Step 5: Measure Your Results
With cold calling, measuring success is a lot less straightforward than with other lead-generation tactics. When you calculate your CPA, you not only need to include the cost of the contact list you buy, but also the cost of the employee doing the cold calling. Although many of the costs are tangible, it can become a slippery slope. Let’s say you pay each cold caller $3,000 per month (or $36,000 per year), and each caller generates an average of 1,000 leads per month. You can argue that each caller contributes $3 to the CPA. But wait! Are you adding in things like computer and telephone costs, office space allocations, taxes, benefits, the average two complimentary soft drinks each employee takes per day from your food and drink pantry, and other, not-so-visible costs? Sometimes, it’s tough to know where to draw the line.
In calculating your CPA for cold calling, it may help you to use the concept of a cost-per-click (CPC), as you would use with online lead-generation tactics like SEM. Even though cold calling is an offline process, and you don’t have a metric like a “click” when you call a prospective customer, you can apply online measurement tactics. For example, think of each cold call you make as being an impression, similar to the impression someone gets when they see a PPC ad for your product on a search engine. The persons you call may not buy your product, but at least they become aware of it.
Think of each lead you get from cold calling as being a “click.” Every time your cold callers pass on a warm transfer to a salesperson, or every time the prospective customer puts down the phone and visits a landing page, you have a lead. So if a cold caller is doing 300 calls per day, and approximately 30 of these calls become a warm transfer, you have a 10% conversion rate. If that list cost you $600, then your CPL is $20.
Measuring the number of calls, or impressions, your cold callers make per day, as well as the number of leads, or “clicks,” they receive, should be easy. Most CRM tools have components that allow cold callers to log the number of calls they make, and to keep track of the number of leads that each caller is able to generate.
There are a lot of ways to measure the productivity of your team, but, at the end of the day, what really matters is how many leads they are generating. Often, their success or failure is not based on how many calls they are making but how they are making the calls. For example, a cold-calling team might average 100 calls per member per day but produce very few leads. But if they change tactics and do a little research on the people and companies on the list before making each call, they can often make fewer calls but yield a greater number of leads.
› › › What You Should Know ‹ ‹ ‹
Here’s what you need to know to plan a cold-calling campaign:
For lead-generation purposes, cold calling is a tried-and-true tactic. It is extremely appropriate for businesses whose purchasing audience is very small. Cold calling works best when the marketing department controls it.
For cold calling, you need to purchase a targeted list of clients from a trustworthy source. The initial list should include contact and demographic information for your potential customers, such as their phone numbers and job titles. Even after purchasing the list, you will need to improve it, either by having your marketing team research and verify the names and contact information on the list, or by hiring a third party to do it for you. Use tools like LinkedIn and Gist to research your prospects and gain as much context about them as possible before calling them.
Cold callers should have a script to follow when making their calls. The script is the creative asset of the cold-calling tactic, and marketing should be in charge of writing it. The script should introduce your company or brand, give your value proposition, and make your call-to-action/offer to the potential customer in about 30 seconds.
The script should also include follow-up questions that will allow the cold caller to qualify the potential customer as a lead during the call. If the customer qualifies, the cold caller should then convert them into a lead by directing them to a landing page, sending them a follow-up e-mail, setting an appointment, or making a warm transfer of the call to a salesperson.
When potential customers don’t qualify as leads but still have an interest in your company’s products, they should be placed in a “drip bucket,” so that marketing materials and special offers can be sent to them in the future. If the person called is the wrong person altogether, the caller should take the opportunity to find out who the right person is at the company—that is, who might have a need for your products.
Measuring your success can be tricky in cold calling because you have to factor in the expense of the employees who are doing the calling. In measuring your CPA, you should measure the number of calls made against the number of qualified leads you receive from those calls.