Cold Calling Pitfalls You Should Avoid

Are you struggling to make successful cold calls? Here are some pitfalls to avoid and tips to help enhance your cold calling strategy.

We’ve all been there.

You have this super awesome pitch, call up your prospect with all the confidence you can muster only to have the listener hang up mid-sentence.

What went wrong?

Cold calling can be tough. Even the best salesmen have been hung up on from time to time. But if you find this happening often, it may be time to revisit your strategy. 

Part of revisiting may involve analyzing the companies you’re targeting, rewriting your script, and paying attention to how you relay information to prospects. 

Today, we’re going to look at cold calling pitfalls and how to avoid them alongside other digital marketing tactics you can use to drive business.

1. Cold Calling 

Let’s jump in:

• Using static list. Purchasing a prospect’s list is convenient—all the work has been done for you. Just pick up the phone and dial. Wrong. These lists are typically based on general qualifications and not on customer needs. Use sales/marketing intelligence to determine the brands that need your solutions.
• Skipping research. Right along the static list alley is a lack of research. The best way to beat to “nagging salesperson” title is to first understand the brand you’re reaching out to and how your offerings can help them drive better results.
• Using generic scripts. Many salespeople rely on generic scripts that don’t reflect any valuable research on the companies they are calling. Personalizing your script says you care enough to know what’s going on with this specific prospect.
• Poor product knowledge. Many prospects will test your knowledge to see if you’re worth your salt. If you’re not in touch with your product/service, you won’t earn their trust or business.

2. Leverage Social Proof

Social proof is a much-needed ingredient in digital marketing. 

You can have a great product/service and create compelling marketing copy, but without social proof, you may not go very far.

Why?

Statistics reveal that shoppers trust recommendations from other people even those they don’t know. 

When making purchase decisions, people look for proof that the investment works. This proof goes beyond anything you (the seller) say and on to those who have experienced your solutions. 

Here are some ways to make this social proof easily available to your audiences:

• Capitalize online customer reviews. With many consumers taking online reviews seriously, actively request satisfied customers to drop positive reviews about your brand and services.
• Showcase customer logos. Showing off the brands you’ve worked with or are working with helps build credibility and confidence among audiences. Be sure to obtain permission from the customers before displaying their logos on your site.
• Award and certifications. Industry-relevant awards or certifications prove your expertise, help establish credibility, and increase your chances of being selected over the competition. Post them on your site and social platforms too.
• Case studies. Create in-depth analyses of the problems your customers faced, how your products/services tackled the problems, and the measurable success the customers’ experienced. 

3. Run Podcasts

An excellent way to get customers to buy from you is to get them to first buy into you.

To humanize your brand in such a way that buyers connect with your vision, passion, and ability to help them achieve their goals.

Welcome to podcasting. 

A digital marketing discipline that enables brands to step away from the conventional toneless, faceless public relations and into direct communication with customers. Where you literally speak to them.

A LinkedIn survey showed podcasts attract C-suite executives, business owners, and department heads. All these people tune in to gather insights about brands, industry trends, and solutions.

Benefits of hosting podcasts include:

• Sharing thought leadership. Rather than churn out content for the sake of it, podcasts allow you to share your expertise with audiences. This helps build trust among listeners and influence purchase decisions.
• Boosting brand awareness. Getting in front of your ideal audience and staying in their memory is tough. Through branded podcasts, you can connect with audiences, answer burning questions, and share useful industry trends ultimately becoming the go-to in your sector.
• Creating scalable content. Podcasts can be repurposed into long-form blogs, email newsletters, shareable infographics, slide presentations, or social media captions. This allows you to derive a maximum return on content marketing investments.
• Forging partnerships that open up untapped markets. Roundtable discussions or expert interviews are low friction ways to grow audiences in complementary markets. 

4. Own Your Audience

Most businesses consider social platforms the hottest place to promote their brand and products. 

There’s some truth to it. With close to 4 billion users combined, it seems like the perfect marketplace for brands.

But is it really?

Social channels are great, and we recommend using them but you need to remember that they are rented property. 

Someone else owns the platforms and to an extent even your social pages. These owners can implement changes that see you lose a chunk of your posts or followers overnight.

Not very dependable, is it?

So what should you do?

Own your audience. How? 

• Engage your audiences better than the competition. Talk to your audiences. Find unanswered questions, tackle them and be there to respond to questions raised. Find useful tips and share them with your audience. It will keep your brand top of mind.
• Establish direct communication. Engaging audiences builds trust and makes them comfortable sharing their email address and other contact information. You can then target them through email campaigns.
• Do more. You’ve heard the saying, “they don’t pay me enough to….” This mentality won’t get you as far as the brand that delivers more value than its customers ask for. It breeds loyalty.

4. Make Your Content Engaging

Honestly speaking, we are suffering from content overload, yet this hasn’t stopped companies from crafting click-bait headlines, regurgitating content, and putting it out there.

What can you do to make your content stand out?

• Be relevant. Let your content revolve around the problems customers are trying to solve. Speak directly into their obstacles, pain, hesitations, and desires. This increases relevance and usefulness to readers.
• Make it easy to consume. Use shorter sentences, break up long sentences and write conversationally. Graphics are great but use them with caution—adding too many is a turn off while optimized ones can slow loading speed, leading to abandonment.
• Experiment with different formats. So long as it’s relevant to your target audience, consider alternating long-form content with infographics, interactive quizzes and calculators, video, and podcasts.
• Check engagement analytics. It will help you understand audience behavior, preferences, and barriers to engagement. You can use the insights to address issues and provide more relevant content.

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