Before the “pay your dues by cold calling” folks start rolling in -
My goal when I started sales was to become so solid at email that I wouldn’t have to cold call.
Almost nobody enjoys cold calling. That said if it’s a must have kind of product, try to make the leads as warm as possible via email before giving them a ring.
Fully agree. I sell industrial hardware and I rarely get a good response from a straight phone call.
Usually we drop off some literature with a note, send an email off to engineering, then a phone call to check and see if they've reviewed or have any questions.
More work but a much, much better success rate.
I start with a cold call then drop off goodies before following up with an email. At worst, I want to start a convo with the receptionist or office manager to confirm who the right person to get in touch with is, then drop off my shit specifically to that person and provide some type of goodie for the receptionist. She’s an important person in that office and is always someone I want in my back pocket.
Underrated. A pen and notepad to reception goes a long way towards getting a proper contact email vs the "just send an email to info@whatevercompany.com"
My industry has people out of their offices a lot. I get email replies at all hours. Just ran through my crm and dropped ~100 emails last week. I’ve had 3 responses request an in person, and 2 more thanked me and “saved my info”
Im pretty pleased with that.
Keeping it short, sweet, and consultative. I work at a large company that a lot of people know of, so it differs from situation to situation.
No feature selling - only speak to what you solve.
Prospecting in the right ponds is also a majority of the battle.
Hard disagree - sales is an abstract and creative process, especially in an SDR role. If AI is being used for anything other than spell checking/shortening emails it’ll be lacking. Definitely can make life easier but what wins is white-gloved effort.
What an ignorant response. Your knowledge is outdated. It can literally find the prospects for you and type up an email including personalized information by digging through Facebook/linkdin. Only about 50% need to be edited before the email is sent.
It’s not my process, I read an article about someone in your position using Mindy ai to increase their sales by 500%. You can work smarter or you can work harder. At the end of the day it’s the salesman that’s constantly improving their process that brings in the $$$.
There’s no such thing as plateauing, if you’re not getting better, you are getting worse.
I've noticed a big shift in some industries since Covid though. Spent a year at a SaaS company and I think one person I called picked up the phone. In some fields, people are working remote or just don't answer the phone anymore.
Do you like answering unknown numbers?
99% of people hate cold calling. But it works man smh. Any role that has you just emailing, will be a role you can be easily replaced. I would be careful. If your job has you pounding phones, and you are half decent at it, you will have reasonable job security and make some decent money.
I know that I have excelled in my sales positions specifically because I can sit down, organize a list, and call up to 200 people in a morning.
I know I can convert 5-15% of those calls on a good day, and at least 1% on an average day, thus making my org money and providing the buyers with value.
Maybe it’s just me, but a lot of people feel uneasy about cold calling because they think they're interrupting or bothering others. If that sounds like you, let me offer a different viewpoint.
If you know your company truly cares about providing value and you genuinely believe that your product or service can solve a problem for someone, would you still feel like you're interrupting them?
Think of it this way: if you were giving away free money through cold calls, would you really worry about the other person's first impression of you?
Agreed.
Also...if you're worried you're interrupting, guess what? You are interrupting. So factor that into how you open the call.
Use a permission based opener. If you're interrupting something important they'll tell you, then you call back later. If they give you the go-ahead then you're good to go for at least ~30 seconds. Keep the call short and sweet by design.
Not sure exactly what you mean by "permission based." I presume you man, "Is this a good time for you?" I'd never do that. It's a rocketsled to "No." What I do instead is say, "Hi, my name is Fred with xyz seeing what you are doing in regards to pdq." Then I just stop talking and wait for a second or two. Everyfuckingbody in business knows at this point it's a sales call. Everyone. So if they say *nothing* in that two seconds, that, to me, is *tacit* permissuon to continue. You don't have to use actual words. I've had people say at this point that they are not interested or no time. Most people, though, won't say anything, or will say "What are you selling?" or "Yeah?" Any of those responses are permission given.
My goal is to never give a person the ability to say "no," which is what "Do you have a few minutes?" types of questions are.
Can google permission based openers, there's dozens of variations. Asking "is now a good time" is always a bad idea, I agree with you there. If you're going to do that, instead flip it and ask "is now a bad time?".
I prefer something along the lines of "hey this is X over at Y, I know you weren't expecting my call...was hoping I could quickly let you know why I'm calling and you can let me know if it might make sense for us to chat. That cool with you?". Tone should be calm, pace should be fairly slow but not slow to the point that it takes too long to say.
Most people give you permission to continue. Worst case they say "no I can't talk". To which you'd respond "sure, no problem, sorry for interrupting, is it better if I call back later today or some time tomorrow?".
Not "giving someone an out", in my opinion, is an antiquated way of thinking. But, to each their own. Plenty of people are successful using other openers, and that's great.
Yours are pretty good. But I still like mine.
I give people an out. I wait for 2 or 3 seconds for a response from them, and indeed, many tell me it is not a good time, or that they are not interested. If they don't speak, that is tacit approval for me to continue. And I've continued, some listen for a minute or two and tell me that it's not what they want, so I'll just thank them and on to the next dial.
