Make Fewer Cold Calls and Get Better Results
by Ari Galper, Founder of Unlock The Game®

Cold calling, the old way, has to be the most painful form of sales work you can experience. There’s a lot of rejection, fear, and deflated hopes. 

But there’s a new way to make cold calling as pleasant and relaxed as picking up the phone and talking to a friend. Just follow these steps, and your cold calls can become an enjoyable part of your day.

1. Rip Up Your Sales Script and Start a Conversation
If you’ve been selling for a while, you’ve probably used a sales script. Perhaps using a script is the only way you know to start a cold call. 

But people can almost always tell when you're reading from a script, even if you think you’re pretty good at it. There's just nothing personal about it, and people pick up on that.

A script isn’t a conversation.  It’s a linear process designed to move the other person toward a sale. You’re not having a real dialogue when you’re using a script. So nothing is “real” about the whole encounter. 

A conversation, on the other hand, is a living, breathing relationship. You’re two real people, talking normally and naturally.

So when you’re just being yourself, the other person’s walls can come down. Because you’re not coming at them with one-way sales strategy. So your cold calls typically last longer. You’ll make fewer calls, and have better results. 

2. From “Dreaded Salesperson” to Trusted Advisor
The old cold calling strategies teach you to polarize the roles of buyer and seller. You’re trying to coax “prospects” into buying your product. You’re not thinking about their world – their budget, problems, or time constraints. You’ve been taught to think about the sale. 

Well, suppose you were to focus instead on the things that matter to the other person. For example, their problems. What if you were to become a problem solver?

That’s exactly the place you want to be when making your cold calls. Imagine approaching someone with the idea of finding out whether you can help solve a problem.  Imagine the kind of attitude this would convey to the other person. 

You’re no longer trying to persuade. You’re not even thinking about the sale. You’re thinking about whether you can help someone solve a problem. You’re relaxed, comfortable, and authentic. 

When you make your cold calls this way, you’ll find that others will engage you more.  And you’ll also be able to really enjoy what you’re doing. 

3. Gain the Respect You Deserve – Stop Pushing and Chasing
The old-school sales gurus teach the essentially the same approach. “Focus on closing the sale. Keep pushing forward. Overcome objections. Your job is to turn every no into a yes.”
Persuading and coaxing has always been considered a normal and necessary part of cold calling. But it’s rooted in a kind of macho selling image. If you don't keep pushing, it means you're giving up. So you keep trying to move things forward, and you keep “chasing” with follow-up calls. 

Even when your focus is on solving a problem for the other person, you can be coaxing and cajoling. But if you do this, how can you become the trusted advisor I spoke about earlier?
It’s really simple. Just let go of your attachment to the sale. When you do this, you can relax into being the professional that you are.  

When you stop focusing on getting the sale, you can become a trusted resource. You’re no longer chasing, pushing, and cajoling. You’re helping. And that makes a world of difference in how people respond to you. 

Follow these guidelines, and cold calling can become surprisingly enjoyable. You’ll find yourself spending much more time with each person. You’ll also see more positive results, whether or not a sale unfolds. Others will tend to respond to you more graciously.  And your whole cold calling experience can become a pleasant one.  

To your success,

 

Is Selling Painful For You?  It's not your fault -- and there is a better way  Is this how selling is starting to feel like for you? Old "tried and true" cold calling and sales techniques that were once successful have completely lost their effectiveness over the years. That's why I developed a new sales mindset and cold calling approach that will quickly and automatically put you ahead of the game and instantly in a league above your competition. OLD SALES GURU MYTH # 1  - "Cold calling is a numbers game."  But, sales is only a numbers game when all you know is traditional selling. Yes, you can call people over and over, chase them until they listen to you so that you just go away. However there is a better - easier method of building trust and getting your product or service message across - all on one call. Simply by changing your sales approach you'll make FEWER CALLS and MORE SALES. OLD SALES GURU MYTH # 2 - "Use a sales script to cold call." People can tell when you're reading from a script, even if you think you're pretty good at it and getting away with it. There's nothing personal about it and people can pick that up. Being artificial just puts you into the typical "Salesperson" category. If you can learn to get your message across in a different way, you'll eliminate the negative triggers that can lose your sale within seconds. OLD SALES GURU MYTH # 3 - "Focus on closing the sale." Are you "going in for the kill" with your closing sale technique? - If you are, you could end up killing your deal instead. Old sales techniques do nothing more than pressure the client or prospect, and as a result they naturally want to retreat away from that pressure - and that pressure is you. By learning to avoid the "push and pull" dynamic between you and your prospect, you'll be able to move the sales process forward to get the result you want. Welcome to Unlock The Game™  Unlock The Game is a radically honest sales and cold calling approach based on integrity and common sense. It challenges traditional sales thinking and helps you achieve better sales results. It's the missing link -- a new mindset and language that converts selling into a natural conversation between you and your prospect. It offers you a new way of thinking about selling, from cold calling -- the most dreaded selling experience of all -- to the end of the sales process. You don't have to abandon the selling skills you already know -- Unlock The Game gives you a new approach and new tools to help you let go of old behaviors that bring you negative results. It's incredibly effective. Best of all, it's easy to learn.   "Unlock The Game is a breakthrough that takes the rejection out of cold calling"   "In a new age of frustrating and difficult selling challenges, more specifically the fear of cold calling, and starting new conversations without feeling rejected, Unlock The Game gives us all the answers to a natural way of engaging new prospects over the phone. Keep up the good work Ari!" Brian Tracy is a leading authority on personal and business success. As Chairman and CEO of Brian Tracy International, he is the best-selling author of 17 books and over 300 audio and video learning programs.        Brian Tracy  Want to learn more? Get FREE Access to The Teleseminar That Put the Old 'Sales Gurus'  Back Into Sales Pre-School!      Learn how to:   Make less cold calls - and get better results   Rip up your sales script and easily get your message across    Change from the "Dreaded Salesperson" to a trusted advisor in a matter of minutes    Get rid of your "Fear of Phone" once and for all    Stop chasing prospects and gain the respect you deserve  Take The Free Test Drive:  Enter your First Name, Primary Email, Phone Number and Your Selling Challenge below to get the first of your 10 free Unlock The Game cold calling audio mini-lessons:     First Name Last Name Primary E-mail Phone Number Your Selling Challenge:   SECURE AND CONFIDENTIAL         (Your email address will be 100% protected and will never, ever be shared.) To your success,    Email to a Friend   Print this Page