How to Make Fear Your Friend in Cold Calling

<p style="text-align: center;"></p> <p>Seth Godin, of Purple Cow fame, writes, “Trust and attention – these are the scarce items in a post-scarcity world.” </p> <p>I’m obviously fairly partisan on this issue but would certainly add “Fear” to his list as well. Or, specifically, how do you embrace and leverage “fear” in your systematic effort towards Market Dominance?</p> <p>No one said Market Dominance would be easy. It’s diligent and deliberate…it’s a three-year marathon where one of your end goals is that you end up having discovery meetings with 60% of your market. It’s both ambitious and arduous to set a course for market dominance. But the results are irrefutable…IF your inputs are consistent. For instance, understanding that the constraint of your sales system is not headcount, sales methodology, or even price point.</p> <p>It’s the flow rate of conversations with relevant people that you have at the top of your funnel that is so commonly the real constraint to success. </p> <p>----more----</p> <p>But as entrepreneurs and Sales Leaders, knowing what we need to do to fix this top of funnel constraint is often a dreadful and fear-inducing exercise. Because we know what this real constraint is called: It stirs in the bellies of sales professionals everywhere. It’s not the bogeyman, or Baba Yaga or Pennywise; it’s the “Cold Call.” This king of all top of funnel constraint leads many teams to displacement…or the simple avoidance of what truly needs to be done by doing something seemingly easier or far less friction. </p> <p>Like sending email. </p> <p>Or better yet, sending an email campaign. </p> <p>Or doing SEO, lots and lots of SEO...</p> <p>Anything but jumping on the phone and talking to strangers. </p> <p>Even in our own sales community on LinkedIn, there are countless and doggedly argued threads every week where a new sales “expert” likes to wax on about the final death knell of the cold call. Or that having your reps Cold Call is a colossal waste of both capital and goodwill. </p> <p>They’ll s