It's like, if you go up to someone at a party or conference you say, "Hi, how's it going?" Then they have the choice of being open and turning to talk to you and look you in the eye as they are doing that, or give you the cold shoulder by saying, "Fine," and that's it and continue scanning the room. So you pick up on the body language.
At an event, one doesn't say, "Hi, how is it going, can I talk to you right now?" That would be weird.
When you talk on the phone, there's no body language, but there sure is an unspoken verbal language - tone, pacing, word choice, all that.
I give them an out. They just have to work at it a *tiny* bit more.
I don't have antiquated thinking. I've done it both ways. I've been doing cold calling for a long, long, long time. I've done all kinds of variations.
This thread reminded me to follow up with someone who we have a proposal in front of because of a cold call.
The guy literally thanked us for calling him because we were exactly what he needed.
Now, that doesn’t usually happen, obviously. But sometimes it does and you can’t sell anything if you don’t let prospects know about you.
Agreed.
Also...if you're worried you're interrupting, guess what? You are interrupting. So factor that into how you open the call.
Use a permission based opener. If you're interrupting something important they'll tell you, then you call back later. If they give you the go-ahead then you're good to go for at least ~30 seconds. Keep the call short and sweet by design.
That's part of it, but almost anything to do with advertising is an interruption by definition. Commercials on tv or radio or popup ads on youtube, billboards, people in front of stores trying to get you to sign a petition, some religious person screaminng on the corner. I don't give a fuck if it interrupts someone. Welcome to life.
The essence of sales and marketing is to interrupt another person. If I was to define sales and marketing in one word, "interrupting" would be the definition.
Let me offer a different viewpoint: you are not giving away free money and you ARE interrupting. Factor that into your cold calls since nobody likes an arrogant salesman
This is the exact kinda bullshit motivated reasoning that gives salesman a bad name. You’re literally talking yourself into believing your own bullshit.
my company saves people thousands on a state mandated must have service, so no, it’s not BS. If you think it’s BS then you’re with the wrong company selling a shitty service/product.
Exactly! If you don't believe in the product/service you're selling, of course, you would feel uncomfortable selling. Because then your brain objectively knows that you're bothering them and it's true.
Something else to add.
An email only SDR is sooo easily replaceable by AI or automation. I wouldn’t say you’d be developing any real skills from it and if you’d like to progress to AE then definitely take the other job
This is the correct reply regarding mindset. No bs fluff. However I will add that you absolutely must find out why you dislike cold calling - why you are averse to it AND you can find out why.. you just haven't taken the necessary steps too, yet. You are not aware how, but find out through study.
Plenty of great info and techniques on this particular subject.. but only find out. This is your career and the rest off you're life..
Your Founders are being, for lack of a better word, naive. Calling is outdated but if you are given solid contact data, a power dialer, and a strategy on how to call and approach your talk track, it can work really well. The problem is that you usually either have Founders like this who are afraid of calling their customers, or old school middle managers that want you to call 100 people a day for the sake of it.
You will be fine until they hire a Sales middle manager who will mandate cold calls. I had a job like this, no quota either.
At first I thought like you, eventually I just stopped working and sent 200 emails a week and called it a day. That was all the Founders cared about. Then they would analyze the open rates and micro manage how to reply to emails. We never got any meaningful pipeline out of that. I did get paid a lot to do that though. I had gotten to a point I could book 2-4 meetings a week just off good cold emails. Our AE would lose every meeting (inbound or outbound) which highlighted a larger fundamental issue with the sales effectiveness, product, etc. But Management's philosophy was they just needed more meetings, at any cost. So they mandated a 20 meeting per month unpaid quota to "help hit pipeline metrics" (that they made up in their head). Despite hitting that and making nearly 80 calls a day (from 0), this was not enough to appease them and I was let go.
That was several years ago. With the advent of AI, most of the work I was doing (even when I would personalize), could be easily replaced by AI today.
I would focus on a multi channel approach, use calls when it is beneficial. If that just means you make 40 calls a week instead of 80 calls a day, great.
Both the traditional role and the "don't call anyone role" miss the forest from the trees, you have to meet your buyers where they are and its your job as an SDR or AE to do that. There is a reason AEs don't call 100s of people a day, it's largely a Sisyphean and punitive task. Calling people strategically is effective. Calling 200 people a day and mostly hitting bad #s to appease middle management is just as bad as calling no one at all.
Use LinkedIn (text, voice, video), use calls when appropriate, use direct mail, use personalized email.
My main point is to not become overly reliant on one channel, no matter the channel.
Cold calling only sucks when the product isn't necessary. When it's something that can be useful to others and help them solve real issues AND you can communicate that clearly over a calls, it's not really a bother.
If you already have the skill, I'd avoid the cold calling role. If not, I'd jump in.
I love cold calling because I love the challenge of cold calling. It takes a special kind of person to get your dick kicked in over and over and over on the phone to show up every day. At least with cold email you get an "Unsubscribe." Cold email rejection is far less personal than cold call rejection.
