So you are trying to prepare for some cold calls, and you definitely want to be successful. Remember that cold calling implies that you will call a total stranger trying to convince him/her in the first minute to subscribe/buy your product. Even if it seems impossible to achieve great success, you can actually become highly efficient by implementing the following strategies

Practice by calling someone you know first– you need to practice, so what better way than to call a friend or a family member and play your role? It is exactly like preparing for an exam, and calling first someone you know will help you better assess your actual skills. If that call goes well, every single time you need to call a stranger, you should envision the entire conversation you had with your relative and just do your performance in the same way. It is extremely important to remember that even if you are calling someone you know, you should act professionally and perform your job duties as regular.

Prepare. Smile. Relax. Dial. The person at the other end of line wants to hear a nice, warm voice and a relaxed, smiling person talking. Before actually dialing, make sure you are completely relaxed and have that ‘smiley’ and nice voice all throughout the conversation.

Body language may actually help– it is impossible for you to picture now how could gesticulating help a phone conversation go well. According to studies in the field, if you just talk over the phone in the same exact way you would talk face to face with a person might actually make your call highly successful. When you talk to someone face to face you use body language, gesticulating, smiling, raising your eyebrows and nodding. Just be natural and use body language as you usually do each time you are performing a cold call. It will help you relax, and help you speak in an extremely natural tome.

Keep it short and to the point- you simply cannot call a stranger and start talking using industry lingo for about 10 minutes. Make your sentences sweet and short, and allow the person at the other end of the line to assimilate that information. Allow the person to formulate his/her own questions and basically carry out a natural conversation. You are not a robot, so talk to the stranger in the same exact way you would like to have a sale person to talk to you over the phone.