5 cold call script strategies to book more

appointments

RingCentral Team Share 11 min read

Whether you’ve been in sales for many years or you’re a rookie, you’ve probably
encountered a variety of perspectives on the art (or science, depending on who
you talk to) of the cold call.

Either way, if you don’t have a healthy pipeline of opportunities or strong leads,
cold calling for appointments is a better way to go than waiting for business to fall
into your lap.

Admittedly, some cold call scripts sound forced or unnatural. That’s one of the
reasons why you aren’t handed a script by the top representative in the company
on your first day. Another reason is that cold calling in insurance, for example, is
probably different from cold calling in another industry.

In this post, we’ll talk about:

Cold vs warm sales call scripts

What should be in your cold call script

How to prepare for a cold call

5 cold calling script strategies

So, how do you write a cold call script you’ll actually want to use—that’ll also help
you schedule discovery phone calls and in-person meetings? How can you
differentiate yourself from other salespeople who are calling these same
Let’s get into it.

Up your prospecting game and close more deals with these free cold calling
scripts. ☎️

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Cold vs warm sales call scripts: different

scenarios require unique approaches

A cold call is an unscheduled, spontaneous phone call from a salesperson to a

prospective customer who has no pre-existing relationship with the salesperson or
the company they work with.

You might say the targets of these calls don’t quite qualify as prospects yet—
they’re better defined as “suspects” because they may or may not have the budget,
authority, need, or time frame for what you have to offer.

A warm call, on the other hand, is when a prospect has expressed an interest in
your products or services. They might have subscribed to your marketing
emails, or maybe they dropped by your trade show booth. Or perhaps they have
talked to your sales rep before.

Word-of-mouth referrals are also considered warm calls, as a prospect has been
informed by someone they trust that your products or services are worth
considering. Generally, this means your sales rep can spend less time educating
the prospect about your company, and instead jump right into exploring the
prospect’s challenges and requirements.

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What digest would

Pro-tip:

Make your first appointment a discovery discussion. Don’t get ahead of yourself (or
your prospect) and start presenting your value proposition or babbling about your
product before understanding if your solution fits their needs (or if they even have
this need). It’ll compromise your credibility or you could misrepresent the value of
your services—neither of which you want.
What should you include in a cold call
script to drive more appointments?

Your cold call script should start by answering these questions:

1. Who are you?

2. Why are you calling?

3. How does the prospect benefit from listening to you?

4. What do you want from the person you are calling? (This one’s easy. An
appointment)

Try not to end the call until two things are clear to the prospect:

1. The appointment you’re scheduling is to understand their business

challenges relative to your industry and domain expertise. It isn’t to
demonstrate your solution, negotiate pricing, or try an ill-timed sales pitch.

2. The prospect will get value from this call with you—whether or not they buy
from you. Either you’ll share some insights about their industry, or you’ll come
back with some recommendations not specific to your products or services
that’ll help them address their challenges.

Pro-tip:

Traditionally, you’d need nothing more than a telephone and a phone book to make
cold calls, but there are a ton of cold calling software that can make your job
easier. For example:

If you have a business phone system, you can integrate it with your Google
Calendar or Outlook Calendar to make sure all your scheduled calls show up in
your calendar
There are also CRM integrations for apps like Salesforce, Microsoft
Dynamics, or Oracle Sales Cloud to help your sales team make more cold calls
in less time while having all their prospect information at their fingertips:

For example, RingCentral integrates with Salesforce to give you valuable data and insights on your sales
calls. How long are they lasting? How many are you “winning?”

If you need to do sales demos you can run those online as well on a call if you
 conferencing, phone calling, and team messaging all in one platform.

Here’s a quick look at a few features that’ll make sales teams’ lives easier, like
scripting and flexible dialing options:

Make appointments, not closed deals, your cold call

goal

The goal of your cold call should be to gain traction with a prospect and secure
time on their calendar. If you plan your cold calls with this idea in mind, you’ll feel a
lot less pressure making your calls—and the people you are calling will feel less
pressured too.

Aggressive salespeople call to sell customers a product or service today, while

consultative sales advisors connect and network with business executives to share
their expertise. By scheduling a discovery call when it is convenient for both
parties, you set the expectation that you have something of value to offer.

