6 Ways to Heat Up Your Cold Calling: Prospecting

Prospecting and cold calling can be difficult. Here’s 6 ideas to make them a little easier:

1. Know Your Numbers

Remember when your math teacher said you better learn algebra because you’d need it in real life and you didn’t really believe her? Well, if you’re a salesperson, you’ve got to solve for X.

Sales is a numbers game. To close a sale, you’ve got to do X number of presentations. To do X number of presentations, you’ve got to have X number of meetings. To set X number of meetings, you’ve got to make X number of cold calls via phone, email, or drop ins.

If you know your numbers, you know how close you likely are to your next sale. Everyone’s numbers are different, and that’s ok. But knowing your numbers helps to keep you motivated and active when the first 5 or 6 cold calls didn’t go as you had hoped. Keep going. Remember, there is no substitute for activity.

2. Tag Team

When I am out making cold calls by myself, I can easily get discouraged. People can be rude or weird or unavailable. I’ve found that I can talk myself into giving up. 

But … on the occasions that I’ve teamed up with a colleague to make some four-legged calls, I’ve found that we can encourage each other to keep going. We can blow off the rude prospect. We can laugh about the weird situation. We can push each other to stay at it when we haven’t been able to connect with a decision-maker.

Tag teaming shouldn’t be an everyday occurrence, but it may be the shot in the arm that your prospecting needs.

3. Get an Idea You Believe In

I love idea selling. I’ll write about it more in an upcoming article. But for now, remember that an idea that you believe in can give you a reason to persevere in your prospecting.

Let me give you an example.

I work in advertising sales. Last year, I came up with an idea that I really believed in – creating a School Garden Spotlight to focus on the amazing school gardens that exist in my area. I did the background work and found a great non-profit to partner with. I just needed to find some clients who would help sponsor the School Garden Spotlight. So, I made a list of about 30 businesses that would be an ideal fit. My enthusiasm for the idea was obvious as I talked to them. It took a while, but eventually, I found 4 clients who were willing to buy into the idea, and it became a reality. I loved the idea so much that I wasn’t going to give up until I found clients who believed in it too.

4. Do Something Completely Different

It’s easy to get into a rut, to fall into patterns that fit my personality. When I realize I’m in a rut, I try to mix things up. For instance, I don’t love making phone calls to prospects. I’d rather email or drop in. So to make phone calls a little more efficient, I once paid one of my kids $20 to make me a spreadsheet of all of the chiropractors in our area, complete with names and phone numbers. Since I paid for the list of leads, I was really motivated to use it. I used that list to make 50 phone calls and secure several meetings. Doing something different helps to break us out of our ruts.

5. Get A Referral

We all have favorite clients. They know us, trust us, and would probably be willing to recommend us to someone they know. Tap into their network. Ask them for a referral. 

A referral gives you a reason to call on a new prospect. “We’ve got a mutual friend, Tom Smith. I’ve worked with Tom for a while, and he said you might be interested in talking, so I stopped in to see if we could schedule a time to meet.” That’s a great hook to get make prospecting easier.

6. Poach Your Competition

When you’re making a sale, you actually have a series of smaller sales to make along the way before you get to the ultimate “yes.” You’ve got to sell them on you as a person. Then, you’ve got to sell them on the value of your industry or medium. Then finally, you’ve got to sell them on your particular service or offering.

Why not eliminate one of these? If they’re using one of your competitors, they’re already sold on your industry or medium.

For instance, when I worked in education technology sales, I loved calling on our competitions’ clients. I didn’t have to sell them on the idea of outsourcing their bookstore because they had already done it. I just had to sell them on me as a person and what my company had to offer. 

Prospect off your competition. Make a list of their customers and call on them. Chances are not everyone working with is satisfied, and you’ll be able to poach some new clients.

When it comes to prospecting, you’ve got to remember that it might not be easy, but there is no substitute for activity. Pick one of these ideas and get after it today!

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Next week, I’ll be writing about how to conduct a meeting once you’ve secured it with a prospect.

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