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8 Mistakes You’re Making in Your Cold Call Pitches
As any entrepreneur will tell you, some of the hardest work you’ll ever do as a business leader or investor is finding your initial customers and partners. Cold calls can help you do this and ensure you whether tougher times down the road. If you want people to respond well to your unsolicited messages, cut these common blunders from your vocabulary.
1. Not recognizing the recipient’s influence on you
Virtually all partners, investors, or customers want to see that your decision to contact them isn’t random. They want to feel like they were chosen for a reason.
So let them know how their preferences or work is driving your own goals or vision. For example, you might note that an article you wrote was inspired by a guest speaker from their company. Don’t note generics that anybody and their brother could grab from the recipient’s LinkedIn profile or quick Google search. That is not personalization, and the recipient will be able to tell if all you did was grab surface-level data.
2. Selling a one-time product or service, not a partnership
What a business or buyer needs from you is going to shift over time. So although you absolutely need to present a clear value proposition where you show that you’re solving a problem the message recipient currently has…