Where to learn Cold Calling?

Every good salesperson should make you need what they are selling, so, therefore, every sales call should be about solving needs.

Thanks. I'm already there in terms of solving a need, I'm just looking for some tips in terms of not making the opening lines awkward and getting past the gatekeepers. Strategies in terms of phrasing and scripts.

There are some good books out there that could help you. The other thing is to go work for some kind of telemarketing company that does fund raising. Experience is the best teacher.

What are you selling and who are you cold calling? I can get past any gatekeeper... except for the one in Ghostbusters.

If you really want to learn how to telemarket go to work in your spare time and learn in the trenches. You can really make good money in just a few hours at night with the right company.

PM me if you want some more information.

I agree you should get a part-time job selling Sky TV or something. When you're in, you will have no choice but to make the calls and being forced into the situation will give you practice and confidence. I had a job for a while, trying to get people to go to a presentation about a holiday company. I did quite well, but quit when I feared for my soul.

Spin Selling taught me a lot about sales.

This was also a good free audio-
Cold Calling Techniques

I used to do cold calling. I hate it but for some people it can be easy. Also depending on what your selling and who your talking to it might be easier for you.

I think the best way to learn Cold Calling is to just do it. You will build up your "mojo" and by the 7 or 8th call you will know how to lead every call. If your calling individuals it can be really difficult but if your speaking to business owners it is much easier in my experience.

Good Luck!

Identify all the features and more importantly, the benefits of what you're selling and then just have a phone conversation with your prospects as though they were your friends. Get excited and show real enthusiasm for your product as though you were telling a friend that s/he just had to have it.

Too simple, huh? That's what I did. You're going to have the phone slammed down on you about one out of five times (at least) anyway so don't sweat it at all. Just make the best of the time you do get with the people who will listen.

There are certainly books out there that will help, but biting the bullet and just doing it is best. Smile and dial. You can do it. Good luck...

Thanks, guys, I'm bookmarking all of this.

Valuable advice from the WF yet again!

Also one thing to keep in mind is everyone that is in sales need someone to lead them if they don't have the experience already, so become a leader by building relationships and adding vaule and you don't have to sale you just attract people.
" People don't care how much you know until they first know how much you care "

Experience is the best way to learn this. You'll get a variety of situations where you can learn from and get new ideas on how to work around them. You could maybe try to work part-time. Start from there and once you've learned the basics, everything will be a breeze.

The best is to have an experience from company in cold calling business. Try HomeWorkersnet.com there are big companies there that offer homejob in this category.

If you're absolutely intent on jumping into the cold call fire you should first familiarize yourself with the general rules of selling. Go to eBay and pick up a used copy of Percy H. Whiting's book 5-Great Rules Of Selling. After you have a grasp on how to talk in terms of facts and benefits and how to create desire and wind up a close start making calls.

Be yourself. Don't use platform English and don't allow your presentation to sound canned. Make your presentation fit your personality. It's important to be thoroughly sold on the merits of your product. Remember, (As Zig Ziglar Says), "selling is nothing more that a transference of feeling. If you can get your prospect to feel about your product the way you feel about your product he/she will buy your product."

Instead of cold calling perhaps you should consider running classified ads in local newspapers, magazines or trade publications that would drive prospects to a toll free 24/7automated hot line. After listening to a brief recorded hot line message telling them about the merits of your offer they would them be given an opportunity to leave their name and telephone number so you can follow up with more information and a special offer.

When you do this you're changing the game. As Dan Kennedy says, "It's better to be an invited quest than an unwanted pest." When you get them coming to you you are no longer viewed as an unwanted pest.

Toll free automated hotlines can be rented by the month from a company called PatLive.com (no affiliation) at extremely reasonable rates.

Good luck and welcome to the world of perfessional sales.

Thanks, I'll check those out.

I would LOVE to have prospects calling me, except this is a slight spin on the offline game, in one niche and local in terms of city blocks, not miles, so broad sweeps like classifieds won't do me much good, at least at the outset.

Hence the cold calling.

But you've given me something to think about. Hmm...

Cold calling on the phone is tough business. First you need to be able to handle a serious amount of rejection.

Most people take the rejection personally and end up looking for work elsewhere.

I've been selling in some form or fashion for 30 years now and I have learned a lot.

