Sales Call Strategy: Everything You Need to Know

Sujan Patel

May 7, 2020

Contents

Phone selling is a must-have skill for salespeople. But unfortunately, in-person sales skills don’t necessarily translate to phone calls, where you don’t get the benefit of seeing your prospect’s expression, body language, and other non-verbal communication. A few of the factors that go into successful phone selling include:

Developing and deploying effective cold call scripts
Knowing how to handle getting stuck in a prospect’s voicemail system
Building rapport when you aren’t face-to-face with your prospect
Being able to qualify or disqualify prospects
Maximizing your efficiency by tracking calls and streamlining your outreach process
Asking the right questions to get the information you need to close the deal

If you’re falling short in any of these areas, the resources below will help get you up to speed. Check them all out, or pick and choose based on your biggest needs:

Cold calling

How to Create and Use Cold Calling Scripts

Wendy Weiss of coldcallingresults.com shares her tips for a) creating your own cold call scripts, rather than relying on ones you find online, and b) how to use them on calls to sound competent and structured while still sounding human.

The Ultimate Guide to B2B Cold Calling

A thorough overview of the steps to take before the call, how to conduct yourself on the call, and what to do after the call to improve the quality of your sales calls and close more deals.

5-Step Cold-Calling Technique That Gets You to the Sales Conversation

Don’t over complicate the cold calling process. This step-by-step guide gives you an easy-to-follow process that focuses on the core elements of effective cold calls (and helps to keep you from annoying your prospects).

How to Create Your Own Cold Calling Sales Scripts

Cold calling sales scripts are everywhere, but it’s impossible to stand out if you use the same templates as everybody else. In this article, Mailshake founder Sujan Patel shows you how to build your own scripts – without reinventing the wheel.

8 Cold Calling Tips to Boost Your Success Rate (& Keep It Fun)

Not getting the results you want from your cold calls? These tips from Rune Ersgard will help you get into the right cold calling mindset, use scripts effectively, and connect successfully with your top prospects.

How to Start a Cold Call

On a sales call with a new prospect, you’ve only got a few seconds to capture attention – so you’ve got to make your intro count. Check it out for appropriate cold call openings and goals for initial connections.

Ditch Your Script, Use These Cold Calling Techniques Instead

If you’re ready to try going off-script, check out Jason Bay’s take on how to open cold calls effectively, leverage your notes from past conversations, and use question stacking to hook prospects in this article.

Phone Sales Tips: Do These 5 Things to Ensure Cold Calling Success

Contributor Joe Latchaw writes in this article that, “There are no shortcuts on the road to success.” But you can learn from his expertise on everything from call timing to developing the right mindset for cold calling success.

Planning your call

How to Sell Over the Phone & Win (Mindset Mastery)

Selling over the phone requires a separate skill-set – one where the value of non-verbal communication is taken out of the equation. Check out this article to learn the CAT Framework for mastering your phone-selling mindset.

Call Mapping: What It Is, and How to Incorporate It Into Your Sales Process

Call mapping involves being prepared for future sales calls with bullets and talking points, developed through educated guesses and obstacles you’ve anticipated. Learn how to do it in this article from Sujan Patel.

How to Execute a Good Sales Discovery Call (Simple 7-Step Process)

Make no mistake: even though discovery calls are for qualifying or disqualifying prospects, they’re still sales calls. This seven-step process will show you how to use them correctly in your sales process.

How to Create An Ultra-Efficient (& Effective) Sales Discovery Call Process

Don’t waste time drawing out the prospect qualification process. Instead, use sales discovery calls correctly to streamline your workflows and free up time for more active selling.

What is a Voicemail Drop and How to Use It to Improve Your Prospecting

80% of calls wind up going to voicemail – and that includes many of your sales calls. Be prepared with a voicemail drop strategy that supports your prospecting goals.

17 Best Call Tracking Software Apps

In the market for a new call tracking software app? Take a look at this round-up of 17 tools that meet our criteria for being intuitive, easy-to-use, scalable, customizable, and feature-rich.

Qualifying leads

8 Questions to Ask on a Sales Discovery Call to Qualify Leads

You’ve got a lead lined up, but how do you know if they’re a good fit? Use these eight qualifying questions as part of your sales discovery process to make sure you’re talking to the right people.

15 Sales Qualifying Questions (And Why They Work)

Expand your sales qualifying arsenal further with these additional questions. Review not just the questions themselves, but the logic behind why they work as well.

A Step-by-Step Process for Qualifying Sales Leads

Even though most salespeople call prospecting a top concern, it’s really lead qualification they should be concerned about. Here’s how to do it well, using this eight-step process.

How to Qualify Leads Using the NOTE Framework

For another way of looking at lead qualification, check out this article, which covers the NOTE Framework used by Sean Burke, SVP of Sales at LivePerson, to qualify leads in their own terms.

Handle yourself on the call

How to Build Rapport on a Sales Call

Building rapport doesn’t always come naturally – even for salespeople. The suggestions here will help you forge connections and avoid relationship-killing missteps when connecting with prospects on sales calls.

How to Listen Actively on the Phone in Sales

It’s easy to understand the value of listening on sales phone calls, but it can be surprisingly difficult to execute. Get back to the basics with these tips on effective listening.

How to Make Sure Prospects Attend Your Sales Calls

There’s nothing worse than holding time on your calendar for no-show prospects. And while the steps in this article won’t guarantee your prospects’ attendance, they’ll go a long way towards minimizing missed meetings.

6 Rapport-building Questions to Ask in Your Next Sales Call

Sick of asking about the weather? The local sports team? These six rapport-building questions will help you engage prospects on your next sales call without falling into small-talk cliches.

How to Ask Probing Sales Questions to Close More Sales

If you can’t get the information you need from your prospects, you can’t close the deal – it’s as simple as that. Learning to ask probing questions as part of your sales process gives you all the ammo needed to land the sale.

How to Leverage Open-ended Sales Questions to Close Your Sales

Stop giving your prospects easy outs with yes-or-no questions. These open-ended sales questions will keep them talking until you have all the information you need to close the sale.