This is the second part of the series “Selling In Steps”, the first part covered activity whilst the next parts will be covering the act of gathering leads.
Cold calling is a true old school technique, it is a way of finding quality leads and it never gets old.
Often by cold calling on customers you will find leads that none of your competitors have touched.
What is cold calling?
Cold calling is in simplest terms the act of calling a customer without any prior activity.
They haven’t contacted you, you haven’t been referred to them, you basically just found the company and decide to call un-announced.
Step 1, qualifying the customer
As you know, not everyone needs your services and not everyone can benefit from your products.
It is a complete waste of time to call a company that doesn’t need your help.
You probably already have, but if you don’t you need to create an image of your ideal customer. What size of company are they, what industry do they work in, number of employees and so on. Whatever is important to what you are selling.
Make sure that the customers you call do fulfill you criteria, otherwise your time is better spent finding other customers that do.
Step 2, Identify the person to talk to
Usually you know what the role of the person in the company has that you need to talk to. It can be the IT-manager, CEO, CFO or a sales manager or the HR-manager.
Often you can find information about this person on the company website and if not you can often use other resources like linked in.
Just spend 5-10 minutes identifying the person you need to talk.
Step 3, Have a clear set goal
Whenever you are making a cold call you need to know what the goal is.
Is your goal to make a sale, book a meeting, send information?
Whatever the goal is, have it clear in your mind so that you can make it clear to the customer.
You never want to be unsure about your goal, the customer can hear it and you will not earn the respect you need in order to sell further down the line.
Step 4, Get to the point quickly
Now that you know the goal, get to it quickly.
If your goal is to book a meeting, don’t spend 10 minutes presenting your product. You want to do that at the meeting!
Just get them to open their calendar and set a time for you to come by.
If you want to send information, give them a brief introduction to your company and product. Give them a reason to read the information and then send it. Don’t waste your time!
Step 5, evaluate your performance
Once you have called on a few customers you have to evaluate your preformance.
What did you do right?
What mistakes did you make? What can you learn?
Did you call the right customers? The right contacts? Did you have a clear goal? Where you straight and to the point?
Learn as much as you can and keep improving.
What I think about Cold Calling
I have found cold calling is one of the most effective ways to find new leads.
It is easy, goes quickly and you often find customers that barely have been exposed to your industry.
If you haven’t tried it, or haven’t given it the time it needs you definitely should.
What do you think?
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Such a well written post.. Thnkx for sharing this post!
Thank you for that kind comment.
I hope to see you here again soon
Searching for this for some time now – i guess luck is more advanced than search engines
What can you say, Humans are better than Machines
Hey admin, very informative blog post! Pleasee continue this awesome work..
Thank you I am glad you liked it.
The rest of this series will be published over the next few weeks.