Sales Chump

I’m not going to beat around the bush or try to make cold calls out to be better than they are… cold calling sucks.  There I said it.  I’m a sales rep and I hate to cold call.  How many of you enjoy it?  If more than 1 of 10 people said yes, I would say there’s something wrong.  It’s not that as sales people we don’t like making new contacts, it’s more of a psychological thing.

I know as a sales rep myself I fear rejection.  This is something I’ve worked out of my system and no longer fear it.  If you complete a good sales process, you will know whether or not a deal will go through.  But I digress from the point of this blog/rant…. cold calls suck.

While cold calling leads isn’t fun, sometimes we find ourselves having to do it to generate new prospects.  Referrals and being an “order taker” is nice but it doesn’t always work out that way.  At some point in your sales career you will cold call. While after a while you can use your customers to generate hot leads and give you referrals, a cold call at some point in time is going to be required.

For example, the other day one of my customers (which was a complete cold call right out of the phone book) referred another franchisee who owned several more locations.  While I get a lot of referral business now, my referrals all started from a cold call at some point when I look back at it.

So what is the point of this rant you ask? I’m getting there…

When you are cold calling, you most likely don’t have much information about the decision maker or the business.  You will find yourself having to work on bypassing the gatekeeper and various other things.  There are some things that can make your cold call easier:

1. Goal for Sales Call - Have a goal in mind for your cold call… what do you want to accomplish on this call?
2. Know the Business You’re Calling - Have an idea of what this business does and what is important to them.
3. They Aren’t Expecting Your Call - Remember they weren’t expecting your call today, that you are interrupting their day.

There are many other things that will help you on your cold call.  For me I have these goals in mind when making my first cold call to a lead:

1. Get Decision Maker name and email
2. How High of a Priority This Decision Is
3. Time to go further in depth about the product

While cold calls aren’t the best thing in the world.  Good things do come from them when the right approach is taken.  If you have to make cold calls, make sure you have clear goals laid out for the call, know the business you’re calling, and realize you are interrupting their day to talk to them.

As always, please chime in with tips that you may have for cold calls.