What's your secret to a winning cold calling pitch?

"Know your audience" I do agree to the need of knowing your audience. Empathy plays a major role in sales, but genuine empathy cannot be manifested without knowledge of your audience - it is "noon-nopi", one needs to understand and feel their realities. Then resonance with them becomes valuable.

Research is King when it comes to cold calling. A deep background check not only helps you tailor make your pitch. But it informs you what is important to the prospect and what is not. Deep research into the prospects buying culture will also help you project how long the sales process might take and how the turn around time will look like towards the close of the sale.

Success in cold calls often hinges on the first 30 seconds. Research shows that approximately 70% of these calls are cut short within the initial moments. Gaining permission for additional time while simultaneously offering value can be a game-changer. A script could look something like: "Hi [Name], this is [x,y,z] from [Company]. Are you familiar with what we do? No? Could I have just 30 seconds to tell you about how we can add value to [Prospect's Company], and then you can decide if it's worth continuing our conversation?" By asking for permission for more time, you're showing respect for their schedule, which increases receptivity. Providing value immediately after sets the tone for a more engaging and fruitful conversation.

Gatekeeper Games-Chapter 1: "May I Help You"? I just replaced my phone, and lost all of my contacts. I had the name and number of your __________ in my old phone. Could you please send me in that direction, or have their number/email so I can follow up on the information they requested?

Changing name, title, company, industry, pain points, goals, and interests in your pitch is NOT called personalisation. Today, most of AI powered tools do it at scale and prospects just get bored of it. They don’t even take the time to read emails as they are all structured in the same way. You need to be authentic, you need to be HYPER personalised, you need to sound different. For this, chose prospects that fit your ICP but that are very active on LinkedIn. Then, in your approach, mention things the prospect liked, shared or comment. Analyse people the prospect usually interact with and mention them in your approach. Show you made the homework about your researches. Sound unique. Be unique.

Telling isn’t selling. You should know the problems your customers face and the ones you solve. Your initial call is much like any discovery call. Your job is to figure out if the pain/initiative exists to begin with. If you hop on the phone and jump right into your value proposition than you’re DOA. Know the questions that will lead your prospects to the conclusions you want.

Do your homework. In my industry we have the capability to see who our prospective clients have leased with, and in some cases what types of equipment they are leasing. If you are calling in, not knowing what they lease, who the competition is and what benefits you provide over your competition, what are you offering? Use knowledge to your advantage, make it part of the solution and/or advise the prospect that they are not receiving the same value-added benefits that the competition does not offer. Prospects know when you are just dialing in from a list and when you know about them, their business, what their needs have and likely may be. You aren't just making a call - you are offering them value.

Stay away from marketing phrases and general buzz terms like "productivity, efficiency, ROI, etc". Get more specific. Tie the value prop you can offer to a specific emotional pain.

In the first 10 seconds, the prospect should be able to know who you are, who you're calling with, and why you're calling. Following this up with discovery questions leading to a conversation about their pain points finding out if your product/service is a good fit or not. If so provide tactical solutions on how the product/service would fix these pain points.

Your call should always lead to problems. If they don't resonate, return to the drawing board and draft better ones. Or change your target audience. Your pitch should resonate at least 25% of the time, or you're not doing this right.

Open-ended questions are essential to better understand your clients needs. One of my favorite books is "Start with Why" by Simon Sinek. Without asking questions, you have no idea if, or why your prospect could even benefit from what you are proposing to them. Do your homework, help your clients uncover roadblocks they didn't even realize they had and take a consultative approach.

