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Being Good At Cold Calling Is Like Being A Functional Drunk
Posted by Michael Cage on Monday, July 19, 2004At a gathering recently I spoke with a b2b service professional who made the bulk of his living by cold calling. By all accounts, he is successful. (Then again, I've found the people who talk most about the money they have usually have the least; and a car they can't afford. So who knows...)
Anyway, he was complaining because his business had stopped growing. I said, "well, of course. You are relying on menial grunt work to get your clients instead of automating the process with a marketing system so you can spend more time cashing checks."
His response?
I was nuts because he was making money doing cold calling, so it was stupid of me to recommend something else and tell him what he was doing was wrong.
At this point I told him he was like a functional drunk. He frowned.
"Just because you can function with a gallon of Jack Daniels in your belly doesn't mean you should, nor does it mean your foolishness isn't gonna come back and kick you hard in the ass sometime in the near future. Cold calling is the same way. Keep it up and don't grow your business the right way when you can, and not only will you stop growing now... you will probably be angry and sorry somewhere down the road when the manual labor becomes less effective or you want to take a few vacations."
He puckered his lips and we said goodbye.
Like they say, you can lead a horse to water. But ya can't make him drink.
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Your comparing Apples with Oranges.
Both methods have a place in a well rounded sales plan.
GC on Friday, July 23, 2004If you have sales professionals on staff, there is no excuse to be wasting their time with cold calling. I’ve yet to find a single person able to present a compelling reason why it makes more sense to have them digging around for prospects instead of having qualified prospects seek them out instead. To do so is a complete and utter failure on the part of whoever is in charge of marketing. In a small professional firm, like the guy I wrote about, there is no excuse whatsoever other than being ignorant of alternatives. (Granted, a problem most small b2b firms have.)
Michael Cage
Michael Cage on Friday, July 23, 2004Cold Calling is fine for Small Businesses starting out but should never be the only method of obtaining sales. Long term database marketing (i.e. mail, e-mail, website promotions, small ads) should eventually get most prospects calling you instead of you calling them. Marty Screeton
Martin Screeton on Monday, July 26, 2004I found that using my extra minutes of my t-Mobile 3000 minutes plan from my cell phone to cold call each month is a really good and cheap way to draw in clients and get your name out. 10%-20% of cold calls end up wanting more information about your service, which is a good reason to go in person and drop off information the next day. I get more responce from cold calls then from ads. Also if you have online ads, you limit your customers to ones that know how to use a computer. One thing to keep in mind is that you should always have a promotion to offer during the call.
Adam Panek on Tuesday, August 31, 2004-----
All major companies use cold calling, Discover Card, Visa, Sony, Seriously if you said cold calling is for small businesses maybe you should check the facts that it makes business grow 43% at least
Dan on Wednesday, September 05, 2007I like the post, and am managing a few lower level sales poeple that are doing cold calls, so I know its not the best way to go. We combine the cold calling with direct mail and email campaigns too. We still do get appointments and business this way, so it is not useless and it takes skill to put together the right approach this way. The point is, it can be effective if you work hard at it and come accross as “different”. I think its important to mix the cold calling with other activities. If those activities grow to be more successful then yeah...forget the cold calling. Nothing is better training on how to handle objections and think on your feet, especially for a young sales person, than cold calling.
James Farquharson on Tuesday, December 18, 2007I agree with last poster about a call first to warm them up, then followup in person for flyer and hopes you can visit with the decision maker to identify if we can assist in helping the company grow or get better at what they do.
At this point it isn’t selling...it is giving them access to our expertise. We really need to show them we can imppact the business and we just aren’t more blowhards.
Timothy Hooker on Thursday, December 20, 2007IN my opinion cold calling is for every business. Their no way that soon or later every business will not have to do some type of cold calling to stay in business.
Ambit Energy Ohio on Sunday, February 17, 2008I believe that a company who refuses to have some type of cold calling system will soon or later be out of business.
Tony Snow
http://www.ambetenergy.com
i am sales and marketing executive and my bosses think we should use cold calling as a marketing strategy. i think its pointless. large amounts of resources are put into calling random potential clients and results are so minimal, they are discouraging. unfortunately, not everyone believes this. in my experience, there are better ways of acquiring business without irritating people who could be future clients
jj on Monday, April 14, 2008Our company uses cold calling as a means of generating new business. We by no means feel that B2B cold calling is dead. In fact our success proves otherwise. Cold calling will not be dead for a long time to come.
PC Bytes Network Consulting on Saturday, April 19, 2008