promoting a new business... is cold calling worthwhile?

[technodup]

Cold calling works if done properly. Nine out of ten cold callers don't do it properly though.

A few tips

A cold call shouldn't sound like a cold call. Know their name, or even better have their card. The card opens up a whole world of opportunity. If I could have 10 cards or 30 names I'd take the cards every time.

Go out prospecting with leaflets and pick up cards when they're not in. Always take the name of the assistant. Use that on the call when you phone ie " I dropped in and spoke to Debbie, I think you were at a meeting in London". Build rapport before firing in with the script.

Don't sound scripted.

100 calls a day should be a minimum. You'll only ever get 30-40%ish of decision makers. That's say 35 calls at an average of 5 mins per call (telling you to beat it takes about a minute) and that's being generous at 3 hrs. A minute each for the rest and it's only half a day.

Ask if it's their own business. Dig in on that, "have you got a partner?". Don't **** about with one half of a two man team, get the other ones number and repeat.

When I call 100 people I'd expect to speak to 30 decision makers and book maybe 6 decent appointments and a 3 dodgy ones, make 5 presentations and sell to 3. As for upsetting people most are perfectly reasonable, you'll probably get a couple of dicks in a hundred get shirty. **** them, the more people that say no, the more people you're talking to and ultimately the more people will say yes.

There's obviously a lot more to it- it's one of the hardest jobs there is and I'm not going to give away everything. Just remember you're intruding on their time, you've got to get their attention in the first 20 seconds or you're dead. If they give you the time make the most of it.

Someone above suggested taking a stand at a trade fair or similar. I wouldn't. Go to as many as you can as a visitor and speak to people for nothing instead. Even travelling the country is cheaper than a smallish stand for a day.

It's marketing services I sell for a living so I won't even start on all the possibilities that opens up. Welcome to the jungle.

 

[silverclaws]

For people who have been the recipients of cold calling, cold calling has a bad reputation and so personally, I wouldn't use it. Info packs, well the amount of junk mail we receive, that option also seems a waste of money, for you see it has all been over done and killed off.

But some friends are getting quite a bit of attention via the interweb, and in that twitter blogs all over the place and on the ground, freebies to select targets.

Even myself, I select people to receive freebies, examples of my work and the people who I give to, I have already researched their sphere of influence, so know what I sacrifice is well placed and I have received interest from it, more than I could handle, what I did not expect is interest from the US, and I did not aim there, as it is the home market, even regional market I am looking to supply. It was an experiment, and when I can pull my finger out to get going, I know there is interest in what I plan.

A successful businessman once said to me when I asked how to successfully start my own business;

Think outside the box and follow your intuition.

 

[jax13]

thanks for the replies folks.

promoting what I do is tricky because there are already a number of established businesses out there doing fairly well but there are a few avenues I know of from personal experience that should give good results its just knowing how best to make the initial introduction from a carefully executed 'chance meeting' to mail outs, cold calls etc.

because i offer a personal service & am trying to break into small corporate functions I am currently targeting stand alone local businesses rather than nationwide companies so I do have a good chance of getting a fairly high success rate if it is done properly because I know that the work is there.

At the moment, the majority of my work comes through word of mouth or people who i have fed at a different event in the past with a small amount stumbling on my website & contacting me through that (currently building a new site which is currently averaging near the top of page 2 on google searches but that should go up once I get it finished). I am looking into game fairs & the like for next year, along with trying to sort out a non-food display that I can use at wedding fairs / trade shows & similar. My biggest problems are a very tight advertising / promo budget & a lack of time during 'office hours' because of work commitments.


as for the "Think outside the box and follow your intuition." quote, there is no real outside the box method I can find for what I do & where I do it. I simply need to get time & opportunity to sit down with the right people & my product will do the rest for me.

 

[NAILTRAIL96]

When you sell by cold calling you're usually selling to a large audience, where as you have a very small number of potential customers.
Look at the ratio mentioned above, think of all the potential clients you can and you may get less than 10% of those.
Cold calling has it's uses but i'd have to say yours isn't one of them.
It's nice to think that making 100 calls would see you set, i'm sure you can convey how good you are as a product and a service but cold calling relys on so much more than just you.

 

[daj]

I know from experience that a menu / price list dropped through the post will be binned without reading 9 times out of 10 so I don't really want to go down that route, nor do I want to do an email as trashing an email from an unknown sender is the simplest thing for anyone to do.

From my experience I had the opposite response totally different business (landscaping/greenwaste) but we peppered the local towns with fliers and the response was fantastic (too good!! :shock: )

Shame your not a little closer we are having a pig roast for our wedding

 

[sylus]

Check out events organisers in the yellow pages and send them your company info. they are always being let down with traders so they like to have multiple options on file.

 

[gregs656]

Sounds like it would be for you. I personally think that it's cheap for you to do and just requires a bit of time, everyone on here might tell you it's not worth it but can you afford to take the risk - when potentially you could phone up a company that has been let down that morning? I could only hack it in short bursts though.

In my (short short) experience, I have found that turning up in person is preferable where possible.

 

[jax13]

In my (short short) experience, I have found that turning up in person is preferable where possible.

my problem is that without calling, I won't always be able to speak to the right person.

I personally don't bother with any rep who comes in to see me during service times - if they knew the business they would know i'm busy at 12:30 and they would catch me either before 11:30 or at 2ish, I especially don't bother with reps who call in unannounced. if someone calls with a product offer, I always invite them to either come down or drop off / send some product info for me to look at. In the catering trade, the majority of people i have worked with / for have operated in a very similar fashion hence me taking this approach initially as the 'cold call' is more of an ice breaker to get me through the door than a sales pitch.

It is these ice breakers I need to try and snare in as many ways as possible to try and get a wider client base & hopefully crack into a bit of repeat corporate work.