Pro-tip:

Hank Aaron, the legendary baseball major leaguer, always approached the batter’s
box planning to swing—and he felt triples were the most exciting play in baseball. A
triple doesn’t get you to home base in one swing, but it does put you in a good
position to score a point later. Aaron retired with nearly 2,300 home runs and
nearly 800 triples. Yet he had the right mindset for putting potential points on the
scoreboard—and funny enough, making cold calls.

How to prepare for convincing cold calls

that convert

Depending on how well-known your company is, you might need to put a little effort
into your sales conversation starter.

If you’re probably going to have to explain what your company does, have a short
elevator pitch prepared that describes your value to the prospect but doesn’t get
you stuck on defining how long your company has been in business, who you’ve
done business with, or other details right away. If you have compelling customer
success stories, use them (and make sure those customers are okay with you
name-dropping them).
Save the meaningful, valuable insights for the actual appointment call. Just make
sure the prospect knows you have valuable information they can benefit from. Be
clear in stating they have to schedule time to learn from your insights.

Pro-tip:

Try to strike a balance between knowing enough about your prospects to build
credibility, and leaving enough room for the discovery meeting to still be valuable
for both of you. Often, this boils down to having good questions that lead to
insightful conversations. Find at least one convincing reason to have a compelling
conservation.

5 cold calling script strategies for your

swipe file

You’ll notice the question “How are you today?” won’t show up anywhere else in
this article. That’s because this question might come across as insincere, and it
generally causes prospects to think about how busy they are and how they should
get off the call with you as soon as possible.

Instead, acknowledge they’re busy and let them know you’re here to help them find
solutions to the problems that are making them so busy.

Keep small talk to a minimum for this appointment-setting cold call and get to the
point quickly. (Obviously, if their social media profiles are littered with messages
about their love for their alma mater or favorite sports team, you can mention it in
passing. Otherwise, stick to the facts.)

Here are five cold calling pitches that have high conversion rates for appointment
setting.

1. The “I’ve done my research” technique

Let’s say you make a call to a prospect on a Wednesday afternoon at 4:00 p.m.
According to HubSpot research 1, that’s generally the best time to make a cold call
and make a live connection.

In any case, you’ve researched the prospect and you’ve identified a news item on
the prospect company’s website that aligns with products or services your
company offers. You find someone in your company’s CRM, either on LinkedIn or
even in the news article, to call based on their title.

You don’t have to call a “Very Important Top Officer” on every call. But if you’re
going to make a habit of cold calling senior executives and you haven’t done your
research, you won’t succeed. By doing some research and telling them what you
discovered, you’ll distinguish yourself from many of the other salespeople the
prospects speak to.

Find a compelling reason why your product, service, or solution should be on an

executive’s radar, and incorporate it into your appointment pitch. If the person
you’re calling is quoted in an article, make that quote part of your script, especially
if the prospect mentioned a business challenge or opportunity that your product or
service addresses
You should always do some research of prospects before you call them. However,
don’t get too deep in research for an appointment you may not get. Find a person
to call with authority, find a compelling reason to be calling, and make a blitz of
calls during prime time.

2. The internal referral tactic

Calling a single contact in a company typically won’t give you the full story of
what’s happening within a company. You may have heard of the “pain chain” within
a business, where a particular challenge impacts multiple executives and their
teams.

Sales reps should end every call where they are turned down for an appointment
by asking if they think there’s anyone else in the organization that might be
interested in discussing a particular business challenge or objective.

Why? Because:

What do you have to lose? You’ve already gotten a no from the first person you
called. By asking for their help, you give the individual an opportunity to give
back. They likely feel somewhat guilty for turning you down.

It demonstrates that you’re invested in this conversation and distinguishes you

from other salespeople who get a no and just end the call.

Maybe the first person you called doesn’t have the authority to talk to a
salesperson on a particular issue, but they may know another project lead that
does—they may just need a little encouragement to refer you in the right
direction.

Pro-tip:

If you do get a referral to a second point of contact (POC), ask the first POC if you
can cite them as the referral source and if they’d want to participate in a
conference discovery call if you can secure an appointment. The first POC may not
have the authority to talk to service providers alone, but they may be a valuable
influencer as the sales process advances.

3. The “unruffled veteran sales rep” approach

Making a cold call to a prospect with a simple goal of a substantive conversation

shouldn’t cause you much anxiety, nor should it raise the blood pressure of the
prospects you’re contacting. Confidence and charisma go a long way in sales,
even over the phone when you are working to book appointments.

