One of the most positive and pervasive things that have come along in 10 years that has impacted cold calling is social media. There is not a seller in the business world that does not understand if you are not using social media to drive new opportunities and new contacts, you are not doing your job as a salesperson. What is not widespread is an agreement that cold calling is a necessary component of social prospecting for social networking and if accepted with as a viable component, how viable it is. If you measure it, it further reinforces this tenet and shows how worth the effort is.
Let’s look at that. Today’s prospect is acutely aware of any intrusion on their space. That is the case because of the amount of messaging that hits them on a daily, even hourly basis. I should say there is a torrent of information that they have to process even on a minute-by-minute basis. These executives in small, medium and large corporations are supported by less people; have to produce greater output, and in less time with greater accuracy. Where would a cold call fit in?What do salespeople when they need to reach them (free “gifts of Knowledge”)?
Going forward, cold calling is part of a very specific and laser focused set of tools. They are supported by the fulcrum, or as we call it the value proposition. Value props by most sellers unfortunately are generalized, and seldom specific as with the type of vertical, industry, even company. It is unfortunate how widespread this is. True it is not easy but then again accessing a Sr. decision maker is equally if not
more difficult. It’s a matter of 5 to 7 seconds to get your value across or you’re done. How can you show you understand their business and themselves in that amount of time? And present a solution to their problem?
Expertise is not easy to sell in the very short run. In fact, it is extremely difficult, but still a critical component of accessing a Sr. executive.
One of the things is using social media to optimize the way you contact people. They will activate your short and to the point value messages. You need the right tools to construct your target hitting value props, and social media is a key quiver. You might be selling to a chief marketing officer, the president, or a SVP, down to the VP or Director of practically any company in Americas. You still have to pick up the phone, email them, and use Social to gain insight to make your messaging resonate and be more relevant. The difference in a modern time, as we are in, is to use an 8 touch campaign where social is a big part of that. It is a combination of email, voicemail, social, snail mail and different combinations. After 8 touches, you have a 65% great chance of getting a response. If not, move on.
What are you starting off at social to move on to call calling? Or any of the other channels? I will say you use social the way your prospects do. By prospects I mean Sr. decision makers. They are the ones who have the budget and will approve or disapprove regardless what the committee says. LinkedIn, absolutely. Twitter where appropriate. Facebook, worth a look. The rest are generally not worthy of a SVP or President of a company. There are the folks you are cold calling to. Try it; I could be off here but generally not.
What does work is finding some subordinates and seeing what they post or what the company posts via social. Any intelligence is good intelligence. Keep in mind, the best response for prospecting is a combination of techniques. I like the phone as with voicemail, it’s free message. And I can craft something even in 7 seconds. It’s not that hard. Don’t waste time with your company or personal name. Cut to the chase and say something like “we produced a 16% decrease in machining costs, 22% faster production times, and with 1 less operator….and with your competition”.
So the multi-touch process works very well, a solid value prop is essential, and dialing makes it complete. I’vealso seen numerous examples of poorly written content that supports campaigning, and even with seven, eight, nine or ten voice mails, emails, LinkedIn, snail mail…there is no response. It takes patience, grit and determination and you too will get results.
Hard work always pays off.
What do you do next? Send us an email and we’ll arrange for you to speak with Ed to chat about how these learnings can help build more sales just for your business.