In this video, we discuss the best way to open cold calls. This is critical because what you do and say in the first 30 seconds of a cold call will determine your success.
Don’t Trigger Guardedness
The first thing you need to do to improve the first 30 seconds of a cold call and opening cold calls is to avoid triggering more guardedness. I say more guardedness because it is safe to assume the prospect’s guard will already be at a medium level when they answer your call.
Prospects get sold to a lot so when they answer a call from someone they don’t know, they will be guarded and trying to figure out if you are the next salesperson who is calling them trying to sell something. With all of that, the first goal when opening a cold call is to minimize how much you sound like a salesperson.
Don’t Talk About Your Product
One key to a good cold call open is to minimize looking like a salesperson by decreasing how much you talk about your product or service. It is very simple – most salespeople open by saying something like this:
I am with Websites Designed For You. We provide Web Design Services. Are you interested in redesigning your website?
I would refer to this as a product cold call opener, basically the salesperson sharing the company they work for and the product they sell. This might sound like a logical thing to say at the beginning of a cold call, but the problem is that it flags you as a salesperson who is trying to sell something and will instantly increase the prospect’s guardedness.
Share Your Value Proposition
You may hear the previous tip and think it makes sense, but question what you are going to say if you don’t talk about your product or service. The answer to that is to replace your product introduction with your value proposition. Staying with the same example, could shift to:
We help small businesses to get more traffic to their website and convert more of that traffic to leads.
Not only does this trigger fewer alarms about you being an annoying salesperson trying to sell something, but it also shifts your focus to what is more important: answering the prospect’s question of, “What is in it for me?”
Add a Soft Sales Takeaway
A nice little trick to use after you share your value prop is to use a soft sales takeaway. This is to express a little doubt after the value proposition by saying something like:
But I am not sure if you are needing that right or now.
Not only does that create a little curiosity on the prospect’s side, but it can actually decrease their guardedness because that is the last thing a salesperson who is just trying to sell something would say.
Don’t Ask the Prospect How They Are Doing
99% of salespeople all do the same thing at the beginning of a cold calls and that is to ask the prospect, “How are you doing today?”. And while this seems like a logical or nice thing to say when you first get on the phone with a prospect, the problem is that if you are talking with something who you do not know and have never spoken to, it is an empty gesture that makes you sound like a salesperson who is about to try to sell something and trigger guardedness.
You may hear that and think, you are just trying to be nice and what are you going to say instead. For the best way to open cold calls, replace asking the prospect how they are doing with this question:
Have I caught you in the middle of anything?
This question is actually more polite because instead of an empty how are you doing question, you are showing respect and concern for the prospect’s time. And when the prospect confirms they are not in the middle of anything, you have just bought yourself a window of 2 to 5 minutes to work with for your cold call. Asking this question can also decrease guardedness by communicating in a more familiar and less formal way.
