Cold calling is an outreach method where you need to establish contact with a prospect who has had no prior interaction with you or your business. Most sales representatives feel uncomfortable with cold calling due to fear of rejection, uncertainty, or becoming annoying to a prospect. Around 63% of sales representatives describe cold calling as the worst part of their job. So if you have this type of anxiety, then you should know that it is natural.
In this guide, we will share 9 effective techniques that can help you become more confident and less stressed during cold calling.
Key Takeaways
- Feeling discomfort or anxiety is normal in cold calling. The stat shows that about 63% of sales representatives consider cold calling the worst part of their job.
- Staying mentally prepared can reduce discomfort. Setting a specific goal and starting with a research-based opener can help you overcome the fear of cold calling.
- Don’t focus on sales but on offering value to your prospect. It will help you avoid making your outreach like a sales call and keep your contact less defensive to your offer.
- Maintaining a good talk-to-listen ratio, like 55:45, can help you make your calls more effective. Since the most successful representative spends more time listening to their prospects.
- Take rejection as feedback but not as disappointment. Receiving “no” or a hang-up is common in cold calling. You shouldn’t give up but adjust your strategy, script, or opener based on what went wrong after an unsuccessful call.
Why Does Cold Calling Feel So Uncomfortable?
Sales representatives often can’t overcome the fear of cold calling due to negative thoughts such as fear of rejection, uncertainty, and becoming intrusive to a prospect.
- Fear of rejection: Calling agents often fear that the prospect may get annoyed or cut them off since they have no experience with their business.
- Uncertainty during a call: Sales representatives can often get overwhelmed thinking of the uncertain scenarios or questions they may need to handle.
- Becoming intrusive to a prospect: Nobody likes to get treated as an annoying person, but cold calling requires a sales professional to establish contact with unknown individuals. Some sales representatives have anxiety, considering that they might be exposed to the outrageous behavior of a prospect.
Your Pre-call Comfort Checklist
Mental preparation for sales professionals shouldn’t be just about preparing a script and conducting prospect research. You need to track down all the things that give your brain the signal that you are ready to handle a call, regardless of how your prospect responds.
Here is a checklist that you can follow for that:
- Set a goal for the session, which must be practical, like the number of calls to make and meetings to schedule.
- Research one relevant detail about each prospect, such as their social media post or recent activities.
- Write your opener and first question so that you can grab the attention of your audience within the first few seconds.
- List your 3 most common objections with a calm reply for each. Some of the most common sales objections are “Not interested”, “Send me an email” and “Not now,” or “Now is not a good time.”
- Note each prospect’s likely pain point based on your prospect research and their common industry challenges.
- Pick the best time window to call your prospect to avoid contacting them at a time when it is most difficult to connect with them.
- Take a breath, count down 5-4-3-2-1, then dial, as it will help you stay relaxed during the cold call.
9 Ways to Get More Comfortable With Cold Calling
Let’s explore some effective practices to help you overcome cold calling anxiety and make you more successful in building a meaningful conversation with your prospect.
1. Get Mentally Prepared Before You Dial
Cold calling can be tough for a sales representative since the success rate in cold calling is 2.7%. Out of 100 calls that connect, roughly 3 conversations can lead to an appointment. setting. So a sales representative needs to be mentally prepared to handle frequent rejection before they start cold calling their prospects.
Here are some tips you can follow:
- Set realistic goals for how many calls you will make, how many appointments you expect to book, and when you should stop calling.
- Read your openers and scripts aloud to ensure you can speak fluently with the prospect during a live call.
- Practice conversations, maintaining a calm tone, and considering the scenarios and example sales objections you can handle.
- Study well about the products or services that you are willing to sell to the prospects.
- Review insights gathered from studying the previous conversation and adjust your strategy.
- Practice standing up, walking, and staying relaxed so you can create positive energy during the calls.
2. Research Your Prospect
You can often run out of words or receive frequent hang-ups due to poor effort in prospect research. When you fail to address the interests of your potential customers, your conversation will sound more generic.
This is why you should manage a good amount of information about your prospect. This can be done by visiting the prospect’s company website or LinkedIn profile or carefully observing their recent activities. Then, use that information to ask questions to build rapport with your prospect based on those questions.
