Cold calling is a sales strategy that involves calling prospects you’ve never interacted with before. Because it relies on a connection with a relative stranger who may not be ready to make a purchasing decision, it’s one of the most challenging parts of a sales rep’s job. However, the process works demonstrably better than email-only outreach.
We’ve compiled 18 calling statistics along with actionable tips you can use to make effective cold calls to grow your business.
1. 82% of buyers accept meetings with sellers who cold call
According to Rain Group’s research, 82% of buyers agree to set up meetings after being cold called. Far from being dead, cold calling is alive and well as a sales method. It’s important to note that this statistic doesn’t say that buyers agree to a meeting after the first cold call. It says 82% of buyers agree to a meeting after being cold called. It does take more effort than just calling once to secure a meeting with a potential customer.
What this means for small businesses
Cold calling works, and the statistics back this up. While there are plenty of ways to connect with customers and prospects, such as email campaigns, text messages, and videos, cold calling should still be an essential part of your sales strategy.
2. It takes an average of 6 calls to connect
Cold calling works—if the frequency is enough. If you can get someone on the phone, you are likely to get a meeting and the chance to pitch your product properly. In fact, 93% of your leads that convert will happen after six calls. However, it takes tenacity and persistence to get someone to pick up the phone.
What this means for small businesses
Sales teams should have a cold calling strategy that details the number of contacts to make, the methods of following up, and how they plan to convert prospects into customers. Sale reps should consistently make six cold calls before stopping their attempts to contact the prospect.
Looking for more information on how to effectively conduct cold calling? Read our cold calling beginner’s guide and follow the simple step-by-step instructions to make calling more successful.
3. Call leads immediately for 60x results & 50% more sales
If you call your leads within the first hour after they submit a query, you are 60 times more likely to qualify the lead. This lets you find out whether the customer is a good fit for your product or service, and whether they are worth spending time and resources continuing to contact them and build a relationship.
Furthermore, the vendor who contacts the customer first earns the sale 35% to 50% of the time. Considering all of the other factors a customer considers when making a purchase, getting bumped up into the 35% to 50% likelihood range of success is a huge statistical jump.
What this means for small businesses
Be proactive—talking to the customer before any of your competitors increases your chances of making the sale by up to 50%. This means a key part of your sales strategy should place a priority on contacting leads quickly.
4. 41% of sellers say calling is most effective
With the rise of social media as a major marketing tool, you might expect sellers and marketers to say Facebook or LinkedIn are their best-selling tools. Surprisingly, that is not the case. Forty-one percent of salespeople say their phone is still their most effective sales tool.
What this means for small businesses
Even in the age of digital communication, picking up the phone and calling leads and customers is still relevant. Ensure that cold calling is a part of your outreach strategy with prospective and current customers.
5. Only 58% of customers who submit web inquiries get follow-up calls
If you have a web inquiry form where customers input their phone numbers, you should be using those phone numbers and calling your leads. Surprisingly, many sales reps don’t. Forty-two percent of customers who give companies their phone numbers never get a callback. That’s a lot of missed leads. Plus, at that point, they’re not even cold calls anymore; they’re warm calls, which is all the more reason not to ignore them.
What this means for small businesses
Websites can collect a broad range of information and it can be hard to keep track of all the data coming from your site. Make “calling website leads” a priority in your sales strategy to avoid losing potential customers who were interested enough in your product to give you their phone number.
6. Pushy sales tactics deter 84% of buyers
Research shows buyers who have a negative cold caller experience say the sales agent did not:
- Avoid being pushy
- Listen to the prospect’s needs
- Research the prospect before calls
The only area in which dissatisfied customers thought salespeople were more helpful was proving product helpfulness. When it comes to being pushy, there is a 34% gap between salespeople’s assessment of their performance and customers’ feelings. The biggest gap is in listening to customers’ needs, with 83% of salespeople thinking they do this well and only 38% of customers agreeing.
What this means for small businesses
Make sure you’re not overly assertive or brash during a call and focus on listening to the prospect carefully for the greatest chance of fully understanding their needs and closing a sale. Consider using customer surveys to learn how your customers feel about your performance, and not just how you think you are doing.
