Sell With A Cold Call!!

Giving a date to girlfriend may be an experience full of nervousness and anxiety thinking if something went wrong and she would say ‘No’.

Anxiety or Nervousness is ok in your very personal matter or days of school or college. But this is real business world!! If not you, somebody else will grab the opportunity.

You can live your entire life and never face the fear of asking someone out, but if you want to survive in business, cold calls must be made!

"You must have a strategy to reach new businesses, and that involves cold calling," suggests Colgan.

Generally, when a player with no money invested in the pot calls a bet and a raise, he is said to be cold calling. But in business, any unsolicited sales call to a person or company in which no relationship currently exists is known as cold calling. In other ways, if an agent calls a new customer for the first time or calls an existing customer about a new product or service that is now available, is also same.

Cold calling happens to be an effective sales tactic if done properly. "I've opened up about 30 accounts in the last 18 months directly as a result of cold calling" said Don Colgan. The simple rule is – "If you need business, you must go after the person."

How shall you give a cold call?

Step1- Decide It

Decide it. Put a goal. The aim of is to set an appointment to make the pitch. Condole!! Condoling is about getting the chance to make the sale.

Step2- Target

Your first step is getting familiar with the person to whom you want to sell. Search, who wants your product? Or to whom you can sell off. This is a market full of potential customers and buyers where you have lot of sellers too.

Do market research to focus and target your market. Do you want to be niche product or service provider? Go to the root. Find details of the company or persons to whom you will make cold call! Determine your market and buyers. Raise one question frequently "Who wants to buy?"

That’s your market, you decided. It sounds much harder than it really is, but be focused and you will do miracles. If you are focused, you have knowledge. If you know every answer for the standing question of customer, you will have confidence. And confidence in self gives immense power to turn deal on.

Step3- Make A Statement

Familiarize yourself to the business you are in. What do you want to offer to your target market? Take an example. Your target market is Real Estate Professionals (REPs). Do you want to handle their direct mailings or handle transaction coordination?

You have to consider client’s needs and address them and head on to organize your thought before calling.

Call and make a statement. Making a statement or question is an art. According to Naguib Mahfouz "You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions." Never ask, "How are you today?" But include introduction of your cold call with greetings. Highlight prospect and benefits of your service or products. Value your client’s time. "I am the world's worst salesman, therefore, I must make it easy for people to buy," said Woolworth. Think of what else your client can do within a time for which he is in conversation with you. Make it simpler and quick.

Step 4 – Write Script

When you make cold calls, you control the direction and flow of the call. Get your point across the client quickly and clearly. Write down possible objections the client can have and prepare answers to be given on the spot.

Scripting of course will not help you to speak word by word but it will make structure of discussion. Be sure that your message is upbeat. Use simple, easy and comfortable words, which can be easily understood. Make it sound conversation. You need not to give lecture or thesis idea. No time to try out five-dollar words.

Step5 – Practice It

Practice makes a man perfect. Once you have written script, review it. Is it in a flow? Are you tripping over words? If you are then you need to revise it. Make a role-playing exercise with your partner. Start by pretending to make the actual call from the pickup to the close. Ask your partner to come up with objections. Your partner should behave in actual way the way your client is to behave.

Step6 – Make an Appointment and Call

"The telephone is a tremendous tool to generate new business," argues Colgan. "Any company that doesn't utilize it is foolish."

Pick up the phone and start calling to your target. Take an appointment to call in detail. You may realize to improve on script even at end of 10th or 20th call.

Be pleasant with the person you are talking to. Develop strategies. That should help you to get the information you need. It helps to know as many people as possible. Put your ears in practice to hear ‘No’. It is inevitable. Someone will say it. Let your ears hear ‘Yes’ finally. It is inevitable. Someone will say it. Personal meeting with product display really helps. Parr says "Bringing a sample product on outside sales calls can be a good door opener, and can extend the time allowed with a potential client."

There is nothing to wait in business. Gather, analyze and start making cold call!!

Words from Last Para!!

Think of a negative response as one more "No" out of the way and one more "Yes" is coming soon. Experts say that 80 per cent of new sales are made after the fifth contact.

In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative original thinker unless you can also sell what you create. Management cannot be expected to recognize a good idea unless it is presented to them by a good salesman." - David M. Ogilvy

Suggested Readings and Sources
Cold Beginnings on Cold Calling: By Dale Noles
COLD CALLING: By Sarah Tobaben Dolash