How to Make Successful Cold Calls
For recruiters cold calls are an important part of their arsenal. Cold calls enable them to make a connection with the candidate, which makes the process easier. With emails you do not have that connection. Unfortunately, cold calls have a bit of a negative reputation since they are used by any company trying to sell something.
How does one make cold calls that keeps the target candidate on the line and then gets them to agree? The following goes a long way towards making cold calls a more successful strategy.
Before reading further I recommend watching the following video about Cold Calling 2.0.
What is a Cold Call?
Cold calling is a sales activity in which sales representatives contact prospective consumers who have shown no interest in the items or services being provided. The term “cold calling” refers to soliciting a prospect through various channels – phone or in person — sans having had any previous interaction with the salesman.
Cold calling has evolved over the years from a way of providing or, rather than reading a sales presentation, into a target-driven marketing communication strategy. To put it another way, salespeople target the proper prospects to increase their chances of success. For recruitment agencies cold calling is about helping the candidate and your client.
Research First
The more you as a cold caller know about your potential candidate the easier it is to make a connection with them and land them for your client. It is therefore important that you do your research first. With so many potential candidates out there, it is important that you also not waste time. Let’s be honest, you cannot spend hours researching a candidate. A good recruiter will know what to look for in the bio of a candidate before they call them. Once they know enough the call can be made. The recruiter should have a better chance with a candidate they researched first
Call at the Right Time
Nobody wants to spend time phoning the same lead over and over again. That’s exactly what will happen if you phone them at the incorrect times.
Among the worst times to call a prospect, according to Peak Sales Recruiting, is on a Friday afternoon. This makes sense since most people had tuned out by this time. They’re putting in the last few hours of work before heading home for the weekend.
Monday morning is another bad time to contact someone. On Monday mornings, many individuals are in a haze, dragging themselves to work while wishing it was still the weekend.
When is the best time to call? Wednesday or Thursday are good options. You have two options: early in the morning or in the afternoon. If you’re a morning person, call between the hours of 6:45 and 9:00 a.m. Give your prospect a call between 4 and 6 p.m. if you favour the afternoon.
According to Peak Sales Recruiting, phoning leads a minute after it is produced may increase conversion rates by 391%.
Have a Strong Opening Line
You just have 10 seconds to show that you’re worth chatting to, so you have to stand out from the crowd. After introducing yourself, personalize the conversation by using your research and focusing on your prospect. I would also suggest adapting the opening line to whoever you are talking to.
For instance, you may begin with a complement on a recent professional achievement you discovered while doing research. It is also important to match the speed and tone with which your prospect answered the phone. Mirror them as much as possible to increase engagement.
Embrace Rejection
From prospecting to closing, inbound and outbound sales, rejection is an unavoidable aspect of the process. Nobody ever closes 100% of their leads. Therefore, you should be ready to be turned down often. Rejection is not something bad though. Every time you are rejected you are a step closer to not being rejected.
Rejection can be made easier to handle by making something like a “funniest rejections” pool in the office. That way all recruiters could pool a small amount of money or something else that is valuable to them and the one with the funniest rejection in the week wins the pool. In this way rejection is made less harsh and recruiters learn to work through rejections easily.
When you approach rejection in the right way you can move on to the next call and not let the previous rejection influence you.
Follow up
According to Peak Sales Recruiting, your effort is far from done after you’ve met with a prospect for the first time. From there, you may need to call at least five times.
It’s your job to call your prospect back, whether they answer the phone straight away or you have to leave a message. Don’t sit around waiting for them to contact you.
After all, you’re the one attempting to sell them something, not the other way around. They are under no duty to keep in touch while you do need to know where you stand with them. The person initiating the interaction has to keep initiating it.
Keep Practicing
What if you’ve tried cold calling before and simply aren’t very good at it? You get uncomfortable and speak over yourself, or you become sad when a possibility rejects you. So, what exactly do you do?
Continue to practice. You’ve probably heard the phrase “practice makes perfect,” and it’s true in this case. Your nervousness will disappear quicker the more you talk on the phone with others. After a time, making cold calls will become second nature to you. You will also start to learn which conversations are a waste of time and avoid wasting too much time.
Final Thoughts
Good cold callers persevere, and they do not dwell on the high level of rejections. If they did, they would get nowhere. They keep trying and for good reason, one successful call makes a big difference in their day. The point is to apply what I have covered here and to keep trying.
With cold calling you definitely have to fail your way to success.
