Outbound sales is a key element for any B2B tech startup, but when, how and why shall you engage with your prospect Customers?

The When

The best timeframe in the workday for tapping into prospect Customers is the late afternoon timeslot (3:00-5:00pm) in their respective time zone, since during this period it’s less likely to view your call as an interruption. Also, the best days in the week is usually mid-week (Wednesday / Thursday) were prospects have not only had a chance to catch up on their to-do list from the beginning of the week but also they have not yet started wrapping things up for the weekend.

The Why

Make sure you figure out exactly what you want to achieve with your cold call before you jump on the phone. Therefore, by defining your ideal outcome for e.g. to better understand your prospect’s workflow and find out who’s involved in their buying decisions, and by learning a few details about the person and the Company you’re planning to contact, then your conversation will sound more like an offer to assist.

And the How

Sales call planning entails a specific set of questions to be answered / documented beforehand that will help keep the conversation moving toward your objective. Some questions to get you started are as follows:

• What is your prospect’s preferred name and how its  pronounced correctly
• What is your prospect’s job title and role inside the company
• What does their company do
• Prepare two easy to answer open-ended company specific questions to engage in conversation
• Prepare three key take-away statements in addition to your questions:

• An attention-grabbing introduction
• A statement or two for dealing with brush-offs
• Setting up the next appointment for a follow-up conversation

• And last but most important practice your call beforehand until it sounds natural, not scripted.

The most important part of your sales call preparation is identifying your prospect’s biggest competitors and determining their Unique Selling Proposition (USP’s), their Marketing strategy and their Brand image.  By reviewing your prospect’s competition, you will spot an opportunity to help them out. Thus, you’ll be in a better position to tailor your solutions to your client’s needs if you understand what they are up against.

The cold call is your first and best opportunity to begin a mutually beneficial and lucrative new sales relationship. Keeping your introduction brief and customer-centric shows respect for your prospect and their time. And since you don’t get a lot of time to make a good first impression, try using the following tips to quickly connect with your prospect during your sales call:

• Always address your prospect by name and correctly
• Immediately move to the reason for your call, emphasizing  the “what’s in it for them”
• Follow up with a couple of easy-to-answer questions to get the customer talking
• Remember to focus on your prospect, not on your product.

Many sales professionals rely on cold calling scripts and automation tools to boost their time efficiency and maintain better directional control over their sales conversations. Choosing a script that can be tailored to your specific needs and situation will improve your cold calling success. Put simply, templates and automation will help you to:

• Present yourself confidently and professionally
• Plan the key talking and listening points of each conversation in advance
• Feel less anxious about making these cold calls

Want to learn more on how-to-do, drop us an email and we will be happy to share our knowledge and insights with you!

For Hippocampus.io,

Christos Lytras – Managing Partner