Podcast episode
The Ultimate Cold Calling Q&A: 16 Questions to Book Your Next Meeting
30 Minutes to President's Club25 Nov 202538 min
Description
From Armand Farrokh and Nick Cegelski, the duo behind the 50,000-copy best-selling cold calling book, this episode breaks down the exact playbook top reps use to consistently book meetings. Learn the highest-converting openers, how to tailor context to any persona, the tactics they use to disarm prospects, and the triple-bypass method for getting past gatekeepers. You’ll also get strategies to avoid spam-tagging, boost connect rates, and keep momentum high during every dial block. Timestamps: 00:01 Current top cold call opener (Tailored Permission) 03:33 Adjusting your opener for CFOs and senior decision-makers 04:43 How to make prospects laugh & break telemarketer resistance 07:26 Triple Bypass: Getting past gatekeepers without sounding salesy 09:49 How much research to do before each cold call 12:12 Blind vs researched dialing: Which books more meetings 13:35 Handling “call me later” and “I’m too busy” objections 16:10 When to leave voicemails (and the voicemail that doubles replies) 17:15 Should you double dial? Smart tactic or spam trigger? 18:29 Tools to speed up dialing and increase conversations 19:10 How to boost cold call connect rates (4 proven tactics) 21:03 Getting accurate phone numbers using data waterfall 22:27 How to prevent no-shows after the meeting is booked 23:32 What to say when someone says “cold calling doesn’t work” 24:59 The fastest way to instantly improve your cold calls 26:22 How to stay confident during a cold call losing streak 27:22 Most memorable cold call stories (good and bad lessons) These Courses Will Get You to President’s Club 🏋 30MPC Training: 30mpc.com/training 👥 Leadership Course: https://bit.ly/4o8KtMT 📧 Cold Email Course: http://bit.ly/44K6jy3 ☎️ Cold Call Course: https://bit.ly/4jqQ4w2 🔮 Discovery Course: https://bit.ly/4cQYaM8 🛠️ Free Toolkits: http://bit.ly/4nZwvO5 Get More Tactics: Cold Calling Sucks (And That’s Why it Works) Join our weekly newsletter – https://hubs.li/Q02NJQ8p0 Things you can steal and use today – https://linktr.ee/30mpc_youtube
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a cold call. And we thought, all right, this book might do all right. It blew up and we've sold over 50,000 copies in a year. And so today we're going to tackle your questions that weren't answered in the book. All right, Nick, so let's start with number one. What is your current number one cold call opener? And is it still a PBO? Well, it's not a PBO. “It is a tailored permission opener.” There is a big difference between a generic permission based opener. Hey, Armand, I know you didn't expect me to call you. Do you mind if I get 27 seconds to tell you why I called? And a tailored permission opener where you lead with the trigger or context that prompted
If my rep can't answer that question, the deal has risk and I have something I can coach to. Now, we built a guide with our friends at Insightly CRM on how to run pipe reviews that surface real risk and get deals moving again. And you can get it for free at the link in the show notes. So a tailored permission opener actually starts with something about them. “The formula is trigger, own that it's a cold call and ask for permission.” And so that might sound like Armand picks up the phone and he goes, hello, and I'm going to go, Armand, I just finished reading the press release about the office that y'all are opening in Tacoma. I'm going to be honest. This is a cold call, but it is a well-researched one. And I'm wondering if I can get half a minute to share why that office opening prompted me to call you.
And you say, Nick, I know I totally cold called you out of the blue, but can I show you what this thing looks like at some point when I'm not cold calling you? And that's really the only question you have to prepare for. The real Q&A back and forth happens when they react to the pitch, aka objections. “So once they start to give us objections, now I can start to ask questions to reveal” the truth behind the objection, or to do a little bit of discovery so I can properly handle the objection. So one of my favorite places to do this is with competitors. So let's say for example, I was selling gym memberships. And Nick was like, I know I'm already at Planet Fitness. He seems like a Planet Fitness kind of guy. And I'm selling Equinox memberships.
to pick up. So overall, when you start parallel dialing, usually your connect rates will drop a little bit, but with some of their prioritization functionality, you can actually get that connect rate to hold while dialing like three or four times the number of people. “So you can like hit 300, 400 dials in a week instead of 200 on like the same amount of” time. So the next question is, do you have any tips for actually improving your connect rates? Yes, we do. In fact, I have four tips for improving your connect rate. Tip number one, generally you should be calling mobile and direct lines because those are going to have a higher answer rate than if you call the company line. Tip number two, follow the law of diminishing returns.
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