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Cold calling is still a very effective method to start a sales pitch for the majority of service providers who are in the consulting business. Cold calling should be the next step once a lead has been identified and converted into contact or prospect. We all know the importance of the first 100 customers for start-ups. Before a cold call is made for a sales pitch, there are few guidelines that must be taken care of to make it effective. Some points are valid as general guidelines for any cold call and few are specific to social media marketing services. All the following guidelines can be categorised under “Know Your Customers, Know Your Prospects”. If you want to download a sample script for cold calling which pitches web designing services to clients, please click:  Script Download

Following the cold calling guideline gives a good success rate in converting prospects into sales.

Know Your Customers, Know Your Prospects

• Study the prospective contact person. 
• Literally, it means to study and investigate his/her social media profiles e.g. Facebook profile, linked in profile, twitter profile, etc.
• Try to find out about his/her hobbies, nature, passions, and goals. 
• See if you can relate to some common interests, goals, and friends.
• Try to find out his/her non-professional and professional acquaintances. 
• Look for the possibility of common references.
• Do thorough research on his/her company and its products and services.
• Do thorough research on his/her company’s competitors and its products and services.
• Study about the website and its ranking and other data on various search engines.
• Skim various social media platforms about the prospect’s products and services to find out positive and negative feedback given by the customers.

Conclude the best time to call him/her. It can be the gym time, swimming class time, golf playing time, or his/her personal leisure time. It is not good advice to call him/her during his/her family time when a sales pitch is made the first time. There should not be any hurry to make a cold call for social media marketing services. It is necessary that proper homework is done on the prospect, company, and products and services before the number is dialled on the keypad. Ideally, there should be a gap of 3 to 6 days before the cold call is made after a lead has been obtained for social media marketing services. This period should be utilised to do the activities, know your prospect. 

How to do cold calling for social media marketing services?

The answer is simple. After the process of “Know Your Customers, Know Your Prospects” the next step should be to get a script for cold calling for social media marketing clients. The script should have well thought of checkpoints and stories to handle all possible permutations and combinations.

The script should tackle the following points:

• Strategy to handle no answer or rebuttal
• Strategy to handle dissatisfied customers who have burnt fingers previously with similar services with some random vendors in the past.
• Strategy to handle customers who do not even have a basic website.
• Strategy to handle customers who can not produce content on their own. They do not have a content development team.
• Ignorant customers who do not even have basic knowledge of SEO, content marketing, PPC, Google advertising and Facebook advertising, etc.

Cold calling opening statement

Any cold calling script for social media marketing services should have a good opening statement and summary. The purpose of the opening statement is to arouse interest in the forthcoming conversation. This should be done in the first 20 seconds of the cold call. It is very important to prepare for the prospect of listening to future conversations. The opening statement acts as a bait for the prospect.

Some of the example snippets are as given below:

Sample 1

Hi ,Good Morning  [Prospect Name]/ Evening [Prospect Name] / Afternoon, I am XYZ calling from ABC company and we are an advertising agency, especially digital. Would you like to cut your advertising cost? With social media marketing?

Sample 2

Hi Good Morning  [Prospect Name]/ Evening [Prospect Name] / Afternoon, I am calling from the ABC company. My name is XYZ. I came to know you launched a new brand. Would you like to start generating sales right now without a big sales funnel?

Sample 3

Hey , Good Morning  [Prospect Name]/ Evening [Prospect Name] / Afternoon, Mr. DEF talked to me about you and your products and services. I came to know that you are looking for social media experts. Let me introduce you to our company XYZ.

Sample 4

Hey , Good Morning  [Prospect Name]/ Evening [Prospect Name] / Afternoon, I tried to search for your products/services on Google. And I was not able to find it in the first few pages. Do you need help in improving it?

Sample 5

Hey , Good Morning  [Prospect Name]/ Evening [Prospect Name] / Afternoon,We have a client who has similar products/services that of yours. They are doing well with the help of social media marketing. Would you like to adopt a similar modal ?

Sample 6

Hey , Good Morning  [Prospect Name]/ Evening [Prospect Name] / Afternoon, I am XYZ calling from the ABC company. We are used to seeing your big presence on TV, Radio, billboards, banners, and posters. What about the cost ? Have you ever thought of social media?

Cold calling conversation

After the attention of the prospect has been captured, the caller should change his/her tone and strategy of conversation. The further conversation should probe the prospect’s burning issues and the caller should adopt the listening approach with short probing questions in between. Listen, listen, and listen. Listening is the key and there should not be any focus on selling the company’s product or services. Understanding where the prospect stands in reference to the current situation in respect to social media activities is of utmost importance.

The purpose of the main conversation is to display the capability and credibility of the company in the social media marketing field.  This positioning of capability and credibility is very important which will lead to face to face meetings with the prospect.

Some of the examples of conversation are as given below:

Snippet Example 1

Prospect: 

Can social media reduce overall advertising cost for a brand like us ?

( Prospect may be referring to his/her own established brand existing for many years.)

Caller:  

Sir/Madam, social media is more effective for established brands as it is

the cheapest method for maintaining “brand recall” compared to other mediums like TV, Radio and billboards.

( Caller can present/share financial savings data made by other brands or companies)

Snippet Example 2

Prospect: 

We are a startup that just launched our products/services. Can social media marketing generate sales? We do not have even a proper team of salesmen.

Caller: 

Sir/Madam,  social media marketing is the perfect fit for you. It is the cheapest way to generate inquiries/leads. If you do not go for Google Ad words and Facebook marketing, it is almost free, Sir/Madam.

Prospect: 

Free? How come? There must be some cost.

Caller: 

Yes, it is the bare minimum like the cost of making graphics/infographics and professional

fees for sharing on social media platforms.

(Callers can share/present/quote the cost of generating content and professional fees for running campaigns on various social media platforms, but not Google Ad words, Facebook Advertisement, and other PPC paid campaign methods.)

Snippet Example 3

Prospect: 

Can my website be listed on the first page on Google?

Caller: 

Sir/Madam, to be visible on the first page on Google, a consistent and repetitive effort must be made by the brand or company. It includes generating good quality SEO friendly content, backlinking with high-quality websites, commenting, and social sharing. Sir/Madam, if we can have a face to face meeting, I can explain to you all in detail. Please let me know when we can meet personally.

Snippet Example 4

Prospect: 

Can I totally discard TV, Radio, and Print media advertising once I switch to social media marketing?

Caller : 

No. It is not advisable to totally discard offline and print media from your marketing strategy. However, it is advisable to reduce the overall budget for offline media and print media.

The purpose of the main conversation should be to create a value proposition for social media marketing services. Cold calls should never be treated as negotiations where closure can be done and a sale is made. This is a general rule and there can be exceptions for some situations and cases. The ultimate objective of the main conversation is to get the appointment or time for a face to face meeting.

Summary

A good cold calling script for social media marketing services leads to appointments for face to face discussion.

Please read: Cold calling is of utmost important for start-ups

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