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Bring up the subject of cold calling with a group of sales people and you are assured of a lively conversation as they lament about the challenges associated with this task.
There is no question that it is difficult to connect with the right person in a company. It can be frustrating dealing with gatekeepers, receptionists, and executive assistants. Not to mention that decision makers seldom return voice mail messages. And, if you happen to connect with them, they often brush you off before you get a chance to tell them about your product or service.
However, let’s turn the tables for a moment and take a look at cold calling from a company’s perspective. Many companies hate sales people who cold call. Here are six reasons why.
1. The sales person is uninformed.
While people in sales will argue that one purpose of a cold call is to gather information about the company, employees in that organization will tell you that calls like this only demonstrate that the caller is uninformed and ill-prepared. Very few people in a company have time to answer basic questions that could be found on the company’s website.
2. The call is an unwelcome interruption.
Virtually every cold call is an interruption and because most employees are extremely busy, the calls are unwelcome interruption. Certainly, some people will say that if you don’t want to be interrupted that you should not answer your telephone. However, when the call originates from an inside extension, the natural impulse is to answer the call. This leads us to our next point.
3. The sales person uses manipulative tactics to make contact with the decision maker.
Because of the challenges associated with cold calling many sales people resort to using a variety of tactics to connect with the key decision maker. These can include asking for a different department and then asking to be transferred or misrepresenting who they are or the reason for their call. It may also include how they represent themselves. Here are two examples.
a. An executive once told me that a sales rep called and told his executive assistant that he was a close personal friend of the decision maker.
b. A sales rep called my office inquiring about one of my training programs only to pitch me on his products.
These types of approaches may work—once or twice—but ultimately they cause decision makers to become more skeptical about accepting receiving calls from people they don’t know.
4. The company has no use for the product or service that is being pitched.
Some sales people will say that the purpose of their call is to determine whether or not their product or service is applicable to the company they are calling upon.
5. The sales person refuses to take no for an answer.
Certainly persistence is an essential sales skill. However, hanging on like a pit bull and refusing to take no only serves to piss off the other person. And any chance you had of meeting or connecting with that person goes down the drain. You need to know when to let go and when to hang on.
6. The sales person is rude to the receptionist, gatekeeper or executive assistant.
Although this is the last point on the list, it is one of the most important. Too many sales people treat the gatekeeper with disdain or like a second-class citizen. These individuals fail to realize that many gatekeepers can influence who the decision maker meets with.
So, what does this mean for you as a sales professional?
It means that you have an uphill battle.
It means that cold calling is becoming increasingly more difficult.
It means that you need to avoid using the tactics mentioned above. Cold calling is not easy but you can stand out from the crowd and separate yourself from the competition by doing your due diligence before you make your calls and by acting like a true professional.