It can be difficult to figure out how to make a cold call. This can be tough because every call, prospect, and situation is unique. In addition, a cold call can often be a hostile environment with a prospect who is not thrilled to talk with you, and a cold call can move quickly in a very short window of time.

But with all of that being said, we have developed a process for how to make a cold call that simplifies all of the complexity and is designed to produce better results. You can either use this process if you are making calls, or this process can greatly improve how you train new sales hires to cold call if you are a sales manager.

 

Prepare Your Sales Pitch First

We will provide a process that will show you how to make a cold call. But before you make your call, you will need to stop and work on your sales pitch. Here are key things to work on:

  • Elevator Pitch: Create a one to two-sentence blurb that explains how you can help the prospect that you are calling.
  • Pain Examples: Compose a list of the common pain points that you help to resolve, minimize, or avoid.
  • Probing Sales Questions: Compose good probing questions that you can ask the prospect to identify if they need the help that you can offer.
  • Objection Responses: Think about the objections that you can anticipate facing and then compose some responses that stand a good chance of getting around those.

 

Executing the Call

When you get a prospect to answer the phone, here are some steps to take for whom to make a cold call.

  • Confirm Availability: We believe that it is important and helpful to start out a cold call by confirming that the prospect is available for your call by asking something like this:

Hi Mary, this is Michael Halper with SalesScripter. Have I caught you in the middle of anything?

  • Deliver Elevator Pitch: Once you confirm that the prospect is available, this is a good time to deliver your elevator pitch. Here is an example:

Great. The purpose for my call is that we help sales managers to get their sales resources delivering the best possible sales pitch.

  • Perform Soft Takeaway: We believe that a great way to disarm the prospect is by doing a soft takeaway right after the elevator pitch by saying something like this:

But I am not sure if we are a good fit for you all.

  • Ask a Couple of Questions: We feel that asking questions on a cold call will make the call more interactive and help you to gather valuable information.
  • Close: When you get a good answer to one of your questions, one that shows a hint of pain or concern, this is a good time to close for moving the prospect to the next step in your sales process, which should be an appointment, conversation, or meeting.

We how this helps you with figuring out how to make a cold call.