Is cold calling really necessary?

Barry Caponi is a regular guest blogger, President of Caponi Performance Group, Inc., and author of the upcoming book, Contrary to Popular Belief, Cold Calling Does Work! The Art & Science of Appointment Making (stay tuned for the release announcement). Caponi Performance Group has created a proven formula (called The Appointment Making Formula™) for setting more initial appointments. Barry has become a trusted sales resource to BrightBlue Marketing as we stress to our clients that cold calling is an important part of a successful marketing mix. Enjoy his blog and please share your thoughts! You can find him at www.caponipg.com.

Very few of us like to cold call, so how do we figure out if we need to cold call at all?

It’s really a pretty simple process as there are basically only three sources for an Initial Appointment with a target. They are:

1. Lead generation marketing campaigns that get people to raise their hands and tell us they are interested

2. Networking and referrals

3. Cold calling

To figure out if we need to cold call (and how much if we do), follow this formula:

1. How many Initial Appointments do I need in a year to hit my sales goal? (You can use our Activity Calculator (free on our website http://www.caponipg.com/ or send me an email at http://www.blogger.com/barry@coldcalling101.com)


2. From that number, subtract the following:


1. The number of Initial Appointments we get from marketing programs


2. The number of Initial Appointments we get from networking activities and referrals from customers


3. Whatever gap there is between the number we computed in step 2 subtracted from the result in step 1 is the number you’ll need to fill with cold calling. There is no other alternative.

Two last caveats –

1. Cold calling works best when we do it on a consistent basis, so we must figure out how many we need on average and do some every day, or at least, week.


2. Marketing, networking and referrals can sometimes not generate what we expected, or an economic downturn can cause us to need more. Make sure you’re looking at your results each week to see if you need open the cold calling spigot to make up the difference – did I mention there is no other alternative?