7. 49% of buyers still prefer cold calling
Cold calling is still a popular and worthwhile approach for salespeople. Forty-nine percent of buyers prefer cold calls as the first point of contact. However, email takes the overall lead as the preferred first-contact method, with 80% of consumers preferring to be contacted by email and 78% of sellers contacting customers by email.
What this means for small businesses
There is a discrepancy between how customers prefer to be contacted and how customers respond when they are contacted in different methods. When you cold call customers, they may say they would have preferred to get an email instead. However, for the best results, you should keep cold calling potential customers.
8. 57% of organizations are embracing hybrid sales
One of the ways the pandemic has changed the face of marketing is the rise of the hybrid sales model. In this method, cold calling and video conferencing are combined with email marketing in a sales model sellers and buyers can access remotely.
HubSpot asked organizations what their sales model would look like in 2021. According to 57%, they would be using a hybrid model, while only 20% said that they would use an outside-only field model. Eleven percent said that they would use a remote, inside strategy.
What this means for small businesses
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, many things that were formerly considered good sales practices stopped being possible, and customers and salespeople adjusted to the requirements of the “new normal.” Going forward, it is important for small businesses to remain flexible and accommodate a sales model that will maximize results while staying safe.
9. The best talk-to-listen ratio is 55:45
Customers need to know the features of your product and why it will help them. Moreover, they also want to know that you’re listening to them and understand their needs. The newest data shows that the ideal talk-to-listen ratio for sales calls is 55:45. This cold calling statistic means that you should be talking 55% of the time and listening to your customer 45% of the time.
What this means for small businesses
Salespeople can’t set a timer to ensure they talk for exactly 55% of the time in every conversation. Instead, the most effective way to implement this information is to review past calls and look at the talk-to-listen ratio and see what adjustments can be made to ensure you are understanding your buyers.
Pro tip: You can use software with artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities like Gong.io to help analyze your call-to-listen ratio and reveal a wide range of insights of patterns of your sales conversations. Sign up for a free demo to learn more.
10. Salespeople spend 34% of their day selling
On average, salespeople only spend one-third of their day actually selling—making calls and talking to customers, whether on the phone or in person. The rest of the day is spent on administrative tasks, research, and professional development.
What this means for small businesses
Make sure the time you allot to selling is focused. Sales automation software helps automate administrative and non-sales tasks, allowing salespeople to spend more time focusing on what they do best—connecting with customers. While salespeople won’t be able to spend their whole day on sales, they can save time by leveraging tools that help take care of administrative tasks.
11. Sales representatives make about 45 calls per day
According to The Bridge Group, sales representatives make an average of 45 cold calls per day, with 5.1 quality conversations per day. Some industries require sales calls that necessitate more or less time with customers or need different levels of preparation and have a number of different factors to consider.
What this means for small businesses
A common goal in cold calling is to establish contact and generate leads. Since it takes six to eight contacts to turn a prospect into a lead, multiply your target number of leads six to eight times to get a rough estimate of how many calls you need to make daily to reach your goals. In addition, it is important to take note of your own personal conversion rate to fine-tune your work goals.
12. Successful calls take nearly 6 minutes
There is a striking difference between successful and unsuccessful cold calls—successful calls take a lot longer. According to Gong.io, unsuccessful calls last an average of three minutes and 14 seconds, while successful calls last an average of five minutes and 50 seconds. The longer you can keep a potential customer on the line, the more likely you are to have a successful call.
What this means for small businesses
This cold calling statistic can help you define your call goals. Given that only 34% of the average workday is spent actually selling, this call time estimate can help you plan how many calls to make per day, based on your own personal conversion rate.
13. Prospecting is the biggest challenge for 23% of professionals
Prospecting has changed since sales have gone predominantly virtual. A Yesware survey showed that the biggest challenge for 2021 for sales professionals is prospecting in a virtual setting, with 23% of respondents indicating that this was their greatest concern. Eighteen percent were most worried about gaining access to the right stakeholder, 11% with creating a targeted prospective survey, and another 11% with prospect qualification.
