When I poll sales audiences about cold calling, many people use it as their primary way to prospect in their territory. Yet they also say that it’s hard work and they get low returns. The reason why is because they’re going about it inefficiently.

No doubt, cold calling is difficult because no one is sitting at their desk, waiting for the phone to ring, hoping it’s a salesperson. Read on to learn three ways to improve you cold calling outcomes.

The Cold Calling Goal

Use cold calling when you don’t have a relationship with a company and you want to start a conversation. Most people attempt to pitch a product on the first call. Unless the person you talk with has an immediate need, you won’t get past the first ten seconds. Do something different if you want to grow your territory.

Instead, view cold calling as a way to start a conversation that leads to a relationship that allows them to trust you enough to buy. If you’ve ever started a conversation while you were waiting in line at a store, you get the idea. If you’re never done that, cold calling might not be right for you.

Immediately Answer Two Burning Questions

If you can’t create a connection in two or three seconds, they’ll hang up and you’ll miss the conversation. When they answer the phone, you must answer two questions burning in their mind in the first 10 seconds:

• Why are you bothering me?
• Who cares? 

Here are a few examples: “Maybe you can help me. I’m looking for the person responsible for your security policy. Who is that?”

“I’m trying to figure out how companies like yours plan and budget for computer storage expansion. Who does that for you?”

“Do you know who I should talk with? I need to find out if you’re protected from ransomware, a computer attack that is an epidemic in our community. Who would know that?”

Notice: no name, no company, just right into your request.

Create Cold Calling Credibility

Next, you must create credibility. Answer the burning question: Why should I believe you?

The fastest way to do this is to make a claim based on your work in your territory. For example:

“We’re the people who work with companies like yours to validate security policies. With all of the changes in the computer world, we find 90 percent of them out of date, creating undue and unprotected risk. Our customers tell us that we prevent major problems for their executives, who are on the hook if there’s a problem.”

“Our customers count on us to make sure that they have enough computer storage and are never surprised when they run out. We’ve been doing this for 23 years, so we have deep experience in making sure our customers have what they need, when they need it.”

I’m go into much more detail on how to do cold calling right in a complimentary one-hour video based on my book, “Guerrilla TeleSelling” co-authored with Jay Conrad Levinson. Click here to watch, free.

Make your cold calls count.

Mark S A Smith

P.S. I’ve created an on-line training session that goes much deeper into creating value by automating the customer acquisition process without cold calling. Sign up here to take the class as my guest.