How Do You Stay Motivated When You're Failing At Cold Calling?
In the sales game most people would admit that cold calling is generally not at the top of their list of things they look forward to tackling on a daily basis. Usually it rates somewhere on the list between doing expense reports and filling out a 183 page RFP.
Since all my team does IS cold call, the continual challenge is providing a work environment where our inside sales reps aren’t dreading the thought of walking in the door every day faced getting one NO after another. Let’s face it, spending 8+ hours cold calling would be something that the average sales person shudders to think of. If that's the case what can you do to motivate your team to make the dials? I hate to say it, but there generally tends not to be one magical answer.
In our traditional day of cold calling we encounter an endless variety of roadblocks. While we are armed with a response to each roadblock, there are however periods that no matter what we do it seems a monumental struggle to hit our goals. The typical response I hear if one of my reps is having a tough stretch is “I don't understand, I'm doing things the same exact way I've always done them but my numbers are terrible this quarter." Of course I'll sit with my folks to try to uncover what may be affecting their performance. After some deliberation, generally what I land on is that there is no magic wand that I can waive to suddenly turn a slow quarter around. You need to anticipate the "Ebbs and Flows". My inside sales reps hate when I say this because they want me to provide them the answers that will immediately turn their crappy quarter around. Unfortunately at times it's just not that easy.
I know saying this may not necessarily make me sound like much of a master motivator, but with cold calling you need to prepare for virtually everything...good, bad and everything in between.
With that all being said - where do you go from here? Though the answer you may be looking for may not present itself immediately I've found that there are a least couple of things that can help to get you headed in the right direction.
First off REMOVE the negative mind set. If you're struggling, your desperation will shine brightly through the phone. Do what you can to get your mind off the struggle. Try calling into Canada or the Southern US for a bit of a pick-me-up... Damn those people are nice! If these people don't give you the time of day, maybe you should start thinking about another profession.
Secondly START SMALL! Don't assume that you can correct everything in a day and turn that quarter around immediately. Rather than banging your head against the wall taking the same exact approach, mix it up a bit. I'm not saying you need to necessarily abandon what has worked for you in the past, but just try incorporating some small tweaks to your daily routine. For example re-work the calling strategy for a day. Try making your calls in the morning and then craft some targeted follow-up emails in the afternoon - then try it in reverse order the next day. Changing things up a bit can help to re-set your mindset and before you know it you might actually start having some fun again.
So buck up little campers. Just because you're not able come up with an immediate solution to a crappy quarter doesn't mean you've lost your touch. Just be prepared to put your gladiator gear on every day you dial. Obviously it can be difficult to not let the negativity get to you at times. If you approach every call with the appropriate amount of confidence regardless of what happened on the previous call, I guarantee you will win a hell of a lot more days than you'll lose.