Inbound Marketing: Assisted Cold Calls Vs. Old School Cold Calls

For all of you diehard Inbound Marketing purists, you may find issue with this article. I am going against the purist grain of my industry’s mantra that “All outbound marketing and sales efforts are dead and a waste of time.” Yes, I am supporting cold calling. Why? Because I believe cold calling is still an effective way of securing new business. (And guess what, shhh… I also condone trade shows, email marketing and advertising; but this is another topic altogether and needs explaining unto itself.) 

Let’s play out a typical, old school cold calling scenario: 

1. You identify your target buyers, industries and geographic areas
2. You buy a list of potential companies that match your profile
3. You start making phone calls, hoping to get the right person on the phone
4. You call as many people as you can knowing that this is all about getting to the right person at the right time
5. You place hundreds of calls and if you are lucky you secure a couple of meetings
6. In these meetings you work to identify the buyer’s needs and pain points so you can sell them the best solution
7. Of the meetings you get, you realize a 10-20% sale conversion rate

You detest this part of your job. You are tired of being hung up on. Just getting past the receptionist is an art in itself. You leave countless voicemails and continue to follow up with more voicemails and emails, pissing off your prospect along the way. When you finally do get through and have an actual conversation, most of the time you get a lame excuse as to why they are not interested. But you are persistent so you put a note in your CRM to call them back in a couple months. And so goes the life of a cold caller.

Does this not sound like an archaic and ridiculous process? So why do so many organizations dedicate countless salespeople hours to doing just this? There is a better way and it's called Inbound Marketing Assisted Cold Calling.

Inbound Marketing is the art and science of attracting prospective customers to you, engaging them and getting information from them so that you can build relationships with them. Inbound Marketing strategies often provide buyer first and last names, company information and the exact product or solution the prospect is interested in - long before you talk to them. 

Let’s play out a typical Inbound Marketing Assisted Cold Calling scenario:

1. You identify your target buyers, industries and geographic areas
2. You implement an inbound marketing program by providing highly relevant content on the Internet to your target buyers
3. Prospective buyers engage with your content while you capture their information
4. You make educated phone calls to specific people and you know exactly what products or services they are interested in
5. You land more meetings because your company is already perceived as a trusted resource
6. You land a lot more business

Inbound Marketing is the new paradigm shift in sales today. To learn more about how your business can shorten sales cycles, improve your sales productivity and increase revenues, download our case study on how one manufacturer doubled visits, leads and new customers here.

Do you combine Inbound Marketing and cold calling or do it the old-fashioned way? Share your experiences in the comments below.