Is Cold Calling Old School?

Most people hate cold calling prospects to offer products or services. But why is that? My guess is that it’s because many marketers confuse annoying (and even borderline-abusive) sales tactics with a convincing sales pitch. I have a long list of telemarketers that call me nearly every month with the same, tired jokes – some of them are even inappropriate or downright offensive! Others try to hook me with a guilt trip. And some just don’t know when to quit; I’ve been asking to be removed from their list for months, yet still they persist. Some even hang up as soon as I start talking, or interrupt me numerous times as I attempt to disengage from the conversation. This has gone on for long enough that many legitimate marketers dread picking up the phone for fear of being lumped in with the rest.

But telephone prospecting doesn’t and shouldn’t be like that. Cold calling is not dead. It’s an art, and it takes truly skillful sales people to do it well. I used to work at a large firm with a very large sales department. In that firm, National Accounts Managers did nothing but cold call all day – and trust me, they were very good at what they did. First off, there was no canned script involved; they researched each and every prospect, and knew exactly whom to speak with and what to talk about. They knew how to frame the conversation in such way that the call never sounded like a solicitation. It just made sense: The customer had a challenge; we had the solution, and voilà! Meetings were often scheduled during the initial call.

Oftentimes, cold calling becomes a dance of sorts. Marketers and sales people might follow up with a prospect for months before they get a chance to set their foot in the door – but persistence, and lots of patience, is necessary. So, what is the difference between being persistent and just pestering a potential client? For one, frequency: When ‘dancing’ with a prospect for an extended period of time, don’t call them every single week just to ‘check-in’ or ‘follow-up’, with no clear topic in mind. Before you pick up the phone, think of something relevant to talk about – perhaps an industry report, or a major acquisition in the prospect’s industry that might influence their business. The point is to think of something that warrants a call in the first place. Then, when the opportunity arises, you can touch on the subject of sales. What you’re trying to do is establish a relationship that will last – not make a quick sell and leave a bad taste in the client’s mouth.

Where many marketers get confused is in measuring success with instant gratification – we call, we sell. Unfortunately, that is not how it works most of the time. The internet has made it easy to expect results in an hour or two. Sometimes, we forget that human relationships take time to develop. Cold calling does, of course, yield return or else it would not be worth the investment of large organization to have inside sales teams – they are in charge of bringing and maintaining the large accounts. However these accounts don’t convert overnight, it takes months, sometimes years for the big contracts to get signed. It is a long and nurturing process. So, if lack of success have left you feeling defeated, don’t give up on your highly targeted list of prospects just yet. Simply change the way you work on it, and above all else, be patient. The results will speak for themselves.