Personally I don't think telemarketing is the best way to try and sell services, esp any type of SEO, I will get your site ranked on Google stuff.

Don't know if that's what your doing or not.

Small business are getting bombarded weekly with, I am calling and I bla bla your site on first page of Google. I know because my own brick and mortar received no less then 1 per day of these calls. So anything related to my web site, Google, Ranking I just hang up.

That is the mentality of a lot of small business owners who've been called a lot.

I know this paints a grim picture for you but it is reality.

But there is hope.

Put on your best shoes and go out and meet them personally. You will get much less rejection and you will find people who will naturally match your personality and end up being clients.

That is basic and there is a whole boat load of stuff I could convey here about cold call face to face sales, putting it together for a report for the offline crowd. If I can just get myself to write the introduction! LOL

Anyways if you want to try just hoofing it, PM me. I'll show you how to "Take them for a walk" do the "No I don't have a Business Card" or "Using Similitude's"

I learned quick from IPA in Buffalo Grove, IL. I learned how NOT to cold call.

"Hello, is [insert last name here] around?"

Not the way to cold call. Once I figured things out, I was making great money until the company started to hold back my checks.

Hi Mike
I do know about cold calling. I took a start up business from zero to $140 million in 18 months just with cold calling methods. However after saying that i think you should expand your thinking a little further and consider alternatives to cold calling.

Simply because i have come to realise there are better ways to gain business than cold calling on its own. I will recommend a competitors book "Cold Calling is Dead" you can find it at amazon.com. Alternatively if you want to still find out about cold calling get my book "Blueprint For Making Millions" master strategies for business and life by Dan Cavalli at amazon.com.

You won't need to look any further it has it all. I'm not pushing my book but rather my competitor's book I hope this helps.
Dan

Hey Mike,

I'm fairly new to IM, but I'm not new to cold calling. I did it while I was in graduate school to make some money.

I was asking for small donations to a well known charitable fund ($25). Plus, every donor received free tickets to Kenny Chesney or other fairly popular recording artists. Great idea right? Wrong.

Let me ask you a question. Do you keep your credit card by the phone just in case someone calls you about purchasing a product? Of course not.

Do you go shopping without money? Of course not.

While I recognize that some people may disagree, I've been there and done that. People don't want to be called out of the blue....period. Unless you are Publishers Clearing House with a zillion dollar check, people do not want you bugging them over the phone.

Cold calling does not work. It hasn't even pretended to work in decades. Sales is about prospects. Good prospects are shopping to buy something. No one is shopping to buy something while eating their dinner. Today's consumers are not morons.

So, if you want to waste an enormous amount of time and effort while building up a huge heapin' helpin' of rejection and frustration...go ahead. If you think conversion rates in IM are tough, you ain't seen nothing.

Besides, with caller ID and many people using wireless instead of land lines, your prospect pool just shrunk. Tack on the do not call list and you are severely limited and subject to potential legal trouble from the very first call. So, please don't waste your time and effort "learning" slick sales techniques that simply don't work because quite honestly, people are not in the mood to get calls from someone trying to sell forex, clear up zits, stop sweaty armpits, etc.

Just don't break any SEC/FTC rules doing it...

Just PM you if you want a good script that I have used for 10yrs works every time

Sheesh, people still do this? Sorry. Threw out my cold calling scripts 15 years ago and added 20 years to my life as my blood pressure immediately lowered.

Yikes!

Did not see all of those arguments coming! Would appreciate it if you'd leave my name out of it, thanks.

I was just looking for some simple recommendations. Obviously I'm aware of the disturbances cold calling causes.

I just have a service I'd like to try that applies to a very small number of businesses pertaining to a geographic area and I wanted some ways to intro the conversation. I'm ok with walking in, but I thought some proven scripts would help me get past the awkward introduction. I'm not trying to drive visits to a website.

Thanks everyone for the recommendations!

Theres some pretty good stuff at a forum called "registered rep". A lot of financial service industry people there(mostly financial advisors). It is not as active anymore, and the community is fairly negative, but I have found some good script examples that have worked for others.

I actually do a fair amount of cold calling myself. If you would like, shoot me a pm and I can point you to a script I use along with a great lead source that has worked very well for me.

