I used to do this kind of work, yep it works. But, you need to do a lot of calls to find a good prospect. Cold calling is a very time consuming prospect, you are better off buying some fresh leads to prospect through, or run a competition.

We purchased leads from survey companies, targeted to people who said they were in the market for x product or whatever. Those leads were a much better uptake. You can generate leads at an expo, or even just off the street.

We also ran competitions and got pretty girls to stop business men in the street, and enter them in a competition.

If you can do some legwork like that yourself then you're making life a lot easier for yourself and you are directing the whole process before you expect an appointment setter to yield results.

You can expect to pay $20/hr to people off fo seek or job sites, they are usually looking for jobs and money rather than being focussed on your business though, it is hard to find good people.

A friend of mine ended up doing this professionally, and still seems to be http://www.appointment-setter.com.au I'd certainly recommend contacting them.

From my experience it is about finding someone that will represent you well, but will stop at nothing to making sure the business comes in the door. That doesn't come from just making calls, you have to really want it.

Telemarketing is a hard, hard slog – and while it can deliver, it aint for the faint hearted.

Barry