Why Don't You Cold Call?
- Thread starter Josh
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Here's my honest answer.
I was taught to be respectful and polite in public, never to be a burden, etc, etc...
Whenever I solicit people cold, I feel like I'm a nuisance. That's against how I was raised. So I'm connecting cold-calling with being a pest.
That's why I can door-knock leads successfully -- THEY sent the card in requesting information. I have a "purpose" for seeing them.
But, truthfully. It's all in the head. 90% of people are friendly that you call or door-knock cold anyway.
But, like many say, it's really a crutch. A knock from a stranger is a cold knock -- with or without a card. Doesn't mean they'll be interested, as many of us know in the FE world.
Also -- I think the other aspect is is that there has been a preponderance of "gurus" saying that cold-calling, cold-doorknocking, and any in-the-trenches prospecting is dead. That of course plays to people like myself, coming to the conclusion that you can prospect without risk of rejection or being a pest.
I was taught to be respectful and polite in public, never to be a burden, etc, etc...
Whenever I solicit people cold, I feel like I'm a nuisance. That's against how I was raised. So I'm connecting cold-calling with being a pest.
That's why I can door-knock leads successfully -- THEY sent the card in requesting information. I have a "purpose" for seeing them.
But, truthfully. It's all in the head. 90% of people are friendly that you call or door-knock cold anyway.
But, like many say, it's really a crutch. A knock from a stranger is a cold knock -- with or without a card. Doesn't mean they'll be interested, as many of us know in the FE world.
Also -- I think the other aspect is is that there has been a preponderance of "gurus" saying that cold-calling, cold-doorknocking, and any in-the-trenches prospecting is dead. That of course plays to people like myself, coming to the conclusion that you can prospect without risk of rejection or being a pest.
- 2,455
I disagree as to one GRAND answer. I do think folks tend to over complicate it (not keep it simple) and don't make it a habit. If you are going to cold call, you have to make a habit of doing it. Very little training is needed in the beginning. All these special dialing systems and other stuff give agents an excuse to NOT do it when a simple telephone will work in the beginning.
In the old agency I was working with, they went through several reps/agents doing 403b annuities mainly. During my time there, I saw about 15 people training 2 to 3 days per week on everything from products to prospecting. You had a couple who trained about 3x and they went to the phones and to the field. The other dozen kept training. The ones who kept training never made it.
The ones who said "I know enough to get started" set goals and prospected. They (about 4 of them) make well over 6 figures per year. The others aren't there anymore. In fact I keep up with a few of them and they are training for something else and then they train for something else.
I've narrowed it down to GOALS being the number one reason people don't do anything. Why don't people cold call? They have no goal with it and if they do, they are not committed. Why don't people train other agents? They have no goal. They just throw shiite up on the wall and see what sticks.
If you have goals or a goal and you are committed, meaning NOTHING will stand in your way, you will cold call. If you have no goals in this business, nothing else matters. Every superstar I've ever met has goals to which they are committed to.
Reardon, I think this is an important point. If I wanted to make a quick buck writing a book, it would be about how you make a huge living right away, and at the same time avoid cold-calling. Problem is, that's just not the real world. Yes, a solid marketing plan and corresponding implementation are critical, but it doesn't take up all your time, and it doesn't always pay dividends immediately.
Cold calling and/or cold walking have to be part of the mix, at least for the first few years.
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- 5,260
I came from a B2C biz prior to selling FE.
My biz marketed to upper-income individuals -- all my prospecting efforts were "passive," as in placing ads and dropping mail.
I created an ad that ran for 1.5 years that pulled $200,000.00 over that period of time, $150,000.00 of it coming from one small community publication. ROI was like 10-15:1.
However, the guy down the street from me doing the same thing, would personally hand-write letters to local businessmen he could get off a list, then follow-up with a phone call a week later. He swears doing that pulled in so much more business than postcards and direct mail.
My biz marketed to upper-income individuals -- all my prospecting efforts were "passive," as in placing ads and dropping mail.
I created an ad that ran for 1.5 years that pulled $200,000.00 over that period of time, $150,000.00 of it coming from one small community publication. ROI was like 10-15:1.
However, the guy down the street from me doing the same thing, would personally hand-write letters to local businessmen he could get off a list, then follow-up with a phone call a week later. He swears doing that pulled in so much more business than postcards and direct mail.
- 5,056
i didnt cold call because i didnt want to...
simple as that
not that i couldnt, but didnt want to
simple as that
not that i couldnt, but didnt want to
- 7,066
That's the best reason.
When I cold called for small businesses, I did it very well. I just didn't have a system in place, to follow through with everything to where it wasn't becoming confusing, and chasing prospects down all the time.
I disliked that immensely, chasing them down. I didn't hit the pain with enough implication questions to cause them to want to take action immediately. And for me, that made me play the chase game.
I am getting ready to do something again similar. Whether its door knock or go B2B or cold call, weather is ripe, and student loans are too huge for me to just lounge around with my extra time when I am not out prospecting other ways...
I disliked that immensely, chasing them down. I didn't hit the pain with enough implication questions to cause them to want to take action immediately. And for me, that made me play the chase game.
I am getting ready to do something again similar. Whether its door knock or go B2B or cold call, weather is ripe, and student loans are too huge for me to just lounge around with my extra time when I am not out prospecting other ways...
There is definitely a lack of good training for cold calling. You can't learn to cold call effectively in a day or even two. It's also a practiced art.
It's very hard to teach inflection, pauses, etc. to someone that doesn't naturally do it. It's not so much what you say, as how you say it. You can get just about any question answered if you ask in the right way. Some agents will never be able to learn to cold call effectively, but most can learn with enough time and practice.
I've been very well trained on giving good phone, and have done much cold calling. I just prefer not to do it anymore. Cold calling was always the last thing on my list of viable prospecting ideas. I would rather spend the money on leads and my time selling than being a glorified telemarketer, but that's just me (time IS money). Some agents just can't afford to buy the leads and need to do it the cheapest way they can. That would be telemarketing.
It's very hard to teach inflection, pauses, etc. to someone that doesn't naturally do it. It's not so much what you say, as how you say it. You can get just about any question answered if you ask in the right way. Some agents will never be able to learn to cold call effectively, but most can learn with enough time and practice.
I've been very well trained on giving good phone, and have done much cold calling. I just prefer not to do it anymore. Cold calling was always the last thing on my list of viable prospecting ideas. I would rather spend the money on leads and my time selling than being a glorified telemarketer, but that's just me (time IS money). Some agents just can't afford to buy the leads and need to do it the cheapest way they can. That would be telemarketing.
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Not sure if you heard about it, but there are new laws where your payments are allegedly only 15% of your disposable income (whatever that litmus test is). If you haven't looked into that, you probably should check it out.
