Never trust the spreadsheet's word for it

This one costs real money to learn the hard way. A lead list said three businesses had no website. All three had websites. Every hour spent building something for them was spent on a premise that was false, and the checking would have taken about ninety seconds each.

Why the column is wrong so often

Whoever built the data checked one place. Businesses put their site in a different field, or only on Facebook, or the listing is five years stale, or there are two listings for the same shop and only one has the link.

The four checks, ninety seconds

Search the business name plus the town. Not the name alone. You want what a customer would actually type.

Open their Google listing and look at the website button. If it goes to a booking page, that is not a website, but it is also not nothing. It changes what you would say to them.

Check Facebook and Instagram bios. A lot of small shops keep their only link there.

If you find a site, load it on your phone. Half the time the answer is not "they have no website," it is "they have one and it is broken on a phone," which is a completely different conversation and usually an easier sale.

Write down what you found

Why this is worth the ninety seconds

Because the alternative is building a finished thing for somebody whose problem you invented. Four full builds is a lot of hours to spend on a premise nobody checked.

The upside nobody mentions

The checking is also the research. By the time you have done these four things you know more about that business than the person who sold you the list, and you have something specific to open with, which is the only thing that makes a cold message land.

← Back to the library