1. Only ask questions that you more or less know the answer to. I don't mean that you need to know exactly. But if you know that your answer most likely will be A, B or C then you can prepare for it and then ask the questions accordingly. Let's say you are selling a product or a service that will replace something that the client already have. If you know some of the issues of the competition then it's easier to set a trap, get the client to acknowledge the problem and now you can save it. Don't ask questions like: "Do you have time?" or "How are you?" It might sound nice but there is absolutely no upside to asking a questions like that. You might end up shooting yourself in the foot. "How are you?"...."My wife just died..."...Uff

Met with a large multi-state nonprofit org with a sales rep on my team. They were firing off questions, but they were closed ended so we were not getting much context, just simple "yes" or "no" answers. I inserted an open-ended in between question and just waited for a response. We could hear the clock on the conference room wall tick, it was so silent. Then the prospect said "I don't know... but I can get the person who does in here now." We gained way more valuable insight from that person and helped the DM realize pains they didn't directly deal with.

Energy conveys through the phone. They weren't expecting your call and, sometimes, don't want to take your call. If you also sound or have a "I don't want to be cold calling" energy then that'll feed into the negative vibes on the call.

This is not necessarily sound advice. If you're ringing a non-enthusiastic market, you will annoy them. Always adapt to your audience, and you'll be much better off. PS: You should sound confident though ;)

Enjoy each call, knowing deep down that you are truly reaching out with a positive attribute to their life. Let them feel your enthusiasm, for it is contagious!!!

We used to use the old "mirror-in-front-of-you trick", so you are always looking at a smiling face!!! It works. It helps with your tone and attitude...

Don't let your call to action be to just "have a chat" sometime next week. Get specific into what you want to discuss or show them. Aligning expectations with specificity is such a time saver.

Once you let go of the "pressure to sell", you can simply ask (and keep asking) for permission to get them information. I never ask if they "Have a minute" because they don't, and it gives you the opportunity to then ask permission to follow up once they have received the information.

Follow-up is king. In your Cadence, under touches, the follow-up will continue after either acceptance to continue or even a thank you email note. Not all industries are equal, you can ask the prospect how is the best way to continue - f/u. I have been using videos and lately WhatsApp; only if both parties agree on this method.

Immediately send a calendar invitation. Try to engage them in other channels as well, like sending a connect request on LinkedIn.

Thanks for reiterating J.C! One my earliest shocking experiences in the sales arena was at age 14, as purchasing officer, when I seek quotations from suppliers, atleast 60% failed to follow-up to either seek understanding our needs/wants, offer value, build relationship, manifest genuine empathy or just to inform us they are working on our and/or if there is anything else we needed or they can do to help remedy our need etc. These are moments of truth that make a difference - genuinely caring (reciprocation principle) . Seeking understanding, coupled with empathy is critical part of the follow-up process. Many knew, we were willing, able and ready to buy, therefore, am not surprise of the deficit in follow-up culture in prospecting.

Set up or calendar your tasks and follow up calls immediately, not only so you don't forget, but you can make notes, etc. Also create your Sales Opportunity notes on the value of the potential customer in your pipeline.

be HUMAN. be KIND. be CURIOUS and always try to ELEVATE & HELP others while not expecting something in return. The rest will come. Trust me.

Be humble. Do not come across as arrogant. Confident. Yes but be humble. Show your prospect that you are there to help solve a problem.

Build rapport early! One of the best cold calling techniques I learned early in my career was to start with 20-30 seconds of basic small talk to build rapport. For example if it's Monday, ask the person you are calling how they are doing and ask one targeted question about their weekend. By the time this exchange is done 30 seconds later, the person will normally ask about the reason you are calling. This is them giving you permission to pitch them, rather than trying to force the pitch with the first thing you say on the call.

You can not win the pitch but not lose it either. There could be a 100 different reasons why they won't set a meeting up right now. When do you usually revisit these kind of things? Should I check back before the new year or is there a better time? You just want to help them, whenever they are ready.

Listen to understand. When you're on a cold call, it's important to really listen and try to get where the other person is coming from. If we're just waiting for our turn to speak, we might miss out on what they truly need or feel. By focusing on understanding first, we can build a genuine connection and offer solutions that truly resonate.