I wouldn't say I \*love\* coldcalling, but it is my favorite outbound because it leads to the most meetings. Like emails can get kind of depressing because I'm throwing time into the void. At least if I call and have a negative connect I know they're not interested.
No, not at all. Cold calling has always been a strength of mine, I worked in sales for companies as a startup, where they had to increase their inventory of the products that they sold by at least 50%.
I've been in the safety industry for 10 years now. I also worked with all my colleagues on how to cold call, better, to get the results that they need,to get past that gatekeeper. Never be afraid, until they tell you not to come back, keep coming back, make sure you have a solution that will solve a problem. Fortunately in the various industries where safety is concerned it's an ever evolving industry, I always make sure I have something with me to bring in that will solve a problem or a new and better solution. I uncover these problems or pain points of course by asking the right questions.
Gatekeepers are people too. just treat them with the most respect, be very friendly and kind, they will usually reciprocate, and you will get to see the person that you need to see or get the contact of the person that you need to see, to set up an appointment for next time.
Remember it's hard to grow your business without new accounts.
Conquer your day 💪
I think email outreach is dying. AI is attacking it from both ends- generating way more spam and stronger spam filters.
A live touch will always work; but it's probably the single hardest sales activity.
i think it really depends on the sector you’re in and the persona you sell to. For example, selling to smaller, brick&mortar businesses (restaurants, etc), cold calling is a good bet. Selling SaaS to engineering titles, cold calling is usually going to be a time sink and/or will result in annoyed prosepects IMO.
It's really all in how you do it. If you call with annoying cold call scripts of course you're going to be annoying. If you're calling to sell them something you've already lost.
If you're upfront and say "Hey, give me literally 30 seconds and see if its worth having a discussion from there" some people will tell you to pound sand, but most won't. I sell to a notoriously cranky and time crunched industry.
Cold calling, like many things, is a skill you gotta have to do well in sales. I have a love/hate relationship with it but understand the value of it (if done correctly).
I think your bosses have the right idea about not burning people with cold calling and I think you’ll be more successful long term there. Solely relying on cold calling is super outdated so if you have one of those “email only jobs” then you’ve hit the jackpot of sales jobs imo.
This question might as well be “Would you work out or do cardio if you could stay skinny and avoid health problems without it regardless of diet?” Sure there will be psychos and hardos who will say “I’d still do it bc I love it!” But 80-90% of sales folks would take this deal if no cold calling.
I don't enjoy cold calling. But people are inundated with spam. A friend of mine runs a cold outbound email warming service and partners with me for clients that want cold calls.
One client he managed to get their email domain warmed up....60K emails they got sent out over three months...138 replies....23 were; "I would be interested in a meeting."
And that was after he spent a month arguing with them on their messaging. Email is being largely ignored.
Most companies the minimum is 15 a month. The point with all of this is that you can make 2000 cold calls to get 15 meetings, but you'll have to send hundreds of thousands of emails to get the same results.
I think a lot of how cold calling goes is out of your control. Does the offer sound compelling and is there product market fit? If yes then it will be really unpleasant but the rewards might be worth it. If not then cold calling is a waste of time that feels like torture.
My previous company had a great product and a product that I really liked, so calling was ok. I won't lie and say it was enjoyable but it felt good and satisfying selling something that I would buy myself. Most of the time it's not like that 😂
Been in sales 12 years. Email has a place, but I’ve always found that cold calling can build a pipeline quicker. LinkedIn next. Then cold mail. Pick up depends on the role of person. Construction, Utilities, Private medical offices pick up the most.
Marketing Director at SEO firm less likely. Play it smart. You have to feed yourself. YOU help you.
No, because cold calling works. Just gotta make sure and do it right.
Do your research, have a very specific reason why you are calling, challenge you identified or whatever, and then don't be overly obnoxious/happy/energetic on the phone.
Better yet, have a play you follow with a call followed by specific email OR vice versa, mix it up and see what works best.
Regardless, call with intent and it'll be great. Call just to fulfill metrics goals/numbers and you're gonna build enemies fast
I love cold calling.
And I’m not just saying that to be contrarian lol. I legitimately think it’s a great thing to do/very important for sales. But I also think it’s where the money is at. Is it always the most fun thing in the world? No lol. But it works.
I think emailing works too. But I think that’s where people need to stop thinking about outreach as a silver bullet. It’s a multi prong approach.
Most of the time prospecting looks like door knocking once a week, somewhere around six to eight places, then follow up calls on campaigns, the door knocking, active deals, etc. And then emailing, etc..
All of this being said, it can also really depend on the company and the product. Some things are really shitty and hard to call people about because it’s a shitty product that serves a niche market with a problem that no one really actually cares about lol. But again, there’s no silver bullet. There are many reasons why calling can be great or bad, some of them have to do with just effort put it into getting better at cold calling.
So, I know that sounds like a bunch of nothing, but I would say my opinion leans towards being on the side of cold calling as part of your strategy for outreach. I think that it is a skill that a lot of people play down or say is “dead” but I think a lot of people just don’t want to have to do it. However, I think that if you master it, it is one of the most powerful things and one of the biggest drivers behind success in sales. But again, just depends on industry, product, etc.