What this means for small business owners
COVID has changed our methods of finding prospects and leads. Prospecting in a virtual setting was the biggest challenge for salespeople in 2021, but challenges are also opportunities for growth. If small businesses can get ahead of the crowd with innovative lead generation strategies for online customers, they can use this challenge as an advantage.
14. Employers misunderstand 12% of essential sales rep qualities
Customers and managers value different traits in salespeople, which can mean the wrong people for the job are making cold sales calls. Forty-two percent of customers value active listening most, while only 26% of managers do. Other qualities, such as problem-solving and relationship building, are fairly close, but there is a massive gap in expectations in industry expertise and years of experience.
Customers valued industry expertise at 23% and years of experience at 25%. However, they did not rank high enough to show up on the managers’ lists of values. Meanwhile, managers valued persuasiveness at 22% and coachability at 23%, while customers did not mention these qualities at all. Naturally, customers aren’t looking for a persuasive salesperson. They talk with someone who is an expert and feel the sales rep has their best interests in mind.
What this means for small businesses
This data is important for maximizing your cold calling success rate because it gives you the information you need to hire for the qualities that matter most to customers. It also helps insure a good fit for your sales positions and reduces turnover when people are well-suited for their job roles.
15. Cold calls are 69% more successful on Wednesdays
Wednesday is the best day to call prospects, followed by Thursday, Tuesday, and Monday. According to cold calling statistics from CallHippo, Friday is the worst day to call because the conversation rate drops by nearly 70% compared to Wednesdays.
What this means for small businesses
Make your prospecting calls mid-week and save follow-ups for the end of the week for the greatest chance of success. Don’t try to establish a new business relationship when your customer is counting down the hours to the weekend, even if they do answer their phone.
16. Unknown calls go to voicemail 94% of the time
According to a 2021 study by Hiya, 94% of calls from unrecognized numbers go to voicemail. That number is going up: In 2014, 80% of cold calls went to voicemail. People are wary of answering the phone because of how often calls are spoofed, with scammers calling from what appear to be local numbers.
What this means for small businesses
You can still leave voicemails. Customers typically won’t answer the phone if they don’t know who is calling, but they may answer the next time if you leave a message and let them know who you are. Convince them in your voicemail that you are a real company and not a scam, and that you are offering something that would be worth picking up the phone for.
Check out our free cold calling templates that you can edit based on specific scenarios. This article will also help you learn how to write your own effective cold calling scripts, helping your team increase success rates.
17. 60% of customers want a call in the consideration stage
HubSpot identified three stages of buying in its cold calling statistics:
- Awareness stage: When customers are just beginning to be aware of a product
- Consideration stage: When they have narrowed down the possibilities they are interested in
- Decision stage: When the lead has decided what they want to buy
They found that the majority of customers want to talk to a sales rep during the consideration stage (60%). That is the stage when they are most likely to have questions a real human could answer more quickly than an internet search, such as specific things they are looking for in a product or service that determines whether they purchase one brand or another.
What this means for small businesses
Get your customers’ information when they are searching your website to compare products and make the sales call immediately. One way to get customer information at the consideration stage would be to offer a discount on their first purchase if they register and agree to receive a phone call.
18. 50% of prospects aren’t a good fit
This cold calling statistic shows that the biggest percentage of salespeople (32.8%) believe that 50% of their prospects are a good fit for what they offer. That means that the other half of the people they cold call are not a good fit and would not benefit from the product.
Sales isn’t just about convincing people to buy. It’s also about making sure people have a need for the product you’re offering. You might be able to make one sale to someone who will later go on to realize that your product doesn’t work for their needs at all. However, they will likely be a dissatisfied customer who could have a negative impact on your reputation.
What this means for small businesses
Recognizing that not everyone is a good fit for your product isn’t just realistic—it’s also a good sales strategy. Have your sales representatives assess customers for whether they are a good fit, and don’t attempt to convince people if there isn’t a good fit. You will convince your customers your business cares about them as individuals and takes their needs seriously.
Bottom Line
Even in light of digital sales strategies such as using email campaigns, social media, and text messages, buyers still want to speak person-to-person—especially for service issues and larger ticket purchases. Cold calling, if done properly, is an effective outreach method for beginner and experienced salespeople.
