Social Sales - Taking the Chill Out of Cold Calling

True cold calling in B2B selling is probably fairly close to being a lost art. If not, it should be. I’m talking about finding a street and then knocking on every office door one-by-one without the slightest idea of what might lie behind that wooden, metal, or glass barrier. The same can be said of “smiling and dialing”.

Why is this traditional part of selling dying out? Probably because most of us who were trained this way are already dead or dying ourselves. The rest of us always hated cold calling so badly that we wished we were dead rather than to have to do it. On top of that, it certainly is not the most efficient way to find new business. It never was but, back in the day, it was about the only way other than referrals and call-ins.[Tweet “Every salesperson wants to take the chill out of cold calling!”]

However, cold calling could actually be at least somewhat effective on a number of levels …

You might just walk in and get to meet the decision maker right then and there. If not, you could generally secure their name and card which you could then use in calling them back later

You got a chance to look around for clues pertaining to potential needs for your services

There was always a chance that there could be an immediate need for your product or service

Perhaps there was even an opportunity to create the deal before they began looking around

At the beginning of my career (1977), I was expected to make 30 in-person cold calls daily. On the phone you could make a ton more calls but that was not something that I did very often. Wore my arm out cranking that phone As much as I hated cold calling, at least I could see who I was talking to and I was also able to glean whatever other information that their surroundings might present to my darting eyes. Read on at Maximize Social Business …

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Craig M. Jamieson

Managing Member at Adaptive Business Services

Craig M. Jamieson is a lifelong B2B salesperson, manager, owner, and a networking enthusiast. Adaptive Business Services provides solutions related to the sales professional. We are a Nimble CRM Solution Partner. Craig also conducts training and workshops primarily in social selling and communication skills. Craig is also the author of "The Small Business' Guide to Social CRM", now available on Amazon!