3. Prepare Your Questions
Asking questions during cold calls helps you build engagement with your prospect. Sales professionals ask different types of questions for this purpose. They can ask the decision-makers about their experience with the current provider and their expectations as a buyer. It is essential that you prepare some basic questions to ask prospects based on your research. It will help you avoid taking a long pause, thinking about what questions to ask during a live call.
4. Get Ready for Objections Before the Call
Handling sales objections in a cold call can be difficult if you are not prepared for it. Since you need to respond to the prospect’s concern directly in a cold call. So you need to be well-aware of the common sales objections you can receive from a prospect. Most common sales objections can be linked to timing, price, compliance, or contract duration.
While taking preparation for a cold call, study the common sales based on your prospect’s industry and how to overcome them. The successful sales representative spends a lot of time practicing how to handle sales objections.
5. Find the Prospect’s Pain Point
A prospect is more likely to convert as a buyer if you can prove that your product or service can solve their specific problems. One of the common techniques sales professionals use to identify these problems or pain points is to ask about their experience with their current provider. Let’s say you are reaching out to a logistics services provider, you can ask:
“Where do you think your current logistics provider could improve?”
6. Make Peace With “No”
Rejection is common in cold calling, and a prospect can reject you for several reasons. Sometimes, they can simply say “no” because they are not interested, they don’t have the budget, or just because they are satisfied with their existing service provider. When you receive a “no” from a prospect, you can ask for a reason and ask for permission to address their concerns.
But if they hang up on your call or reject you anyway, respect their decision. Don’t get disappointed because in cold calling, it is normal. Just take the “no” as feedback and use it to adjust your script or approach. It is normal to get disappointed after a rejection, but try to find motivation after the rejection to get better results with other prospects.
7. Do Not Try to Sell on the First Call
The goal of a cold call is not to make a sale on the first call but to build a conversation that leads to scheduling a meeting. When you set your objective to make a call on the first sale, your conversation will sound like a sales pitch. The prospect can notice that urgency in your tone, and they may give you a brush-off.
Instead, try to establish rapport with your prospect by introducing yourself nicely and asking them some questions to identify their pain points and unique needs. Then try to schedule a meeting with them so you can have a conversation about how your products or services can solve their problems. It will help you reduce your tension as you are not pressuring someone for a sale but just asking them if they want to know about the solution you can offer.
8. Talk Less, Listen More
A cold call should be a two-way form of communication, and your goal in it should be to establish a connection with the prospects and build trust. One effective way you can do this is by making them feel the conversation is going to be about them. Humans have emotions, so when they feel heard and understood, they get more interested in continuing a conversation with a person.
This is why you should maintain a good ratio between talking and listening. So your prospects can share more than just listening to your speech. The gold ratio for talking to listening in sales is 55:45. It means you will spend 55% of the time talking to a prospect and the rest of the time listening.
When you notice that they are engaged and sharing information about their problems. Then, it will be easier for you to ask them whether they want to schedule a meeting with you and discuss everything in detail.
9. Use Warm and Polite Language
A warm and polite language helps you set a friendly tone in a conversation. This is why you should use words or phrases like “thank you”, “please,” or “sorry”. The prospects will feel respected when you use these polite phrases.
When addressing your prospect, you can use their “name”, “you,” and “your” so that your speech doesn’t look like a sales talk but a personal conversation. It will also give a good impression of yourself as they notice you are being respectful to them and not just delivering a scripted sales pitch.
A Sample Cold Call Script That Builds Comfort
Sales representatives often feel anxiety during a cold call because they don’t have enough practice and they don’t know what to say to their prospect. A structured conversation or template can help you if you are having this kind of problem.
Here is a sample cold call script that you can follow:
Open with a pattern interrupt, not “How are you?”
“Hello, this is {{Your Name }} from the {{Your Company}}. How have you been?”
Reason: “Pattern interrupt opening lines” refers to those introductions that are different from the usual ones. An analysis showed that a cold call starting with the question “How have you been?” has a 6.6 times higher success rate.