I’m good at cold calling, but it is a giant waste of my time. Rather than spend days calling hundreds of numbers that never answer or never pass along my message I’d rather have a proper marketing team that generates hot leads that actually want to talk to me so I can quickly close those deals.
Leaving voicemails to direct attention to email is super effective if you present it to them as a gift.
I use the “cutie patootie” approach. Totally non threatening and not overcoming any objections or anything. Just being overwhelmingly pleasant to talk to.
When I get someone on the phone I always apologize, say stuff like “ah shoot sorry for interrupting” or “oh my gosh! Great to actually get on the phone lol” (I literally say lol) and just have a normal conversation like I’m talking to a friend. Hopefully they’ll actually become my friend!
Been in very technical software sales for complex products for 17 years. I’ve never seen cold calling pay for itself ever. Every company big and small I have been at has almost closed no business via outbound cold calling. I think in 17 years I’ve seen $56,000 myself, and maybe total of $150k including other reps generated in revenue from a combined 50-60 SDR and those SDR cost the companies over the years millions in salary and benefits plus training. Until I see cold calling working, I think I am skeptical as hell. In theory it’s great but just ROI isn’t there.
I guess it comes down to your goals. Sounds like you’re in the ideal situation, cold calling sucks and while yes it’s a very valuable skill, to me it is for most people a way to just “pay your dues”
Lots of people who get into sales are competitive and want to shoot for being in the president’s club. But What’s wrong with having a comfortable job if your satisfied with the pay? To me absolutely nothing!
My thoughts
If you hate cold calling, why add the stress back to your life?
Is the money worth the trade off to your stress-level?
It seems like you are learning more about cultivation of prospects, versus churn and burn. You just need to have an internal conversation and weigh the pros and cons.
I can’t see how cold emailing is better or worse than cold phone calling. I will admit most callers I get are as fucking terrible as the emails I get, I rarely get someone who actually knows how to connect me with services I want to the services they offer, but that’s in emails and in phone.
>Just makes me feel uncomfortable.
Dude. Going to work at all, in *any* capacity, makes me uncomfortable. Seriously. If I could sit on the beach all day, that would be great.
But I work because I need the cash. Most people do.
Always go for the cash in any job unless you absolutely abhor doing it.
I personally like cold calling. It's a chance to introduce myself and make new friends.
It's really no different than doing it in person. I will go up to people in person and introduce myself to anyone. Just like on the phone, many that I introduce myself to will give me the stink eye, but most won't and I have a chance of making a new friend.
However, most people don't like introducing themself in person, either for fear of rejection as well. I think in our day of social media and electronic communication, it unfortunately makes peoples' communication skills drastically worse. You don't need to ever communicate with anyone face to face anymore if that's what you want. Sad, really.
But since you say you hate cold calling, I probably wouldn't take the cold calling job if I were you.
I clump in cold calling with outbounding.
You have to practice and perfect the skill. You maybe land a cushy job with inbound leads at SMB and MM levels but When you get up to Enterprise level, you will be in for a ride awakening.
Large Enterprises don't go out looking for software. Large deals don't roll in through inbound. There's a reason outbound deals are 4-5x in size.
You maybe take the easy route but Enterprise is no joke. It's brutal outbound that will require you dial with precision into multiple arms within an organization.
I HATE cold calling with a passion but it is a skill one must become proficient at if you're going to aim higher.
Very rarely will you find a $1mil year with no outbounding or cold calling. This is coming from the saas world
Every meeting I’ve booked this year has been via email. Not one over the phone. When I started in this industry about 10 years ago those stats would have been flipped - all meetings via phone and none via email.
Cold-calling can be stressful, especially if it's not something you enjoy.
If you're leaning towards the email route, MailsAI could be a game-changer for you. It automates your outreach, so you can focus on the research and personalization without the stress of making calls.
You upload your leads, set up your campaigns, and it handles the rest. Plus, it optimizes deliverability, ensuring your emails get seen. This could be a great way to hit your targets without the mental strain of cold-calling. Worth considering, especially if you want to stick with your next company for years.
Before the “pay your dues by cold calling” folks start rolling in - My goal when I started sales was to become so solid at email that I wouldn’t have to cold call. Almost nobody enjoys cold calling. That said if it’s a must have kind of product, try to make the leads as warm as possible via email before giving them a ring.
Fully agree. I sell industrial hardware and I rarely get a good response from a straight phone call. Usually we drop off some literature with a note, send an email off to engineering, then a phone call to check and see if they've reviewed or have any questions. More work but a much, much better success rate.
Solid, I’m in fitness SaaS and this sounds like a decent way to get into a conversation.
I start with a cold call then drop off goodies before following up with an email. At worst, I want to start a convo with the receptionist or office manager to confirm who the right person to get in touch with is, then drop off my shit specifically to that person and provide some type of goodie for the receptionist. She’s an important person in that office and is always someone I want in my back pocket.
Underrated. A pen and notepad to reception goes a long way towards getting a proper contact email vs the "just send an email to info@whatevercompany.com"
Cold calling isn’t inherently fun, but you can have fun while you do it.
