Cold Calling Does Not Work!!!
Reading through numerous sales related blogs, it seems that many people believe cold calling does not work. In summary, since the advent of email, texting, websites, SEO, social media etc, we are increasingly told there is no place for initiating new business via an old fashioned telephone….
Sadly for most “salespeople” this is absolutely correct, for the simple reason that they either do not, or won’t cold call, or when they do, they do not know what they’re doing.
Prior to the recession, there was an abundance of demand for most businesses, so “salespeople” could muddle their way along without developing their cold calling skills, and still hit their targets. Things now are very different, as businesses now have to actively create demand, rather than relying on fulfilling existing demand. This is one reason, I believe the deluded statement that “cold calling doesn’t work” is actually dangerous for businesses. For sure, cold calling does not work for most “salespeople”, but only because they have never had any real training in it, and also that cold calling is uncomfortable so very few people ever do it consistently enough to become proficient.
Doctors, lawyers, accountants, firemen, professional footballers, architects, professional soldiers etc, all undergo extensive and ongoing training to stay at the top of their game. Salespeople meanwhile, are typically given a day’s product (not sales) training and a briefcase, and then told to get on with it. Is it any surprise therefore, that most salespeople don’t know what they’re doing and feel so very uncomfortable in one of the fundamental foundations of selling, that of prospecting for new business via the phone?
Now that all of these new technologies have come along, many businesses and salespeople have quite rightly taken them up, but to use this as an excuse for not cold calling, especially in the new demand creation economy is deluded. The case for a professional and targeted cold calling strategy is now stronger than ever, but since cold calling is uncomfortable, and (certainly in the UK) businesses are loathe to invest in professional ongoing sales prospecting training, I suspect there will always be the majority of people who based on their own experience believe it doesn’t work, and the minority who know it does.