Lower the pressure and earn permission
Prospect: “I am doing well. What do you want?”
“Thank you for taking my call. I know you are busy. So I would like to request two minutes of your time so that I can explain how you might help me.”
Asking for help invites curiosity instead of resistance.
Explain the agenda briefly and specifically
Prospect: “Ok, tell me how I can help.”
“The reason for my call is that I noticed your brand is active on social media, which is great. But you haven’t posted any video content yet. 84% of consumers prefer more video content from their favorite brands. We support businesses like yours with video content production. Would you be open to a quick conversation about increasing audience engagement for your brand with video content?
Keep the window open, even on a soft no
Prospect: “I am not sure. I would need to check with my team, but I’ll let you know.”
“Would you mind if I follow up again on Friday this week?”
Prospect: “Ok, sure, you can reach out to me on Friday.”
Even though the call ends with a soft no. But it ends on a positive note. It leaves you with an opportunity to schedule a meeting next time.
Common Mistakes That Keep You Uncomfortable
There are some common mistakes that can make your prospect disengaged and make a conversation stressful for you:
Not researching the prospect: Sales professionals can often run out of things to say when they don’t know much about a prospect. This happens when you don’t conduct prospect research properly.
Calling unprepared: Picking up a phone and dialing without any preparation can make you feel tense after saying a few words. No matter how confident you are, building rapport with an unknown individual without preparation is always difficult.
Giving a scripted speech: A script is meant to help you with the opening and structure your conversation in a professional manner. But scripts are never meant to prepare you for how you need to show empathy or genuine interest to a prospect. So when you just keep reading a script in the cold call, the prospects can get annoyed at you.
Pitching before Listening: A natural conversation should be two-way, which means you will listen and then respond. Some sales representatives speak too much or before listening. This reduces their chance of establishing rapport with their prospect, which results in a hang-up.
Giving up after the first “no”: When a prospect says no, it doesn’t mean you have to get disappointed or uncomfortable. It is your responsibility to handle their sales objection and turn that no into a yes. When you don’t have enough practice to respond to a “no”, cold calling will always be stressful for you.
When Your Discomfort Tips Into Fear or Anxiety
It is usual for sales representatives to feel discomfort and anxiety during the first few calls or in case of some specific scenarios that they are not prepared to handle. But if you have persistent fear or anxiety about making cold calls, then you need to start with recognizing the underlying reasons behind it. Sometimes, sales representatives avoid cold calling because they just can’t overcome their negative feelings about cold calling. Here is a guide on cold call reluctance that can help you if you are having such a problem.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is cold calling so uncomfortable?
There are some common psychological factors that make cold calling uncomfortable, which are fear of rejection, uncertainty, and the thought of being intrusive to someone.
How do I stop being nervous before a cold call?
It is necessary that you prepare a script, do prospect research, and take mental preparation before every call you make. Frequently practice your speech, openers, and how to handle the common objections your prospects are more likely to give you.
How long does it take to get comfortable with cold calling?
The time it takes for a sales representative to get comfortable with cold calling can vary. Some reps can take a few weeks by consistently calling the prospects, handling their rejections, and practicing strong opening lines.
What should I say at the start of a cold call?
At the start of your cold call, try to use a pattern interruption, which means something your prospect doesn’t expect to hear in a sales call. You might ask, “How have you been?” or “May I steal 27 seconds of your time? ”.
Is it normal to feel anxious about cold calling?
Yes, if you are feeling anxious about cold calling, then it is normal. About 63% of sales representatives think cold calling is the worst part of their job.
How many cold calls a day is normal for a beginner?
A new sales rep can make 30-50 calls per day, and expert professionals can make 80 to 100 calls.
Does cold calling get easier over time?
Yes, with practice, sales reps can reduce their stress or discomfort during cold calling. They just need to be consistent at following all the best practices for cold calling, like doing prospect research, creating a strong opener, and practicing handling sales objections before calls.
What is the 5-to-1 countdown for cold calls?
The 5-to-1 countdown is a mental technique developed by Mel Robbins. It helps individuals interrupt hesitation and take action by counting backward from five to one and acting immediately.