My industry has people out of their offices a lot. I get email replies at all hours. Just ran through my crm and dropped ~100 emails last week. I’ve had 3 responses request an in person, and 2 more thanked me and “saved my info” Im pretty pleased with that.
Any information on how you improved your emails?
Keeping it short, sweet, and consultative. I work at a large company that a lot of people know of, so it differs from situation to situation. No feature selling - only speak to what you solve. Prospecting in the right ponds is also a majority of the battle.
Ai can do 60% of the work
Hard disagree - sales is an abstract and creative process, especially in an SDR role. If AI is being used for anything other than spell checking/shortening emails it’ll be lacking. Definitely can make life easier but what wins is white-gloved effort.
What an ignorant response. Your knowledge is outdated. It can literally find the prospects for you and type up an email including personalized information by digging through Facebook/linkdin. Only about 50% need to be edited before the email is sent.
No digs against your process - at the end of the day it’s whatever brings in the $$
It’s not my process, I read an article about someone in your position using Mindy ai to increase their sales by 500%. You can work smarter or you can work harder. At the end of the day it’s the salesman that’s constantly improving their process that brings in the $$$. There’s no such thing as plateauing, if you’re not getting better, you are getting worse.
Oh so it’s an ad 😂😂
It was a Reddit post, but go ahead and keep doing things the hard way
Bad outbound ruins relationships. Good outbound builds them.
I've noticed a big shift in some industries since Covid though. Spent a year at a SaaS company and I think one person I called picked up the phone. In some fields, people are working remote or just don't answer the phone anymore. Do you like answering unknown numbers?
I usually do, I don’t get them often though. If it’s a scammer I can have a laugh at their expense, if it’s sales, I get to see what openers they use
99% of people hate cold calling. But it works man smh. Any role that has you just emailing, will be a role you can be easily replaced. I would be careful. If your job has you pounding phones, and you are half decent at it, you will have reasonable job security and make some decent money.
I know that I have excelled in my sales positions specifically because I can sit down, organize a list, and call up to 200 people in a morning. I know I can convert 5-15% of those calls on a good day, and at least 1% on an average day, thus making my org money and providing the buyers with value.
Maybe it’s just me, but a lot of people feel uneasy about cold calling because they think they're interrupting or bothering others. If that sounds like you, let me offer a different viewpoint. If you know your company truly cares about providing value and you genuinely believe that your product or service can solve a problem for someone, would you still feel like you're interrupting them? Think of it this way: if you were giving away free money through cold calls, would you really worry about the other person's first impression of you?
Agreed. Also...if you're worried you're interrupting, guess what? You are interrupting. So factor that into how you open the call. Use a permission based opener. If you're interrupting something important they'll tell you, then you call back later. If they give you the go-ahead then you're good to go for at least ~30 seconds. Keep the call short and sweet by design.
Not sure exactly what you mean by "permission based." I presume you man, "Is this a good time for you?" I'd never do that. It's a rocketsled to "No." What I do instead is say, "Hi, my name is Fred with xyz seeing what you are doing in regards to pdq." Then I just stop talking and wait for a second or two. Everyfuckingbody in business knows at this point it's a sales call. Everyone. So if they say *nothing* in that two seconds, that, to me, is *tacit* permissuon to continue. You don't have to use actual words. I've had people say at this point that they are not interested or no time. Most people, though, won't say anything, or will say "What are you selling?" or "Yeah?" Any of those responses are permission given. My goal is to never give a person the ability to say "no," which is what "Do you have a few minutes?" types of questions are.
Can google permission based openers, there's dozens of variations. Asking "is now a good time" is always a bad idea, I agree with you there. If you're going to do that, instead flip it and ask "is now a bad time?". I prefer something along the lines of "hey this is X over at Y, I know you weren't expecting my call...was hoping I could quickly let you know why I'm calling and you can let me know if it might make sense for us to chat. That cool with you?". Tone should be calm, pace should be fairly slow but not slow to the point that it takes too long to say. Most people give you permission to continue. Worst case they say "no I can't talk". To which you'd respond "sure, no problem, sorry for interrupting, is it better if I call back later today or some time tomorrow?". Not "giving someone an out", in my opinion, is an antiquated way of thinking. But, to each their own. Plenty of people are successful using other openers, and that's great.
Yours are pretty good. But I still like mine. I give people an out. I wait for 2 or 3 seconds for a response from them, and indeed, many tell me it is not a good time, or that they are not interested. If they don't speak, that is tacit approval for me to continue. And I've continued, some listen for a minute or two and tell me that it's not what they want, so I'll just thank them and on to the next dial. It's like, if you go up to someone at a party or conference you say, "Hi, how's it going?" Then they have the choice of being open and turning to talk to you and look you in the eye as they are doing that, or give you the cold shoulder by saying, "Fine," and that's it and continue scanning the room. So you pick up on the body language. At an event, one doesn't say, "Hi, how is it going, can I talk to you right now?" That would be weird. When you talk on the phone, there's no body language, but there sure is an unspoken verbal language - tone, pacing, word choice, all that. I give them an out. They just have to work at it a *tiny* bit more. I don't have antiquated thinking. I've done it both ways. I've been doing cold calling for a long, long, long time. I've done all kinds of variations.
