Warm calling lands somewhere between a cold call and a friendly conversation. Unlike cold calling, when you’re contacting someone who’s never interacted with your company, warm calling is connecting with prospects who already know a little about you. Maybe they visited your website or were referred by a co-worker. This familiarity gives you a head start since they already have some knowledge of you.
So, how can you make the most of this head start? Read on. In this issue of PromoPro Daily, we highlight a blog post from Revenue.io that shares some best practices for warm calls.
Begin by referencing the connection. With warm calling, the prospect already knows you or has heard of you. If you’ve spoken in person, bring that up. Or if they’ve engaged with your promo company online, mention your company and reference how they interacted with you. The Revenue.io recommends listening carefully to how the lead responds. It’s great if they recognize you but if they don’t recall a connection, you’re now making a cold call and you should adjust. The post points out that even if your lead doesn’t remember any prior interactions, you still have all the information from them and you can have a stronger sales discussion.
Speak their language. When you get the prospect on the other end of the line, make sure you use terms they know. Don’t use buzzwords or industry jargon. The idea is to show them you understand their business and their needs.
Build rapport quickly. In some ways a warm call is the same as any other sales call in that you need to execute on certain sales fundamentals to make the call successful. The Revenue.io post says that even though the person on the other end of the phone may know of your business or even who you are, it is still important to get them to like you by doing some rapport building.
Always ask questions. Finally, you can improve your warm calling by asking smart questions. The post says questions can help you qualify your prospect and show your professionalism. They also shift the focus away from a scripted pitch and open the door for a more genuine conversation.
Warm calling gives you an advantage. To make the most of the opportunity, remember to bring up the connection, personalize the conversation and ask thoughtful questions. Always listen more than you speak and focus on connecting rather than pitching.
Compiled by Audrey Sellers
Source: A blog post from Revenue.io, a revenue operations platform that helps teams with real-time guidance.
