Zintro Experts typically receive numerous Inquiries. Because of that, they are continually trying evaluate whether it is worth their time to respond to any given Inquiry. Some of the considerations:

• Is the Client a “tire-kicker” looking to see what kind of responses he/she will get or is he/she serious about talking with Experts?
• Does the Client have a budget for either a phone consult or follow-on project?
• Am I a really good fit for this particular Inquiry?
• How many Experts are likely to respond?
• How many Experts is this Client interested in talking with?

You get the idea. Good Experts want to vet the Expert before deciding to invest time. So, how do you optimize the quality and quantity of Expert responses you will receive? The following proposes some useful suggestions. Some may apply to you. Others may not. But choosing to employ even one suggestion will most likely improve your Zintro experience.

Suggestion 1: Use the appropriate Inquiry Type

Zintro supports many different types of Inquiries. Some Experts filter out certain types of Inquiries. Be as specific as possible.

Suggestion 2: Make the Inquiry description compelling & credible

Experts are trying to be efficient with their time. Well-written Inquiry descriptions are worth the extra 30 seconds they take to write:

• State your credentials in the body of the inquiry. If you have impressive credentials, use them to send the message to experts that you are a Client they should pay attention to. If you work for McKinsey, say “I work for a prominent global consulting firm and am looking for a…”. That will draw attention.
• If you are concerned about confidentiality, don’t include information (e.g. company name) that would allow a reader to reverse-engineer your identity. Once you receive initial responses back from Experts, you can share more information on a selective basis.
• Use the words “I am looking for a consultant” or “I am looking for an Expert”. The word “consultant” implies budget, which will increase credibility. Even the word “Expert” sends the message that you want to talk with someone (that usually implies budget) instead of simply getting an answer by zNote.
• Do not be “spammy” with the description – it will lower your yield.
• Use industry-specific terminology and acronyms. “FMCG” = “Fast Moving Consumer Goods”. “OLED” = “Organic LED”. Speaking the language of the industry sends the message to the Experts that you are professional.
• Avoid typos. They present an unprofessional image. With built in spell-checkers, there is no reason to have typos anymore.
• Use Inquiries for their intended purpose – do not use Inquiries to try to generate business. As a general rule, Inquiries are for buying – not for selling.

Suggestion 3: Use 1-to-Many Inquiries instead of 1-to-1 Inquiries

There are two types of Inquiries:

• 1-to-Many Inquiries which are sent to multiple (system-matched) Experts simultaneously
• 1-to-1 Inquiries in which the Client finds an Experts on Zintro and contacts them individually

We strongly suggest sending 1-to-Many Inquiries because they leverage the power of the Zintro platform. That, of course, is up to you.

To send an Inquiry to a specific Expert

• Click on Browse Experts
  
• Browse through the Experts until you find one that you like
• Click on the Contact Expert button (see below)

Suggestion 4: Sign up as a Premium Client

Signing up as a Premium Client provides several benefits that will help you accomplish your Zintro objectives. Premium Clients:

• Get greater responses from higher quality Experts because your Premium Client status clearly conveys the message to them that you value connection with Experts enough to pay for it.
• Get back-end support from Zintro. Zintro’s Admin will add keyword tags and take other steps to help maximize the quality and quantity of Expert responses for Premium Clients.
• Ensures deeper distribution of your Inquiry into the Expert pool.

Click here to sign up as a Premium Client

Suggestion 5: Thank Experts for responding, even if not selected

The most common complaint we hear from Experts is that they took the time to respond to an Inquiry but never heard back from the Client. In most cases, this happens because the Client selects another expert(s) or solves their problem in some other way.

To be fair, as it currently stands, Zintro does not make it easy to respond back to multiple experts quickly. The system runs slowly (we are having scaling issues). There is no way to send out one message to all unselected Experts, etc. We are working on software functionality that will make it much faster & easier. However, in the mean time, it would be nice to send a message to Experts who seemed like they invested a lot of time in responding to your Inquiry telling them “We’ve chosen to go in a different direction” or “We are looking for a more technical expert”, etc.

Suggestion 6: Review sample Inquiries