The possibilities are now endless: Should you send an SMS or an email? Which is better: Facebook advertisements or Google ads? TikTok, Instagram or YouTube videos?
Despite the emphasis on disruptive and inventive marketing, some strategies have shown to be effective throughout time. B2B cold calling is still one of the most effective strategies to generate new leads, receive feedback, and build partnerships. Nowadays, 92% of all business-to-business interactions take place over the telephone.
B2B (business-to-business) cold calling, with a well-prepared approach strategy and a sustained effort, leads to the development of new markets and inspires new potential customers to discover and meet you.
What is cold calling?
Cold calling is the activity of attempting to sell to a potential customer who has not previously contacted your company or salesperson.
We can encounter 2 types of scenarios:
Prospective customers have not indicated interest in acquiring the product or service prior to the call.
Warm selling, on the other hand, occurs after a prospect has signed up for a free trial, completed a lead capture form, or downloaded a guide.
Cold calling, without a doubt, appears to be a difficult task. Without or with few customer information to start the sales pitch, sales agents must rapidly find a way to engage with customers in order to try to make a sale.
However, this does not rule out the possibility of cold phoning. In fact, 82 percent of buyers are willing to meet with vendors who initiate contact.
In this sense, the problem isn’t with cold outreach. It’s all in how you go about it.
What’s the appeal of cold calling?
With the pandemy and the new technologies, contactless sales have recently been adopted by 40% of US B2B (business to business) sales teams. This means there will be no more face-to-face sales.
Therefore B2B salespeople intend to make more sales calls (phone and via video conferencing), with 39 percent intending to use more cold outreach in the process.
How does B2B cold calling differ from B2C
Although the end goals of B2B and B2C telemarketing are similar, there are a few key differences, starting with tone: Because their product or service becomes an investment for their buying company, B2B telemarketers must provide solutions to their customers’ problems. They must identify the right decision-maker and interest him, knowing that this decision-maker will buy based on facts or performance forecasts aimed at efficiency or cost reduction. The B2C telemarketer, on the other hand, has more leeway in terms of strategy, as B2C customers generally buy based on their emotions and desires.
5 Key things for a successful cold calling:
1) Define your target and do some preliminary research
A good strategic thought to clearly define the target according to criteria such as region, sector of activity, minimum and maximum number of employees is a prerequisite for building a telephone prospecting list. Subsequently, doing preliminary research before cold calling can help identify the right decision maker up front and increase the ability to interest and engage prospects.
You will be able to research to see if your product or service is suitable by browsing:
– Your prospect’s website
– His LinkedIn profile Use this preliminary research to determine the type of problems your products can address.
This preliminary research is also a good moment to figure out who the major decision-maker is.
2) Increase the amount of calls you make
A cold caller gets a lot of rejections on a daily basis. He will need to raise your call volume to fight these denials.
An outbound sales rep should make at least 60 calls every day to achieve the greatest outcomes.
3) Make sure you call at the proper time – Timing is key.
We believe that knowing how to engage a prospect at the correct time will increase the likelihood of a conversion.
This is especially true in B2B sales, when staff are busy and thus unreachable during specific periods of the day.
Calling B2B prospects over lunchtime is never a good idea because they won’t be at their desk. Contacting them before or after lunch is a much better idea.
4) Try an hybrid approach
You run the risk of calling someone at an inconvenient moment if you phone them directly.
Try cold email or LinkedIn outreach instead, which is significantly less intrusive.
The B2B outbound telemarketing approach can be carried out alone or combined with LinkedIn Prospecting, which aims to increase visibility to a larger number of potential clients in your publications and to obtain qualified networking appointments. Optimal results are obtained by combining these two approaches.
Remember that the majority of sales emails are opened at 3 p.m. If you want to enhance open rates, avoid shooting in the morning and instead shoot in the late afternoon.
5) Be concise and Keep it short.
The goal of the conversation is to ignite the customer’s curiosity and lead them along the sales funnel.
This may be for a product demonstration or a future call with decision-makers.
In any case, keep this first cold call brief. After all, you’ve just rudely disrupted someone’s day.
Why outsourcing your B2B cold calling:
The prospect of doing B2B outbound telemarketing internally is daunting for many businesses. Hire a resource, train them, manage quality control – fortunately, you can avoid this by outsourcing B2B outbound telemarketing services: the campaign can be set up within a week, and the expertise of Direct B2B’s resources ensure that the campaign becomes effective very quickly.
Find out what Direct B2B can do for you
As the weeks go by, you’ll see that we can quickly become an extension of your company that you can rely on to grow your business. This is our commitment, our DNA, what motivates us, what drives us.
Contact us to get a free quote for your B2B telemarketing
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