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Life Health > Life Insurance

The truth about cold calling

By Kelley Robertson

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Contrary to popular belief, cold calling still is an effective strategy to generate new business leads. In fact, I know many companies that rely heavily on this activity to capture new sales.

Over the years, I have read numerous books, listened to a variety of audio programs and even attended workshops and seminars on cold calling. What I have noticed is that very few people discuss how to deal with the real issues involved with cold calling.

It’s not just about overcoming your fear regarding making calls or creating an effective, attention-getting opening or connecting with a decision-maker. Believe it or not, those are easy compared to the real issues at hand.

What’s difficult — especially at first — is figuring out the lay of the land, navigating the corporate hierarchy and getting the information you need so you can effectively position your solution to your high-level prospect.

What most cold-calling experts don’t say is that you need to invest a significant amount time making multiple calls to a company and speaking to a variety of people before you actually connect with your decision-maker. It’s not as easy as simply picking up the telephone and asking for the key person in charge.

It takes effort, focus, discipline and a significant amount of mental energy. Unfortunately, many people don’t understand this at first, so they are often not prepared for the work required to make that connection. As a result, they get frustrated and start believing the myth that cold calling is a waste of time.

Cold calling is challenging; I will not dispute that. And it’s always been a numbers game — you have make lots of calls in order to get results. However, once you realize this, you can approach the process with the understanding that each call will take you one step closer to your goal.

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