Uncover the overlooked aspects of sales success in the modern sales landscape beyond cold outreach.
Revolutionizing Sales: The True Impact of Cold Outreach and Essential Sales Skills
If a non-salesperson joined LinkedIn, they might believe that cold outreach is the most important sales skill. More digital ink is spilled on cold outreach than on any other sales skill. Meetings are necessary, but what is the point of a meeting if you don't possess the skills necessary to win deals?
A large part of this overvaluation of cold outreach results from sales organizations reorganizing to rely on sales development representatives (SDRs). They believe this model is less expensive than traditional ways of organizing a sales team. As with many things, the price is lower, but the cost is often greater than it should be. Many, if not most, would do better with full-cycle salespeople.
The Art and Science of Cold Calling
You will find many approaches to cold calling and cold outreach. Acquiring a meeting is a confidence game. Your belief that you can create value for your client must be greater than their fear that you will waste their time, like so many others who have acquired a meeting without having anything to offer.
The confidence to schedule a first meeting without creating value is why so many salespeople cannot book a second meeting. When the prospective client agrees to the second meeting, they often ghost the sales rep, something easy to do when the meeting is virtual. Salespeople in this situation are like the proverbial dog that catches the car. Unable to do anything once it grabs the bumper, the dog must turn around and run back to its yard.
Achieving Sales Success: Beyond Meeting Bookings
A first meeting is an audition. You either pass the audition and are invited to a callback, or you fail, wasting your time, your client's time, and worse, leaving the meeting without the hope of creating an opportunity.
Once you have failed the audition, none of your calls or emails to the client matter. Your only option is to walk away with nothing, having wasted the opportunity, which will go to your competitor. In many industries, your competitor may retain that client for years or decades. You may not have a second chance after celebrating many birthdays.
If you go to a gym, occasionally, you might see a person with a great big chest and arms, and thin legs. This person spends more time on their upper body, ignoring their spindly legs.
It does no good to have a strategy to book meetings only to fail the client, fail to schedule a second meeting, and fail to create an opportunity. Sales leaders and sales managers believe the meeting is what matters. Most allow their sales force to log the first meeting as a new opportunity, convinced that pipeline coverage will ensure they reach their goals. Adding a new opportunity with nothing more than a first meeting is a "worst practice" in B2B sales.
Overvaluing cold outreach and the undervaluing everything that follows is one reason win rates are abysmal, and quota attainment continues to fall. To improve your results and win deals, you need to reverse your priorities. What happens in the meeting is far more important than getting it on the calendar.
There is no reason to schedule a first meeting if you will not be able to win the client. You don't need activity. You need effective activity to create and win sales opportunities. If a salesperson isn't effective in the first meeting, there is no reason to book it. Doing so is wasting an opportunity.
Why make a call with your dream client only to disappoint them? Unless you can create value for the client and book a second meeting, cold outreach isn't your problem; selling is your problem, even if you prefer to believe you have the coverage you need.
Understanding Buyer Needs and Sales Evolution
To create and win deals, you must create value for your prospective client and potential dream client. Being unable to do this prevents you from creating and winning deals.
It is easy to recognize when an organization's sales approach or methodology is outdated and no longer capable of creating value for the client. The evidence is a pipeline full of "opportunities" that have never progressed beyond a first meeting.
Facing a rare decision that they must get right on the first try, buyers and decision-makers want—and need—more from salespeople. When they don't get the help they need, they dismiss the salesperson who doesn’t create value for them and their company, even if the sales organization has the perfect solution for them.
Adapting Sales Strategies for Modern Buyers
It can be difficult for sales leaders to believe their longtime approach has lost its effectiveness, despite the mounting evidence that buyers want a different sales experience than the one they are receiving now.
Some suggest that nothing in B2B buying and B2B selling has changed. They seem to have missed things like the change in our environment, the internet, business models, and a hundred other things that are now different.
If your results are not what you need them to be, you need to change. If you want your team to produce more meetings, start by making sure they are competent to provide buyers and decision-makers what they need to continue in a conversation with the salesperson and their company.
In revolutionizing your sales approach, remember that cold calling and essential sales skills are only part of the equation. It's about understanding your clients' needs and creating value. By focusing on value creation and relationship building, you will set yourself apart in today's competitive market. Shift toward full-cycle sales and leverage these skills to build stronger, more effective client relationships. This value-driven approach will enhance your sales strategy and also position you as a leader in the evolving landscape of B2B sales.
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