Cold Calling Best Practices
Tim Edwards
At EBQ, we use this framework to guide our sales development efforts. Simply put, you call a company and have 30 seconds to fight for 3 minutes with a decision maker, to ultimately set an appointment with sales for 30 minutes. We’ve put together a list of our ten proven best practices, which we call EBClosing, to help your team become more effective SDRs.
10 Best Practices for Cold Calling
1. Be Comfortable
Making your initial cold calls can be very stressful. It’s easy, and natural, to be nervous when cold calling. Even experienced SDRs can have some stage fright before making that dial. The longer you put it off, the more anxious you can become. Don’t wait, start calling.
When cold calling, you need to cut distractions to get in the zone, maintain a clear head and focus on the call.
Understanding how your company’s closing process works and visualizing how you’re going to set the appointment beforehand will help you navigate a call with a stranger.
Part of being comfortable is understanding your persona and how to speak in their language. Always work towards learning more about your specific industry and the value of your offering.
2. Make a Call, Not a Dial
Getting something out of every call is important. It’s easy to say “I made 100 dials today,” but what did you actually accomplish? You need to have back and forth communication with prospects, not just dial in and read a script. Extract value from every call, because you always want to be moving forward.
A dial is only a touch. A call is in pursuit of a goal.
When applying a touch to a contact, we’re essentially leaving a fingerprint. Even leaving an email, a voicemail, or having a conversation with an administrative assistant will increase your chances of setting an appointment.
A word of warning though, don’t become complacent with just leaving fingerprints. You need to make sure that you actually speak with them in the future.
3. Always Be Closing
With every dial, always be in pursuit of your goal and actively work towards it. If the prospect wants you to send some information, try to get them to agree to an appointment.
With every stage in the sales pipeline, you want to be moving your leads further downstream. But remember, sales development isn’t sales. You’re not trying to sell them the offering. You’re trying to nurture them and move them to the next step so your salespeople can do what they do best, close the deal.
This mindset ties in with professional persistence. One rule of thumb we abide by at EBQ is the 3-No’s Rule. Don’t stop investigating until you hear three professional “no’s.” After hearing three “No’s” you can be confident in relegating that contact and move onto your next lead.