Has cold-calling gone cold?

“Hello?” (distractedly)

“Hello, is that Joe Bloggs?” (friendly and enthusiastic)

“Speaking.” (warily)

“Hi, Mr Bloggs,” (even more friendly) “I’m calling from Office Supplies Ltd, I was wondering…”

“Not interested thanks.” (firmly)

“But Mr Bloggs…” (friendliness verging on hysteria)

Dial tone.

Ah cold-calling. About as popular as flu. And yet as prevalent as the common cold.  But why? When was the last time you actually let the salesperson even get past the introductions before hanging up?

The shutters comes down for most of us as soon as we realise this is, indeed, an accursed cold call, those regularly cited inclusions in our personal lists of The World’s Most Annoying Things. Even if they were selling you a house in the Bahamas for £6.50, you’d still probably announce decisively you weren’t interested and hang up the phone with a satisfying sense of not being one of those saps who sits through the entire call out of politeness.

And as for doing it, the common view is most of us would rather jack it all in and re-train as a circus performer than interrupt dozens of irritated and busy members of the public on a daily basis.

So why does this sales technique continue to flourish? Common sense tells us that it must be because it still works. But in an age where people are bombarded with sales messages thousands of times a day, selling has to be able to cut through everything else to make a connection.

With an ever-more sophisticated consumer, impatient and busy, it takes a lot to grab their attention. Is cold calling enough?  It does sometimes get sales, but does it generate enough to justify the hours of rejections a salesperson has to sit through before catching a break?

Many people say it does – but only if you have the right people doing it the right way. This is probably correct. But as a start-up, it seems unlikely that anyone would have enough time or expertise to successfully cold-call, and when the business is bigger, sales budgets might just be better spent looking after existing customers and using more sophisticated marketing techniques to attract new ones.

It’s difficult to imagine a world of sales that doesn’t include cold calling. But maybe it’s time to ask – is cold calling still relevant to today’s businesses? If cold-calling works for you, or if you think it is a waste of time, tell us about it below.

What do you think? Let us know in the box below.