Making Cold Calls
By Gary Ferrington

OK, so you decided the best person to work for is yourself. You have everything set up. You've had a cable connection installed for your computer/server. The phone works. The address on the door clearly states your name and that you are ready for business. Now all you need are clients who want your services.

Now there's the rub. Clients! Unless you have somehow established a clientele you need to advertise and more importantly go out and start selling your services.

This week's Random Links presents a number of online resources related to cold calling - that is picking up the phone and contacting a potential client, or hitting the street and knocking on doors.

Effective Use of Cold Calls - Pitching web design. By Rachel Goldstein. "There are not many people that enjoy cold calling, so I assume that you might be a little worried about this. Believe me, I hate cold calling as much as you. But if you are in need of a gig, I would give it a shot. With use of a script, and a lot of practice, cold calling will seem much less intimidating." Source: Creativepublic.com and AllFreelanceWork.com.

Making Cold Calls. "The objective of a cold call is to gather information about the prospect's potential, educate the prospect on the benefits of your product or service, and in many cases, to get an appointment. There are several challenges to cold calls and they include: fear; getting past assistants, secretaries, and other gate keepers; finding the right contact; and finding a way to make a pitch quickly that will move the sales process forward." This article presents eight tips to help you overcome these challenges. Source: Small Business Exchange.

6 Steps for Turning Cold Calls Into Hot Sales. By Carla Goodman. This article, like the one above, presents a number of tips on how to overcome your fear of cold calling. The focus is to shift one's attitude about approaching strangers and being passionate about what one has to market be it a product or service. Source: Entrepreneur.com

Cold Calling Tips. By Susan Ward. "While in the perfect world, your phone would be ringing off the hook all day with clients offering you business, the reality is that if you want business, you need to go after it, and cold calling is an effective sales tactic if it's done properly." Source: About.

The Art of Cold Calling. By Stacey Baillie. Preparing a telephone script provides you with confidence and consistency in making cold calls. Two scripts are presented by the author that she uses during a cold call; and one where she calls after a mailing. Readers are encourage to use and adopt to their needs. Source:Suite101.com

Bundle Up for Cold Calling - Parts 1 and 2. By Chris Yeh "Cold calling is also one of the most important aspects of sales, especially for a freelance business, and if you're a one-person-show, there's only one poor guy or girl upon whom you can pawn off the distasteful task: yourself. Fortunately, there is a science to cold calling, and there are ways to avoid feeling like a pushy parrot." Part 2 includes eight simple tips about scripting to make your cold-call pitch as effective as possible.