I found a new blog called SalesPractice today because there’s a big debate going on there about the effectiveness of Cold Calling. The author’s argument is essentially
If you have nothing else to do, why not get on the phone? What are you scared of?
The author is trying to counter the argument of the sales reps who’d rather do anything but cold call. He argues that if there’s not enough warm leads for them, instead of waiting for the phone to ring, they should pick it up and start dialing!
He then relates the story of a sales rep who cold-called Toyota and got a million dollar sale from it. I can relate my own cold calling success story when I cold-called a man who’s name I read in a magazine. He agreed to meet and within 5 months of V1 product release, I had my own million dollar deal from a F500 account. So does cold calling work? Of course it can. But I made hundreds (no, it was thousands) of cold calls to land that deal.
With success in hand, I was able to leverage that “halo account” sale into new customers, new referrals and new partnerships. Did I stop cold calling? Not right away but as my other sources of leads became stronger and stronger, I was then able to reduce my reliance on cold calling.
I agree with the author’s argument that you have to start somewhere. And you can’t use the excuse of “…cold calling does not work…” if you are not leveraging other lead sources correctly.
But does this mean cold calling works like the author claims? Sure, like walking from Boston to San Francisco is a fast method of getting there!
All About Referral Selling 