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Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

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Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#21

Post by goatherders »

MatthewRJones wrote: post #10
goatherders wrote: post #3

Cold calling is wildly effective. It just takes making more than 2 calls a week. I tell my team "get 100 on the phone without selling something and I'll give you $100" been doing that for years and have never paid a rep the $100.

Eh... I'm not sure about "wildly effective." A few years ago I started a business and cold called for several hours each day for the first four months. I didn't make a single sale, and I'm told I have an excellent phone presence. What succeeded for me was SEO, direct mail, and email campaigns. I still had to do sales pitches, but I was working off warm leads from people that actually wanted to hear from me. I'm not s…

It wasn't wildly effective for you, over four months, for your product/service to the specific people you called at the price you offered. A valid data point for sure, but far from empirical.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#22

Post by goatherders »

oligopoly wrote: post #17
maxxxxx wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your experience with people actually enjoying it or at least not hating it and finding such people? I have done cold calling myself but found it very exhausting to the point that I just couldn't do it anymore.

State management and selling something you find to be beneficiary to client helps. I Haven't done it for ages but damn making a sale is a great feeling :) Kinda makes me want to google start ups looking for sales people based on commission. Would be fun to experiment stuff I've learned since those days.

I have a few friends that do this - fully staffed businesses for outsourced sales for startups. I do it myself on the side. We work only on commission and make a killing. So many startups are founded by people that want nothing to do with selling. They gladly pay the fees.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#23

Post by sremani »

plinkplonk wrote: post #16

I hate getting cold calls. So I avoid doing it to other people. Yes that makes me less of a salesman. So be it. Tangent: In India you can report unsolicited sales calls to a central (government) authority, where you can sign up to get on a "Do Not Disturb" list, and get any sales caller who ignores this fined, and eventually get his number disconnected etc. The system isn't perfect, and there are some impressive hack…

Are you an entrepreneur? Have you built a business? When things are done to extreme sure.. the slimy salesman or the spammy robo-calls are a nuisance.

Take a list of the world's 400 billionaires and ask them who has NOT Cold-Called?

My guess is its less than 10. Or to put it another may, most successful people Cold-called, their "heros" or experts in their field or successful people in town etc.

So I disagree the way you put cold-calling.

If you want to start a business, I strongly suggest you to change you attitude towards Sales. Unfortunately, Engineers have this unjustified hate towards Sales, not every sales pitch or call is unethical or pushy.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#25

Post by EtDybNuvCu »

If you cold-call me, I will spend the first few minutes feeding you false information. I will deliberately drag out the process, and at about 12min into the call, I will confess that I've been faking everything. At this point, I will attempt to tilt you so that you lose your temper and start cursing at me. On a really good day, you'll be so angry that your manager will have to come onto the call. I will feed them a few minutes of fake information, then attempt to tilt them as well. On the best days, you and your manager will sit around a reverse phone book and dox me, looking to find ways to intimidate or control me while I laugh and attempt to keep you on the line. My record is 52min, lasting over multiple phone calls, ending in a dramatic reading of a maths paper over the phone to a speakerphone consisting of three levels of management.

I want your business to fail if you cold-call.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#26

Post by goatherders »

EtDybNuvCu wrote: post #25

If you cold-call me, I will spend the first few minutes feeding you false information. I will deliberately drag out the process, and at about 12min into the call, I will confess that I've been faking everything. At this point, I will attempt to tilt you so that you lose your temper and start cursing at me. On a really good day, you'll be so angry that your manager will have to come onto the call. I will feed them a f…

Lol. You do realize that you are wasting your time, not mine?

My business succeeds BECAUSE of cold calls. So your drop in the ocean matters not.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#27

Post by hobofan »

sremani wrote: post #23
plinkplonk wrote: post #16

I hate getting cold calls. So I avoid doing it to other people. Yes that makes me less of a salesman. So be it. Tangent: In India you can report unsolicited sales calls to a central (government) authority, where you can sign up to get on a "Do Not Disturb" list, and get any sales caller who ignores this fined, and eventually get his number disconnected etc. The system isn't perfect, and there are some impressive hack…

Are you an entrepreneur? Have you built a business? When things are done to extreme sure.. the slimy salesman or the spammy robo-calls are a nuisance. Take a list of the world's 400 billionaires and ask them who has NOT Cold-Called? My guess is its less than 10. Or to put it another may, most successful people Cold-called, their "heros" or experts in their field or successful people in town etc. So I disagree the way…

Given that 20% of the people on the billionaires list were already on there by inhereting the money, I'd be willing to take that bet.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#28

Post by Nullabillity »

sremani wrote: post #23
plinkplonk wrote: post #16

I hate getting cold calls. So I avoid doing it to other people. Yes that makes me less of a salesman. So be it. Tangent: In India you can report unsolicited sales calls to a central (government) authority, where you can sign up to get on a "Do Not Disturb" list, and get any sales caller who ignores this fined, and eventually get his number disconnected etc. The system isn't perfect, and there are some impressive hack…

Are you an entrepreneur? Have you built a business? When things are done to extreme sure.. the slimy salesman or the spammy robo-calls are a nuisance. Take a list of the world's 400 billionaires and ask them who has NOT Cold-Called? My guess is its less than 10. Or to put it another may, most successful people Cold-called, their "heros" or experts in their field or successful people in town etc. So I disagree the way…

Yes, all cold calling is horrible and unethical. Whether or not it works is besides the point.

Re: Cold calling for my startup and how I learned to embrace the challenge

#29

Post by goatherders »

overcast wrote: post #24

Cold calls like will likely get forwarded to our internal extension that relays to "Lenny". The longest we've had someone on the line talking to the bot is currently at 8:37 on the leaderboard. :D

I don't understand this. Say you're not interested and move on. Being a dick to someone trying to earn a living says a lot about your character. And I promise, the sales rep doesn't care. Their job is dials and talk time. Your bot is helping them reach their daily quota.
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