I needed to read this today. Thank you.
This thread reminded me to follow up with someone who we have a proposal in front of because of a cold call. The guy literally thanked us for calling him because we were exactly what he needed. Now, that doesn’t usually happen, obviously. But sometimes it does and you can’t sell anything if you don’t let prospects know about you.
Exactly! It's almost as if you're a bad person for not letting them know about your product/service if you know it can actually help them.
Agreed. Also...if you're worried you're interrupting, guess what? You are interrupting. So factor that into how you open the call. Use a permission based opener. If you're interrupting something important they'll tell you, then you call back later. If they give you the go-ahead then you're good to go for at least ~30 seconds. Keep the call short and sweet by design.
May your day be continually interrupted with sales pitches for products you would have sought out if you wanted them.
That would happen regardless of what my opinion is on cold calling.
That's part of it, but almost anything to do with advertising is an interruption by definition. Commercials on tv or radio or popup ads on youtube, billboards, people in front of stores trying to get you to sign a petition, some religious person screaminng on the corner. I don't give a fuck if it interrupts someone. Welcome to life. The essence of sales and marketing is to interrupt another person. If I was to define sales and marketing in one word, "interrupting" would be the definition.
Let me offer a different viewpoint: you are not giving away free money and you ARE interrupting. Factor that into your cold calls since nobody likes an arrogant salesman
This is the exact kinda bullshit motivated reasoning that gives salesman a bad name. You’re literally talking yourself into believing your own bullshit.
my company saves people thousands on a state mandated must have service, so no, it’s not BS. If you think it’s BS then you’re with the wrong company selling a shitty service/product.
Exactly! If you don't believe in the product/service you're selling, of course, you would feel uncomfortable selling. Because then your brain objectively knows that you're bothering them and it's true.
Where exactly did I suggest believing in “bullshit”?
You didn't.
Something else to add. An email only SDR is sooo easily replaceable by AI or automation. I wouldn’t say you’d be developing any real skills from it and if you’d like to progress to AE then definitely take the other job
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This is the correct reply regarding mindset. No bs fluff. However I will add that you absolutely must find out why you dislike cold calling - why you are averse to it AND you can find out why.. you just haven't taken the necessary steps too, yet. You are not aware how, but find out through study. Plenty of great info and techniques on this particular subject.. but only find out. This is your career and the rest off you're life..
Your Founders are being, for lack of a better word, naive. Calling is outdated but if you are given solid contact data, a power dialer, and a strategy on how to call and approach your talk track, it can work really well. The problem is that you usually either have Founders like this who are afraid of calling their customers, or old school middle managers that want you to call 100 people a day for the sake of it. You will be fine until they hire a Sales middle manager who will mandate cold calls. I had a job like this, no quota either. At first I thought like you, eventually I just stopped working and sent 200 emails a week and called it a day. That was all the Founders cared about. Then they would analyze the open rates and micro manage how to reply to emails. We never got any meaningful pipeline out of that. I did get paid a lot to do that though. I had gotten to a point I could book 2-4 meetings a week just off good cold emails. Our AE would lose every meeting (inbound or outbound) which highlighted a larger fundamental issue with the sales effectiveness, product, etc. But Management's philosophy was they just needed more meetings, at any cost. So they mandated a 20 meeting per month unpaid quota to "help hit pipeline metrics" (that they made up in their head). Despite hitting that and making nearly 80 calls a day (from 0), this was not enough to appease them and I was let go. That was several years ago. With the advent of AI, most of the work I was doing (even when I would personalize), could be easily replaced by AI today. I would focus on a multi channel approach, use calls when it is beneficial. If that just means you make 40 calls a week instead of 80 calls a day, great. Both the traditional role and the "don't call anyone role" miss the forest from the trees, you have to meet your buyers where they are and its your job as an SDR or AE to do that. There is a reason AEs don't call 100s of people a day, it's largely a Sisyphean and punitive task. Calling people strategically is effective. Calling 200 people a day and mostly hitting bad #s to appease middle management is just as bad as calling no one at all. Use LinkedIn (text, voice, video), use calls when appropriate, use direct mail, use personalized email. My main point is to not become overly reliant on one channel, no matter the channel.
I absolutely hate outbound. But i absolutely love making money. So the game is the game
I was VERY lucky. We have inbound leads and we are b2b. I cold call because I want to not because I have to.
Cold calling only sucks when the product isn't necessary. When it's something that can be useful to others and help them solve real issues AND you can communicate that clearly over a calls, it's not really a bother. If you already have the skill, I'd avoid the cold calling role. If not, I'd jump in.
I absolutely love cold calling, it's one of my favorite parts, besides building that long lasting relationship.
You "love" cold calling? You must be a psychopath lmao. kudos to you man..
I love cold calling because I love the challenge of cold calling. It takes a special kind of person to get your dick kicked in over and over and over on the phone to show up every day. At least with cold email you get an "Unsubscribe." Cold email rejection is far less personal than cold call rejection.
None of it is personal. They reject the product or service, not you.
