Is cold calling still an effective method for B2B sales for lead generation?

Cold calling can be effective, but it’s not easy.

People actually don’t hate to be cold-called, they hate being bothered with stupid stuff.

I think what’s effective is definitely dependent on the B2B company.

Some marketing tactics may be more effective for certain businesses vs. other marketing tactics.

Generally speaking, cold calling can be more time consuming than other outbound marketing tactics.

Cold calling is an early stage technique in the sales process and phone prospecting is still, despite connotations of being out-dated, an imperative part of many businesses sales approach.

And that is because there are not enough warm leads to survive off alone. Alongside that,cold calling is still the fastest, most direct and low-cost method to influence a sale. It is also a way to generate leads from absolute scratch in the most simplified form and provides an open platform to access a completely new potential clientele and target pool.

Though it may not work every time, there is nothing to say that the next conversation you provoke will not lead to a sale. And that could escalate within a matter of moments if you are lucky enough to pick up the phone to the optimal target.

Now a day, you may find everyone saying that cold calling is their main source of generating leads mostly in large companies who comprise of large stacks of people dedicated for doing calls all day.

Do they really get the results as per the efforts that they are pouring?

Only in some cases the organizations find this process successful due to many aspects that we will discuss later.

But many of them find that giving cold calling as the high priority for lead generation is not at all working much.

The reason is very obvious because whenever you receive any call from any sales call from banks for investment, other companies for hiring you, selling their product and so on we normally disconnect the call saying that you are busy or not interested and also disconnect within 2 seconds once you heard that the call is of no use.

But whenever we are really in need of such offers or proposals that the sales person was doing since many months we normally prefer to find those things from internet.

So the main agenda of explaining this thing is that you cannot force your client to get interested in you directly unless they have any such requirement. You can reach into their mind through strong SEO, strong social media marketing, promotions and lot more time to time and whenever your customer/client is in need of your service/product they will pitch you directly.

Many times cold calling plays a coincidence role, where you knock the doors of the customers just when they are in need of your help and at that time you find it profitable to make a sales call. But this miracle happens very rarely across the lot of sales call.

So it is strongly recommended to carry out other activities to create a noise in the market of your organization.

After this discussion, I am not saying that you should completely stop doing cold calling but I would recommend that you should do very targeted calls where you have a proof that they really have a requirement so that there will be more chances of converting these prospects into potential lead.

“Some products are more suited for this type of sales than others, but once you acquire the knack of it, it can be very powerful.”

For every company that doesn't use cold calling, there are many more that do.

But apart from this cold calling can also work if you have a great strategy. Here are some of the things that we need to consider in able to be effective in cold calling.
 
Have a Targeted List and Research

Make a list and create a profile of the ideal prospects that you want to reach out to. Be sure to target the right individuals and decision makers. Read about the industry and gain knowledge about your prospects' history, current situation, and problems that they can be encountering. You must develop a clear idea on how your prospects can make use of the solutions that you offer.
 
Define Your Objective

Remember that we do cold call not to sell or close the deal. Cold calls are one of the initial steps made to open the stage for the rest of the remaining steps. We do cold calls as an introduction and to set further appointments or meetings to our prospects. The value of the cold call is not only making your prospect know about your product but more of the initial impressions you and your company make.

Be a Pro

Aim to be a cold calling professional. Dump the robotic script and personalize your approach. Be warm and friendly to your prospects. Don't compete with your prospects and make them feel that you want to team-up with them in resolving some of their problems. Lead the conversation and focus on the objectives that you defined.

Combine Strategies

One of the most important strategies is to combine cold calls to other means of interaction with your prospects. Do not limit yourself with the phone call. Reach out using other ways like cold emails or social media marketing. In combining different strategies, better rapport with your prospects would be built and the conversation would be warmer.

You may carry out the techniques for creating a noise in the market rather than just cold calling:

• PPC campaign
• SEO
• SEM
• Email Marketing
• Webinar
• Videos
• Newsletter
• Social media marketing
• Content marketing
• Blogs
• Reviews on Clutch