The Fall of Cold Outreach Sales

Welcome back to the latest edition of the Trelis video series featuring CEO Isaiah Bollinger discussing some top trends in eCommerce to look out for in 2020. In the past, Isaiah has shared expert insight on scaling your business, maximizing your budget, and hiring quality talent. Today, we take a look at the sales process and discuss the transition away from traditional cold calling strategies.

Abandon Cold Outreach for Warmer Waters

2020 will be the year that brands begin moving away from cold calling and rather focus on fostering relationships that provide greater lifetime value. In the past, cold calling was the go-to strategy to build a business. Now, it is quite difficult to build a solid foundation of sales off of cold leads only. We are not advocating for a complete abandonment of cold outreach, but rather we are encouraging businesses to begin thinking of other selling strategies. From our own experience, we have noticed that building relationships with clients and then selling to them is the way to go. Gain their trust and prove your loyalty before they sign on the dotted line. This will create a symbiotic partnership as both parties have something to gain from the exchange.

Create Brand Influence Over Time

If your business was built on cold outreach, you do not have to abandon that approach entirely. Rather, begin integrating warm outreach strategies into your business so you do not fall behind. Inbound leads or warm leads are much easier to close than cold calls. Businesses should focus on building relationships between brands. This can begin through organic networking, connecting on social media, or inbound lead traffic. If you can create some level of traction between you and potential clients, a snowball effect will begin and eventually the potential clients will be in a position to be sold to. Use your social media accounts to interact with your followers and deliver content that reinforces your brand to potential customers. Every time potential customers come in contact with your brand, it is a win. They become increasingly likely to work with you and become a customer. Use the law of familiarity to your advantage. Creating a more robust sales approach will yield the most effective results. This approach is more long-term oriented so maintaining patience is a must. Trust in your relationship-building capabilities and sales will eventually roll in.

Reach Out at the Right Time

A central problem associated with cold outreach is that you contact a plethora of people that are not good fits for your business and will never be interested. This results in wasted time and money while also burning through lead lists rapidly. A better approach is to create curated lists of decision-makers that are known to be in your industry and have a baseline of knowledge relevant to your products or services. This will facilitate the sale and make it easier to approach them in the first place. Providing context increases the likelihood of the sale. Use customized messaging, personalized branding, and gifting to capture even more customers.

 

.