Cold calling (from the callee’s perspective)

I found a great blog post by Greg Reinacker, CTO of NewsGator who apparently gets cold called a lot at work. Greg took the time to write out in detail what it’s like to be the reciepient of a bad cold call. Here are some good quotes:

Imagine this, which seems to happen most of the time:

Greg: “Hello, this is Greg…”

Sales guy Bob: “Hello, Greg, this is Bob WannaSellYa. How are you doing today?”

11 words, and this already puts me in a bad spot, and instantly annoys me. First, I have no idea who Bob WannaSellYa is or what company he’s with. So I’m either annoyed that he wants to know how I’m doing even though I don’t know him, or I’m horrified that I might have met him yesterday and forgot his name. Could go either way. If you have some connection to me – if say someone I know gave you my contact info – then say so right away, and I’ll pay much more attention. Otherwise, my usual response to this:

Greg: “Fine.”

And I’m sorry to admit, it’s not a polite “fine” – it’s more of an annoyed, who-the-f%@!-are-you “fine”.

He even offers some tips to the would-be-callers:

• Get to the point quickly; small talk is awkward when we don’t know each other.
• If we have some mutual acquaintance or connection, say so quickly, and I won’t blow you off. Better yet, ask them to introduce you to me via email.
• If I don’t answer your voice mail, you don’t need to leave 8 more messages – I got the first one. I probably just don’t need what you’re selling at the moment. It’s no offense.