Cold Call

“Cold calling” is such an apt term for it. When you get on the line with a complete stranger, for the purposes of pitching them a product or service, you’re often greeted with a certain “chilliness.”  The conversation can seem stiff, as though frozen. Your muscles get tense and you can’t communicate as freely and fluidly as normal.

It’s for this reason that SDRs – especially those of a social media generation – dread having to make cold calls. But what if you could warm up your cold calls, make it so they don’t feel as stiff, tense and burdening? What if you could make your life easier and be better at your job?

You can, but it will take some work. To that end, here are a few pointers you can use to warm up your sales calls.

Leverage Social Selling

The debate rages on about whether cold calling or social selling works better, but why not synthesize the two approaches. For all the internet ink spilled on the topic, there are not nearly enough people discussing how you can leverage social selling to improve cold calling. Research your prospect over social media, send them relevant information, build out the relationship a little and warm them up for the first call. Decision makers (especially those more accustomed to online interaction) will welcome the trial period of social media communication – often, they feel just as awkward on the phone as you do.

Do Your Research

Would you rather write a test you were prepared for, or go in completely cold? Of course, you would choose the former, and the same applies to cold calling. The more information you learn about the prospect, the more confident you will feel contextualizing your product within their business concerns. You might even add a VBR, or “valid business reason” when you speak with them: a reason why you are calling, based on what you know about their company.

Take Full Advantage of Voicemail

People don’t give voicemails the respect they deserve, assuming they go unheard and therefore are allowed to be unimpressive. But voicemails are a fantastic opportunity to warm up the prospect for a call. Rather than leave the same voicemail each time (or, worse yet, skip the script altogether), map your voicemails to offer new information and add urgency.

Manage Your Inside Sales Cold Calls

When your brain is scattered, when you are grasping at straws trying to figure out who to call next, you won’t be a great cold caller. You need a system to manage your cold calls, preferably one that has lead-based queue routing to help you always work the best leads. The easiest way to do this is to deploy a sales engagement platform. But before you do, read through this article, which lists the 10 best practices you should know for deployment; it will help you do it the right way.

You might dread picking up the receiver, but the inconvenient truth is that cold calling remains a useful tool in the sales efforts arsenal. You will have to do it occasionally. Fortunately, following these tips, cold calling doesn’t have to be so hard – or cold, for that matter.