How to Survive Cold-Calling

This exercise is intended for individual or team sales agents as a way to practice and reinforce learnings. Incorporate this practice into your day and, if possible, into your ongoing sales work. This practice shouldn’t take you more than 10-15 minutes a day. Keep it simple. Good luck and have fun!

Introduction: Let's take some of the stress out of cold-calling by preparing a few go-to answers for the more uncomfortable customer reactions that will, inevitably, come up. You never know what personality you might meet on the other end of the line nor which mood she/he will be in: some people may be non-receptive or downright mean or angry. It’s easier to handle this when you’re better prepared.

Instructions: Prepare your parachute

Step 1: Prepare yourself mentally. Not everyone is going to like you, like you calling them, or like your product. In fact it is statistically impossible that everyone will. Take a moment to fully feel this truth.

Step 2: It’s not personal. An anxious waitress, a grumpy person at the check-out counter…everyone is living their own story and their own drama and it’s rarely your doing. The same is true for a cold-call that turns icy (or sour). You really have no idea what the other person is going through or their context that makes them react the way they do. It’s NOT personal.

Step 3: For the start of every cold call, please remember: It's like a game show where you a the singer on a stage singing for a jury. Focus on the first 15 seconds and make them as enjoyable and valuable for your customer as possible. Then focus on the next 15 seconds...and so on. Prepare 1 or 2 catchy (and maybe even funny) things to say at the start of your call. Let stand-up comedy be an inspiration to you. Give your company or product a short, catchy intro and give the person an idea of what you are about without getting into details. Get the audience on your side at the start of the show. If they don’t like it, or they are too busy to talk, that’s OK too.

Step 4: Prepare 1 or 2 response for when your prospect gets aggressive or annoyed with you. There’s no need for you to get defensive - they chose to pick up the phone and speak with you - and you too have the right to do your job and reach out to them. Instead, when you see that your prospect is upset, you could say something like: “I have the feeling that I disturbed you, maybe there’s a better time to call you later on in the week?”; or “I have the feeling you got off on the wrong foot this morning - are you OK?” Yes, you have to be professional, but first and foremost you are human and you are making a human connection.

Step 5: Prepare for when someone will hang up on you (if needed). Hopefully this won’t happen often, but it can occur. If you find it difficult to deal with a prospect hanging up the phone, come up with a plan to deal with your own disappointment/discomfort. Go back to step 2 and remember that it’s not personal. Stand up, listen to some happy music and dance for a few minutes. Have some cute pictures of baby penguins on hand to cheer you up. Figure out whatever it is that you need to feel better, apply this balm and continue with your day. Don’t let anyone make you feel bad for doing your job. Once you calmed your mind again and feel good about yourself for taking such good care - pick up the phone and call the person that just hung up on you again ;)

Goal for the week:

Tuesday-Thursday: Prepare your parachute before your cold-calls today.
At the end of the week: Did you end up needing zero, one, two or all parts of your parachute this week? Were there any particularly unpleasant calls you went through? Is there any way you can improve upon your parachute to help you even more? What did go well when you applied your parachute?