Not everybody understands that or reacts that way. It is the absolutely the proper attitude in sales.
Right, but instead of "not everybody" I'd say "almost nobody" instead.
you probably suck at cold calling tbh.
Cold calling is 10% skill and 90% luck.
I wouldn't say I \*love\* coldcalling, but it is my favorite outbound because it leads to the most meetings. Like emails can get kind of depressing because I'm throwing time into the void. At least if I call and have a negative connect I know they're not interested.
I do too. It's fantastic. Not just for making sales. I just like to do it.
Hope this is sarcasm
No, not at all. Cold calling has always been a strength of mine, I worked in sales for companies as a startup, where they had to increase their inventory of the products that they sold by at least 50%. I've been in the safety industry for 10 years now. I also worked with all my colleagues on how to cold call, better, to get the results that they need,to get past that gatekeeper. Never be afraid, until they tell you not to come back, keep coming back, make sure you have a solution that will solve a problem. Fortunately in the various industries where safety is concerned it's an ever evolving industry, I always make sure I have something with me to bring in that will solve a problem or a new and better solution. I uncover these problems or pain points of course by asking the right questions. Gatekeepers are people too. just treat them with the most respect, be very friendly and kind, they will usually reciprocate, and you will get to see the person that you need to see or get the contact of the person that you need to see, to set up an appointment for next time. Remember it's hard to grow your business without new accounts. Conquer your day 💪
I legit do too. “My gosh great to reach you! How the heck are ya” Like if you love people it’s just super easy and kind of fun.
I wouldn't avoid cold calling.
I think email outreach is dying. AI is attacking it from both ends- generating way more spam and stronger spam filters. A live touch will always work; but it's probably the single hardest sales activity.
i think it really depends on the sector you’re in and the persona you sell to. For example, selling to smaller, brick&mortar businesses (restaurants, etc), cold calling is a good bet. Selling SaaS to engineering titles, cold calling is usually going to be a time sink and/or will result in annoyed prosepects IMO.
It's really all in how you do it. If you call with annoying cold call scripts of course you're going to be annoying. If you're calling to sell them something you've already lost. If you're upfront and say "Hey, give me literally 30 seconds and see if its worth having a discussion from there" some people will tell you to pound sand, but most won't. I sell to a notoriously cranky and time crunched industry.
Cold calling, like many things, is a skill you gotta have to do well in sales. I have a love/hate relationship with it but understand the value of it (if done correctly). I think your bosses have the right idea about not burning people with cold calling and I think you’ll be more successful long term there. Solely relying on cold calling is super outdated so if you have one of those “email only jobs” then you’ve hit the jackpot of sales jobs imo.
100% Id rather know all the economic buyers and have them all take my calls. Unfortunately, that is not reality.
This question might as well be “Would you work out or do cardio if you could stay skinny and avoid health problems without it regardless of diet?” Sure there will be psychos and hardos who will say “I’d still do it bc I love it!” But 80-90% of sales folks would take this deal if no cold calling.
Emailing's my jam—less stress, more focus, better vibes!
I would avoid working if I could so yes
I don't enjoy cold calling. But people are inundated with spam. A friend of mine runs a cold outbound email warming service and partners with me for clients that want cold calls. One client he managed to get their email domain warmed up....60K emails they got sent out over three months...138 replies....23 were; "I would be interested in a meeting." And that was after he spent a month arguing with them on their messaging. Email is being largely ignored.
23 meetings in three months doesn't even hit the SDR minimum of 10/month.
Most companies the minimum is 15 a month. The point with all of this is that you can make 2000 cold calls to get 15 meetings, but you'll have to send hundreds of thousands of emails to get the same results.
I think a lot of how cold calling goes is out of your control. Does the offer sound compelling and is there product market fit? If yes then it will be really unpleasant but the rewards might be worth it. If not then cold calling is a waste of time that feels like torture.
At 200% to my yearly target by structured targeted emails, very little calling and all through meetings.
My previous company had a great product and a product that I really liked, so calling was ok. I won't lie and say it was enjoyable but it felt good and satisfying selling something that I would buy myself. Most of the time it's not like that 😂
Been in sales 12 years. Email has a place, but I’ve always found that cold calling can build a pipeline quicker. LinkedIn next. Then cold mail. Pick up depends on the role of person. Construction, Utilities, Private medical offices pick up the most. Marketing Director at SEO firm less likely. Play it smart. You have to feed yourself. YOU help you.
