to develop enough information about the client to be able to make a focused suggestion for a meeting. This approach would at the very least give the banker more information about the client; give the client more of a sense that the manager is interested in their financial well being and when it did lead to a meeting would produce more meetings in which there is a possibility of a positive increase in business for the branch.

Bud Brown is a trainer of sales systems based on the approach of such sales giants as Steve Schiffman (author of books like Make It happen Before Lunch) and Tony Paranello (Author of books like Stop Cold Calling Forever). Bud can be reached at his website at www.mcrgroup.net.