Amazon.com: Cold Calling Techniques: That Really...
This book, is pretty solid. I have read it and this fella gives some good advice on cold calling and getting rid of some of the obstacles many face.

Freshers have a habit to think that cold calling is about qualifying the sale. It's not. It's about getting the chance to make the sale. Preciselylu, the motive of a cold call is to set an arrangement to make the pitch. Herewith I am posting a link. I hope that would be useful to you.


books.google.com/books?id=hwFN2sOZJtMC&pg=PA43&dq=Where+to+learn+Co ld+Calling%3F&hl=en&ei=_QvZS8CJI5O-rAfujPW1Dw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4& ved=0CEwQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=Where to learn Cold Calling%3F&f=false

I'm a long time saleman / later sales trainer for nearly 20 years - and I still don't like cold calling :-)

The hard part though, is just thinking about needing to do it. Once you are making calls it isn't difficult at all. What happens is that you learn quickly what works and what gets blocked. During this time you need either a ton of motivation or a thick skin. My old sales manager used to say, 'they can't punch you on the nose over the phone'.

Confidence comes from success, success comes from trying, trying leads to some failures inevitably but you have to get past that. All it costs you really is time. And then out of the blue you get lucky; someone who wants what you sell will say 'yes' to you and that gives you a great boost. The first time that ever happened to me, I couldn't stop myself questioning it with, 'Really?'.

The plus side of telephone sales work is that you know that your message has reached your prospect and the feedback can be instantaneous. None of the other methods such as direct mail / email etc have that advantage.

I have tons of articles with advice on sales technique at Articles on Selling by Robert Seviour

I've also run hands-on workshops with live calls. Students are always amazed to find that cold calling really does work and it is not as hard as they imagine.

Robert

just outsource it. $7 per hour...why D.I.Y.?

You NEED to read Brian Tracys' Advanced Selling Strategies.

I have a whole library of sales books. This book is by far the best. I have read it cover to cover at least 5 times. I also have it on CD so I can listen to it in the car on the way to meetings.

It is just killer!

Once you have learnt that maybe go into NLP. I studied sales at John Grinder NLP institute and it blew my mind, literally. Pre-supposition, mirroring and matching, test closes... It is real Obi Wan Kanobi sh*t.

If you are selling the right way then you do not sound like a salesman, you sound like a fellow businessman with a compelling offer.

I am selling leads right now and I don't phone people up and say "HI, I want to sell you leads".

I say "Hi, I am getting several exquiries for xxx, I am looking for a company that would be happy to take the referred business, who do I need to speak to?"

Then I leave it to the prospect to make me an offer (with a few nudges if needed) and use the scarcity card to get the price to where I want it to be.

If a prospect feels like something was their idea then it gets past their filters. The trick is to get them interested and make it easy for them to make you an offer. Let them show their hand first and you have the bargaining power.

Of course it doesn't always work and some people need a more direct approach, but it is important not to come across pushy and always listen carefully to what they are saying. Rapport is usually the only thing stopping them slamming the phone down on you so its important not to break it.

Duplicate post due to lag, please delete this post

Check out YouTube - gaviningham's Channel

He has a very good and clear series of videos that should get you inspired and ready to go!

Good luck, Pete.

Spend some time creating a good DM, semi-personalize it and do some research to find proper businesses to send it to. Then write a date you will call them on in the DM, and follow up over the phone, while trying to get an appointment with them. (DM is a whole different chapter though, try making it appealing and personal so you know they will read it. Hand written envelopes etc.)

Make it sound like it's a quick meeting, and no big deal, get there, and close the sale.

With the new Do Not Call Registry cold call marketing has changed quite a bit. Make sure you brush up on the legal aspects.

Personally I would rather get a tooth pulled than do cold calls ;-)

Mike,

PM me and we can arrange a skype call to help you with this as I've been involved in this area selling $30K coaching services.


Steve

@Butterflygarden - I don't know how it is for businesses in the US, but here in Norway, companies can't reserve themselves against cold calling, while private persons can.

Also, I would think it depends on how you get the contact details. For example for spam, that is the definition. (Automatically collecting emails vs. manually sending them)

Either way, most people will just say they are on the list immediately, and then you just thank them for their time and hang up.

As for cold calling, it's possible to warm them up quite a bit first, making rejection less likely