Cold calling is considered a challenging task by the sales team. Many don’t even want to do cold calling. There can be many reasons why sales reps hate cold calling. One of the reasons is calling a prospect at least eight times to get through them, which can be a lot of work.
Though, there are a lot of other ways through which one can reach customers. SMS, emails, and social media are some of them. But still, cold calling works effectively. A study showed that actual interactions happen only through a phone call — which is about 92% of them. While you may not like cold calling, it’s still effective. And there are still techniques that work when it comes to cold calling. So, what are these techniques, and how can you use them for your benefit? Let’s take a look.
Five cold calling tips to close more deals
Cold calling will always be effective means to talk with prospects and close deals. The trick is to learn some of those techniques that can work well to ace your cold calling strategy.
Use a simple, polite tone
Nothing can beat when you use the right words and a polite tone. But if you have a harsh or cold tone, then you’re going to get any deals signed.
According to a research study by Close.io, 93% are successful when you use a polite tone.
With that much chance of getting success, no one can afford to get things wrong, especially when it comes to fixing one’s tone. Here, you will have to be confident and show the prospects that you know what you’re doing. You have to be enthusiastic, friendly and at the same time not be too pushy and neither be aggressive while cold calling prospects. To do so, you can always do a practice call or two before making an actual sales call
Use a script
If you’re making a sales call for the first time, then it can be a daunting process. It’s completely normal to get nervous and make mistakes. To overcome the nervousness, you can use a cold calling script to do the sales call. It may not completely remove your nervousness but will give you the confidence to push through and make the sales call. Eventually, you’ll be able to make a sales call without following any script.
While using the cold calling script, make sure you don’t stumble upon words, forget any line, speak quickly or talk loudly. None of those are good things. You can even do these things while following the script, thus practice hard before actually making a sales call. And always remember the first point, to use a polite, confident, and friendly tone while talking to the prospects.
Make a point to follow up with the prospects
Just because you have done the first call doesn’t mean your work is done. In fact, the actual work has started just now. Now, the time is to follow up with your prospects. And it’s not always an easy process. While doing cold calling, it’s always advised to take the lead and call your prospects. Because it’s hardly unlikely, they will call you back. And they have no reason to do so. It’s your job to call them back and make a sale. Around 80% of the sales team has mentioned that they have to follow up at least five times to get things done.
Practice hard before making a sales call
Whether it’s your first time or you have years of experience while making a sales call, there’s no denying that there will be instances where you get nervous or stumble upon words. It’s completely normal. But even if you’re unsuccessful in your previous call, don’t let it get to you, instead work hard to ace the next one. The only way to get successful is to work hard and practice many times. Here, practice is the only thing that can help you to get success. Practice in the right way, take feedback from your leader and ask them what the areas where you can improve yourself are. There will be many things to improve at first, but eventually, you will get the hang of things, and they will not affect you anymore.
Give enough time for prospects to talk
Most of the time, during a sales call, sales reps hardly give prospects a chance to talk. Of course, there’s a certain number of sales calls that you have to hit every day. But it doesn’t hurt to allow the prospects to talk. This way, you can find out more about them, their needs, wants, and problems and give you a better chance to place your services/products as a better solution. You can even use speech analytics software for sales to analyze the sales call and understand the prospects better.
Conclusion
Cold calling may not be everyone’s cup of tea. But it’s undoubtedly an essential strategy for the sales and marketing team. Using the above tips, you can improve your cold calling skills, increase your software sales and reach your sales quota.
