Has cold-calling ever worked for you?

I have made thousands of cold-calls both face and phone over the years, more so in the early part of my career.

One of my first jobs was selling life insurance door-to-door in the western suburbs. I didn't really enjoy this experience, however I learned about the power of sales-process and overcoming rejection, which put me in good stead for later in life.

I then worked spruiking at shopping centres and tradeshows armed only with cleaning products, a microphone, and the sound of my own voice to keep me company - this was cold-contact selling, but with leverage from marketing via television.

In one of my businesses prior to BOOM Sales!  we created one of Australia's largest web marketing companies, using a combination of outbound telemarketing and other lead generation activities. We had in-bound and outbound telemarketing that was supported with process and a sales team.

We had search engine marketing and backward links driving in-bound enquiries, and although these types of in-bound calls are considered warm, they need to be treated with the same support and process as a cold-call.

Many salespeople make the mistake of treating in-bound calls as easy wins or a guaranteed sale. However, my experience suggests you need to engage customers in the same way, don't skip steps in y0ur sales-process, and never assume they have buy-in just because they called you, as they may also have called three of your competitors.