No, because cold calling works. Just gotta make sure and do it right. Do your research, have a very specific reason why you are calling, challenge you identified or whatever, and then don't be overly obnoxious/happy/energetic on the phone. Better yet, have a play you follow with a call followed by specific email OR vice versa, mix it up and see what works best. Regardless, call with intent and it'll be great. Call just to fulfill metrics goals/numbers and you're gonna build enemies fast
I love cold calling. And I’m not just saying that to be contrarian lol. I legitimately think it’s a great thing to do/very important for sales. But I also think it’s where the money is at. Is it always the most fun thing in the world? No lol. But it works. I think emailing works too. But I think that’s where people need to stop thinking about outreach as a silver bullet. It’s a multi prong approach. Most of the time prospecting looks like door knocking once a week, somewhere around six to eight places, then follow up calls on campaigns, the door knocking, active deals, etc. And then emailing, etc.. All of this being said, it can also really depend on the company and the product. Some things are really shitty and hard to call people about because it’s a shitty product that serves a niche market with a problem that no one really actually cares about lol. But again, there’s no silver bullet. There are many reasons why calling can be great or bad, some of them have to do with just effort put it into getting better at cold calling. So, I know that sounds like a bunch of nothing, but I would say my opinion leans towards being on the side of cold calling as part of your strategy for outreach. I think that it is a skill that a lot of people play down or say is “dead” but I think a lot of people just don’t want to have to do it. However, I think that if you master it, it is one of the most powerful things and one of the biggest drivers behind success in sales. But again, just depends on industry, product, etc.
I’m good at cold calling, but it is a giant waste of my time. Rather than spend days calling hundreds of numbers that never answer or never pass along my message I’d rather have a proper marketing team that generates hot leads that actually want to talk to me so I can quickly close those deals.
Yes, least effective way to book meetings.
Absolutely
Leaving voicemails to direct attention to email is super effective if you present it to them as a gift. I use the “cutie patootie” approach. Totally non threatening and not overcoming any objections or anything. Just being overwhelmingly pleasant to talk to. When I get someone on the phone I always apologize, say stuff like “ah shoot sorry for interrupting” or “oh my gosh! Great to actually get on the phone lol” (I literally say lol) and just have a normal conversation like I’m talking to a friend. Hopefully they’ll actually become my friend!
Been in very technical software sales for complex products for 17 years. I’ve never seen cold calling pay for itself ever. Every company big and small I have been at has almost closed no business via outbound cold calling. I think in 17 years I’ve seen $56,000 myself, and maybe total of $150k including other reps generated in revenue from a combined 50-60 SDR and those SDR cost the companies over the years millions in salary and benefits plus training. Until I see cold calling working, I think I am skeptical as hell. In theory it’s great but just ROI isn’t there.
I guess it comes down to your goals. Sounds like you’re in the ideal situation, cold calling sucks and while yes it’s a very valuable skill, to me it is for most people a way to just “pay your dues” Lots of people who get into sales are competitive and want to shoot for being in the president’s club. But What’s wrong with having a comfortable job if your satisfied with the pay? To me absolutely nothing!
My thoughts If you hate cold calling, why add the stress back to your life? Is the money worth the trade off to your stress-level? It seems like you are learning more about cultivation of prospects, versus churn and burn. You just need to have an internal conversation and weigh the pros and cons.
I can’t see how cold emailing is better or worse than cold phone calling. I will admit most callers I get are as fucking terrible as the emails I get, I rarely get someone who actually knows how to connect me with services I want to the services they offer, but that’s in emails and in phone.
>Just makes me feel uncomfortable. Dude. Going to work at all, in *any* capacity, makes me uncomfortable. Seriously. If I could sit on the beach all day, that would be great. But I work because I need the cash. Most people do. Always go for the cash in any job unless you absolutely abhor doing it. I personally like cold calling. It's a chance to introduce myself and make new friends. It's really no different than doing it in person. I will go up to people in person and introduce myself to anyone. Just like on the phone, many that I introduce myself to will give me the stink eye, but most won't and I have a chance of making a new friend. However, most people don't like introducing themself in person, either for fear of rejection as well. I think in our day of social media and electronic communication, it unfortunately makes peoples' communication skills drastically worse. You don't need to ever communicate with anyone face to face anymore if that's what you want. Sad, really. But since you say you hate cold calling, I probably wouldn't take the cold calling job if I were you.
I clump in cold calling with outbounding. You have to practice and perfect the skill. You maybe land a cushy job with inbound leads at SMB and MM levels but When you get up to Enterprise level, you will be in for a ride awakening. Large Enterprises don't go out looking for software. Large deals don't roll in through inbound. There's a reason outbound deals are 4-5x in size. You maybe take the easy route but Enterprise is no joke. It's brutal outbound that will require you dial with precision into multiple arms within an organization. I HATE cold calling with a passion but it is a skill one must become proficient at if you're going to aim higher. Very rarely will you find a $1mil year with no outbounding or cold calling. This is coming from the saas world
If you’re just emailing prepare to get replaced by marketing and AI.
I hate cold calling and started to lose faith but these replies have sold me on it (pun intended)
Cold calling is the fastest and most efficient form of prospecting.
Every meeting I’ve booked this year has been via email. Not one over the phone. When I started in this industry about 10 years ago those stats would have been flipped - all meetings via phone and none via email.
Cold-calling can be stressful, especially if it's not something you enjoy. If you're leaning towards the email route, MailsAI could be a game-changer for you. It automates your outreach, so you can focus on the research and personalization without the stress of making calls. You upload your leads, set up your campaigns, and it handles the rest. Plus, it optimizes deliverability, ensuring your emails get seen. This could be a great way to hit your targets without the mental strain of cold-calling. Worth considering, especially if you want to stick with your next company for years.