Author and sales coach Brian Tracy suggests salespeople challenge themselves to
make 100 cold calls as fast as possible (without burning bridges for future
attempts). By prioritizing quantity of calls over quality during a blitz, sellers may find
their “smile and dial” marathon can produce better results than if they took the time
to take rejection to heart.

Try saying things like:

“I’ve been speaking with a number of [prospect titles] who said they are
 is on their priority list for this fiscal year. Does that resonate with you as well?

“My company was able to help [your customer, indirect competitor of the
prospect you are calling] to [benefit of your products or services that the
prospect should care about based on their role].

Would you be interested in having a discussion later this week/early next about
how we were able to help them [quantified business value, such as increasing
business productivity or reducing production costs] in [quantified time]?

Pro-tip:

Be sure to have accurate referral numbers for any claims you make, because the
prospect you’re speaking with may have a relationship with your existing customer,
and they may call to verify your claims. Stranger things have, and will happen.

The more you come across as an experienced and reliable advisor, the more likely
you are to book appointments. Showing respect for a prospect’s time, and your
own, is critical.

4. The “let’s have a discussion, and if we don’t see a fit,

we part as friends” strategy

Do you need a way to build trust and rapport with prospects when asking for an
appointment? Show them you are comfortable with a “No” answer.

That doesn’t mean you get a “No” and you say goodbye. It means that you get an
objection, like “We already have a phone system”, but you can acknowledge their
objection and address it by differentiating your business from what they’re currently
doing.

Don’t make the mistake of pointing out the weaknesses of their existing solution.
Instead, speak to the strengths of what you have to offer and any opportunities to
enhance their existing investment with services from your portfolio. Instead of
suggesting a prospect to “rip and replace” what they already have, try to find a way
to find a “beachhead” opportunity to win over a new account.

💡 Pro-tip:

The “beachhead,” aka the “land to expand” sales strategy, refers to selling a small
quantity of products or services now in order to generate more sales later on. For
example, a customer may subscribe to 5 Ringcentral licenses for their inside sales
team. A resourceful salesperson may then propose a long term vision for
deployments across the entire sales organization including sales rep in the field
(maybe 20 or 30 people).

5. The “making friends with gatekeepers” cold call

There are so many obstacles for salespeople to navigate through, especially when
 Voicemail purgatory

The “I have a meeting” ruse

The “press 1 for this department” voice menu labyrinth

The executive assistant barricade

Are you the kind of salesperson who’d rather charm a gatekeeper to get on an
executive’s calendar? Or do you prefer the stealthy yet direct path to an
executive’s desk phone or mobile device that an auto-attendant can sometimes
provide? Let’s look at the benefits and drawbacks of both scenarios.

If you’re navigating through a phone menu (or a virtual attendant), you may
discover names of executive assistants or colleagues on voicemail greetings which
you can leverage to your advantage.

Enrich your prospect calling lists with these new names and titles you discover. Or
better yet, you can learn more about the organization and have conversations with
a decision maker’s colleagues who have influence on the suppliers they know, like,
and trust.

Cold calling etiquette for EAs (your VIPs)

Much like the way you treat the wait staff at a restaurant can dictate your dating
success, gatekeeper etiquette is key to your success, especially in B2B sales.
Write gatekeeper-specific cold call scripts that foster trust and rapport.

Don’t underestimate the influence of an executive assistant. Treat them with tact
and respect, as they often have a great deal of influence on the calendars of
multiple executives.

Cold call sales scripts: remember to leave

room for improvisation

Cold call scripts are a great resource to build a routine for calling blitzes and for
building confidence to ask for appointments. Build in a few “If prospect says X,
then I say Y” decision tree branches.

As you build confidence with your script and know your elevator pitch and unique
sales proposition inside out, find opportunities to improvise based on how a call is
flowing. Tailor your script messaging to the roles of the people you are talking to.
One script does not fit all!

And remember, if you speak to someone who says they don’t have a need for what
you offer, ask them if they know someone else who might. Word-of-mouth goes a
long way.

1
blog.hubspot.com/sales/the-best-time-to-cold-call-more-data-driven-sales-secrets-infographic

Originally published Mar 16, 2020, updated Nov 18, 2021